permanent agriculture to permanent culture is perhaps the point at which we can catch a glimpse of a process of differentiation that finds, in Transition, one of its possible continuations. Rob Hopkins, who has been (and still is) intimately involved with the unfolding of Transition since its beginnings, is a practitioner of permaculture. He first tried to apply it to facilitate a process of energy descent in response to peak oil and climate change in Kinsale, Ireland, where he used to live prior to moving to Totnes. It was in Totnes, however, that this form of permacultural intervention got a distinctive name as Transition.
This passage, where permaculture forks into something different (and yet genetically related to permaculture itself) through the initiation of Transition, is one that is often overlooked in the scholarly literature on Transition. Permaculture tends, in fact, to be presented as one of the ‘key components’ of Transition, following the approach of breaking something continuous into constitutive parts, as though it were the result of their juxtaposition. So it is, for instance, that Polk suggests that the Transition approach ‘uses permaculture as its central premise’.8 Hardt, after acknowledging that Transition is endowed with certain distinctive properties that are specific to its style of development, subsequently falls into the analytical way of seeing and dissects Transition into formative components, among which a central place is occupied by permaculture.9 The stress on permaculture is one that also emerges strongly in the early literature on Transition by Hopkins, albeit with a dwindling focus as one moves beyond the Handbook. So it is, for instance, that permaculture is acknowledged as one of the main philosophical foundations of the Transition concept in the Handbook.10 It becomes a ‘tool’ (among many) for Transition in the Companion,11 and loses a dedicated reference in The Power of Just Doing Stuff.12 Far from implying that permaculture is irrelevant to Transition, my intention here is to stress that the moving of Transition is related yet at the same time different from – and not reducible to – permaculture, not even by saying that permaculture is a ‘component’. This can mislead us into expecting to find permaculture inside Transition in exactly the same way as it exists for its own sake; insulating it from the bubbling tapestry of other trajectories it binds with (and alongside which it consequently achieves a fit) in the moving of Transition.
One initial step in the direction suggested here can be taken by dwelling on the distinguishing aspects between permaculture and Transition, as acknowledged by Hopkins himself:
Permaculture is a movement which offers, as redefined by Holmgren, the design system and philosophical underpinning of a post-peak society, yet at the same time, according to Stewart, it is often guilty of maintaining a distance from that society.13
For Hopkins, the moving of Transition possesses a quality of inclusiveness that is somehow missed in the permacultural approach when it comes to shooting for more than food-growing projects. There is, in other words, a sense in which permaculture is perhaps less inclusive than it purports to be, possibly due to the knowledge gap between a ‘trained’ permaculturist and someone who has not yet approached the knowledge base of the subject. For example, by virtue of being articulated through twelve principles and three ethical guidelines, permaculture is harder to explain and introduce to a complete layperson than Transition would be. This is something that Hopkins already picks up on in the Handbook.14 There is a knowledge barrier to becoming conversant in permaculture – by virtue of the means through which the narration of permaculture is articulated – that makes it somewhat harder for it to involve complete laypersons, unless these are convened specifically with the purpose of learning about permaculture.15 Permaculture is not, in other words, something as easy to ‘stumble upon’ as Transition is, despite the great resonance between the two in terms of approach.
In fact, I would like to submit that Transition could be regarded as a reflexive application of permacultural methods for the purpose of devising an approach that makes permaculture accessible to a wider audience.16 By this I mean that, on the one hand, Transition resonates with the permacultural practice of careful prior observation insofar as it stays tuned to the subtleties of interaction (such as knowledge differentials, information overload and the non-permaculture focused nature of gatherings in which Transition may be introduced) in settings where the moving of Transition expresses itself by making a difference. On the other hand, it is this very application of a careful observational approach that prompts a departure from the ‘standard’ presentation format of permaculture, morphing into something different within Transition, so as to enable wider inclusion. This is perhaps why Hopkins also refers to Transition as a ‘Trojan horse’ for permaculture, underlining both the relatedness as well as the difference of Transition vis-à-vis permaculture.17 As Hopkins suggests: ‘permaculture is a concept that is very hard to explain to the person in the pub who asks you what it means, if you don’t have a flip-chart and pens and fifteen minutes in which to draw pictures of chickens and ponds and green-houses. [...] Yet somehow the concept of Transition is easier to explain, allowing more time for other conversations’.18 He goes on to observe that the existence of permaculture in a set of material practices and bodies of knowledge that present some kind of barrier to ‘mainstream’ access risks confining it to a long-term vision of survivalism, opposing the initiated few to the many laypeople. This would however require – to protect permacultural oases in a post-peak oil world – for those tending to them to be willing to defend such oases from hordes of others excluded from the movement of permaculture (which would contradict the very ethos of compassion and care that informs permaculture in the first place).19 Including as many people as possible from the start is therefore a way out of this ethical impasse, so as to ensure the sustainability of a permacultural approach to collective dwelling even in a post-peak oil future.20
Hopkins’s work can subsequently appear as a response to such concern, trying to emancipate permaculture from its more institutionalised aspects and the risk of closure and recast it in a manner that allows it to mix in the life of a range of other situations, beyond the specialised ‘Introduction to Permaculture’ weekend, for example. The inception of the moving of Transition, if we try to find our way into it from permaculture, seems to be located precisely at this fork in the road. A fork where it parts from some of the attachments that are characteristic of permaculture proper, and experiments with alternative modes for drawing in more trajectories and possibilities. And this search gives shape to the moving of Transition, which begins developing precisely around the quality of lowering the threshold for engagement. This is why it then makes sense, after acknowledging the ancestral bloodline with permaculture, for Hopkins to go on to outline ‘six principles that [...] define what is distinctive about the Transition concept’.21 It therefore appears equally – if not more – interesting, when seeing-in-relation Transition and permaculture, to focus not merely on what they have in common, but on where they part. This inquiry becomes an occasion to find what is distinctive in the moving of Transition, such as a tension towards inclusivity that appears to differentiate it from permaculture.
By these means, it is possible for the continuity between Transition and permaculture to shine through, alongside the simultaneous differentiation of Transition’s own style of moving. The concern that initiated this distinction – about avoiding that permaculture close in on itself – would, once woven through Transition, mix and creolise with a number of additional trajectories of action so as to confront Transition with a horizon of its own, distinct from that of permaculture.22 In sum, this varying degree of openness to other trajectories opens a fork in the road, a fork where Transition and permaculture can be set in relation to one another in the process of articulating their reciprocal difference. The import of this differentiation can already be grasped by witnessing the distinctive fit that gardening and food growing – practices that are equally central to the life of permaculture – find within Transition initiatives. It is to these that I now turn to.
Gardening in Transition
Gardens are one of the most iconic ‘things’ that can be observed across Transition initiatives; they are everywhere.23 Food growing projects within Transition take the most varied of forms. In my own experience in Totnes, I have come across tree planting, the upkeep of communal gardens and orchards and the development of community-supported agriculture schemes.24 Moving across the spectrum of food growing projects
