Ecotopia A Novel About Ecology, People And Politics In 1999

The impressive, environmentally benign energy, homebuilding & transportation technology described by Callenbach in Ecotopia was based on research findings published in such journals as Scientific American. The author's story was woven using the fiber of technologies, lifestyles, folkways & attitudes that were being reflected from real-life experience in the pages of, for example, the Whole Earth Catalog & its successor CoEvolution Quarterly, as well as being depicted in newspaper stories, novels & films. The main ideas for Ecotopian values & practices were based on actual experimentation taking place in the American West. To draw an example, the fictional Crick School was based upon Pinel School, an alternative school located outside Martinez, CA, & attended by Callenbach's son. The author’s Ecotopian concept doesn't reject high technology, but members of his fictional society prefer to demonstrate a conscious selectivity of technology, so that not only human health & sanity might be preserved, but also social & ecological well being. Interestingly, Callenbach’s story anticipated the development & liberal usage of videoconferencing. During the 1970s when Ecotopia was written & published “many prominent counterculture & new left thinkers decried the consumption & overabundance that they perceived as characteristic of post-WWII America”. The citizens of Ecotopia shared a common aim: they were looking for a balance between themselves & nature. They were “literally sick of bad air, chemicalized food & lunatic advertising. They turned to politics because it was finally the only route to self-preservation.” In the mid-20th century as “firms grew in size & complexity citizens needed to know the market would still serve the interests for those it claimed to exist”. Ecotopia targets the fact that many people did not feel the market & government were serving them in the way they wanted them to. This book was “a protest against consumerism & materialism, among other aspects of American life”.