Ownership says: this is mine, I can do what I like with it. Stewardship says: this is in my care for a while, and I will hand it on better than I found it. The land will be legally owned, by a foundation or cooperative of the circle, because that is the only way to stop it being taken back or sold. But it will be run as stewardship.
In practice that means a few things. Decisions about the land are made for a horizon of decades, not seasons: plant the slow trees. The people who tend the land year-round are stewards, not landlords; they hold it for the circle. Every year the land should hold more life, more water and more soil than the year before, and that is measured and written down. And the legal form has a lock: the land cannot be sold for profit, or to anyone outside the purpose, by anyone, ever.
Related words
- Intentional communityA group of people who choose to live and work together around shared values and agreements, rather than by accident of geography.
- Regenerative landLand managed so that it gains life each year: more soil, more water held, more trees, more species, measured rather than claimed.
- RewildingDeliberately leaving parts of the land alone so that wild processes, and wild species, return on their own.
Join the circle