Where to begin, you wonder.  How do we become guardians?  How do we serve as guardians?  Here are some possibilities, a set of steps on the path to identifying what you want to protect, creating a council of guardians, and taking actions as a guardian and council.

You can become an individual guardian by choosing (or being chosen) to guard some aspect of the commons that you want to pass on to future generations.  You may already be part of a group like a bird-watching organization, an anti-poverty NGO or a river-keepers group.  You are well on the way to having the skills and insights to serve as a guardian of the birds or water or poor children.  But it is likely that you have discovered that protecting one aspect of the world is not enough, the rest of the web of life is fraying all around you.

It may also be that the long-range thinking necessary for guardians of the future is new.  I know that it was for me, even though I’ve been an environmentalist for 25 years.  Guardianship offers the long view as well as a very different way of making decisions.  It not only grounds those decisions in our moral imagination but it invites us to take precautionary action.  In the past most decisions about the commons and public health have been made reactively, as matters of science and not ethics, with a short record of the past, and no vision of the future. 

Most of the things that must be passed on to future generations are part of a larger web of nature, economics, architecture and culture.  Accordingly, it is quite difficult for guardians to act alone or in a single-issue organization.  Poverty and the environment loop back into each other.  Toxic chemicals, biodiversity and global warming are often linked in curious ways.  The most wonderful aspects of our culture -- the town historic district or a quirky, well-loved local business or a state park-- are threatened by the same things that threaten clean air and water.  So it is crucial to make common cause with other guardians who share a commitment to passing on an inheritance of beauty and wholeness to future generations. 

One way to join with other guardians is in the form of a council of guardians.  The council is non-hierarchical and seeks the wisdom of every voice.  It is a way of collecting information, looking for patterns in the information, and identifying wise actions that will increase the chance of the long-term survival and well-being of the community commons.

Here is a set of steps that you can take to become a guardian, take action to protect your subject, form the council and work collaboratively.

A PATH TO GUARDIANSHIP

     A. Issuing the Call to Serve

Issue a call to others to join you for a conversation and visioning exercise.  This is a conversation about the elements of your community that you do want to pass on to future generations and those that you don’t want to pass on to future generations. Invite people who desire to become guardians to join you.

Gather at the public library, a church or similar place.

Hold a conversation about things in your community that are valuable, loved, beautiful and that you want to hand on to future generations.  Think broadly about individual species, historic buildings, community traditions, children’s health, specific places or ecosystems.  For example, I want to see the Frank Lloyd Wright houses in the town where I grew up passed on as well as the flickers and foxes that share my backyard.  I also want clean air for the kids across the street and a clean creek that flows down the hill from my house.  I particularly want to see future generations have a healthy food system with access to heirloom seeds and animals.

Discuss those things that you do not want future generations to inherit.  In my case I do not want to pass on poverty and income inequality.  Nor do I want to pass on polluted rivers and lakes.

List the things that the group describes and see if anyone wishes to adopt one of those things as its guardian.  If there are any elements that are not adopted but are crucial for the future beings wholeness, send out an announcement to the community with a job description for that guardian.  A guardian may already exist as part of another group either as a staff person or as a volunteer.  But they may not have thought in terms of working for the long term future well-being of their protectorate or of joining with others across sectors and issues. 

     B. The Work of the Guardian

Set your intention to serve as a guardian of some bit of the world with the goal of passing it on to future generations.

First and foremost, pay attention to your subject.  Get to know as much as you can about the topic.

Collect information about your subject in a systematic way. What are the indicators of health for your subject? Find a way of reporting your information to your council of guardians. 

Set up a schedule for monitoring your subject.  Some things may need to be monitored daily others weekly, monthly or quarterly.

Assess any threats to your subject. 

Determine points of intervention.  Are there places you can intervene as a private citizen or in government or business?

What other guardian may have information or access that you need?  (If your protectorate is a bird, is there a guardian of the wetlands or the forests that may be an ally guardian?)

Report at regular intervals to your council on the status of your subject.
See if patterns emerge from all the guardians’ information.

Identify appropriate actions and take them.

     C. The Work of the Council: Mechanics

Choose or designate one person who can collect and aggregate the information.  This may be a different person than the one who runs the meeting.  The person who is collecting the information might/should have skills in mapping, graphing and organizing data so that the patterns can emerge.

Set regular meeting times for the council – once a month or once every six weeks so guardians can report on the status of their subject and turn in any information. 

Keep good records of the stories and the information. Make it available to the wider community.  This will also become a record for future generations so they can know what you were doing on their behalf.

Delve into decision-making tools like the precautionary principle.

Vision. Plan. Act.

     D. The Evolution of the Council: Meaning, Initiation, and Mentoring

Honor guardianship as sacred work.  As you find your way into your full stature as a guardian and as a member of a wise council, the spiritual dimension of this work will become clearer.  This may manifest itself in dreams, stories, art or other individual or communal expressions.

The council might draft a covenant with future generations.

Hold ceremonies of commitment for those who choose to be guardians.  Perhaps ask them to bring some symbol of their commitment and have them sign the covenant. Welcome them into the council of guardians.

Perhaps hold a retreat for guardians.  The deep ecologist, Joanna Macy, has created exercises and spiritual practices for people who wish to become or serve as guardians of future generations.

Create training, mentoring and partnering programs for those that wish to become guardians of future generations.

 Remember that it is not all up to you.  But you can make a difference.  You have a sacred right and obligation to make that difference on behalf of generations to come.

Give thanks.

Carolyn Raffensperger
Science and Environmental Health Network
January 2008