Resilient Communities

If you aren't familiar with John Robb you need to go check him out.

www.resilientcommunities.com

What he is talking about is EXACTLY what the Citadel needs to be. Local production of food, water and energy. A community based effort to not be dependent on large, fragile, remote systems that you have no control over.

Interestingly enough, one of his other primary recommendations is that a resilient community needs to have local manufacturing of products that can be sold nationally or internationally. That means the business based on that product is not dependent on the local economy. It's especially good if the product is custom, semi-custom or unique in some way so as to make it a high value added item. One of his examples is a custom bicycle shop that ships its products all over the world. Sound anything like a recently started firearms company to you?

As I understand it, he got his start analyzing 4th Generation Warfare, especially the ability of non State actors to disrupt large systems with minimal effort. He became well know enough to be invited to present his information to places like the Pentagon and CIA. His analysis lead to the next logical step - strategies to counter those capabilities. The strategy that he came up with is decentralization - Resilient Communities.

Even if the Citadel is not for you, go check him out. It's well worth your time.

VJ