Tomorrow starts off a whole New Year! For the last thirty-five years, New Year's Eve has had a special significance for me, since my daughter, Sonya, was born on December 31st. But New Year's Eve has always been a favorite. It hasn't been New Year's "resolutions" that have preoccupied me so much, but "scheduling" myself for the next yearly cycle upcoming. When I was on the Board of Supervisors, I allocated my time according to a weekly Board meeting cycle, and then an annual budget cycle, and I like the kind of stability provided by such a regular calendar.

In fact, I think I welcome the stability of regular "cycles" of activity as a kind of buffer against the ultimate reality of human life, which is the opposite of stable. Human beings have been given the tremendous and terrible gift of freedom, which lets us, at any time, begin the world anew.

Hannah Arendt's wonderful book, On Revolution, discusses this in the context of political theory. The regular cycles we depend upon are, themselves, a kind of "revolution," meaning a stable cycle and recurring pattern. But the word "revolution" has come to mean, in the political context, something quite different. It means the activity by which we break out of the cycles that have bound us in the past, and begin a new chapter in our political experience. New Year's Day is the symbol of that ever-present opportunity to begin anew.

For KUSP, this is Gary Patton.

More Information

Hannah Arendt
http://www.iep.utm.edu/a/arendt.htm

On Revolution (Online Edition, Penguin Classics) –
http://books.google.com/books?id=C8GoV3xOV
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Happy New Year to everyone! As I said yesterday, New Year's Eve and New Year's Day have a particular meaning for me, since I see, in this annual "contract renewal time,* an opportunity to consider whether or not we should begin something new.

Hannah Arendt's powerful book, On Revolution, reminds us of the wonderful possibilities revealed by the political thinking that inspired the American Revolution. Arendt notes that the premise of the American Revolution was that ordinary men and women, acting together, could create a whole new reality, by taking action within the sphere of politics.

The dollar bill memorializes this amazing revelation, as we see the unfinished pyramid topped by a numinous eye, representing the vision of things seen but not yet made real, with the slogan "Novus Ordo Seclorum" underneath: a "New Order in the World." If you check this out, you'll find that the "Great Seal" of the United States has the Eagle with its arrows on the "back," and the visionary eye and pyramid on the topside.

Frequent listeners know that we have one of our best opportunities to create a "New Order in the World" by changing the policies that govern the future growth and development of our communities. Land use policies are important, and this first week of this New Year, I may wax even more philosophical than usual, as I discuss them.

* Some time ago, long before the Loma Prieta earthquake destroyed the Pacific Garden Mall in downtown Santa Cruz, a woman in colorful attire, called "Cosmic Lady," was frequently found dancing to the music of the band "Warmth," at the Cooper House, and telling everyone who would listen that it was "contract renewal time." Let me, here, remember her fondly, and by this reference reiterate her very well-taken advisory.

For KUSP, this is Gary Patton.

More Information

Hannah Arendt
http://www.iep.utm.edu/a/arendt.htm

On Revolution (Online Edition, Penguin Classics)
http://books.google.com/books?id=C8GoV3xOV
bIC&dq=on+revolution+hannah+arendt&pg=PP1
&ots=JLebKxch1P&sig=_JJnrMsx2qQATYXoO501
uNNfhNY&hl=en&prev=http://www.google.com/
search?client=safari&rls=en&q=on+revolution,+
hannah+arendt&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sa=X&oi=
print&ct=title&cad=one-book-with-thumbnail#PPP1,M1

The Planning and Conservation League is holding its annual Environmental Legislative Symposium on January 12th, in Sacramento. Its title is: "State of Change: How Californians Can Change The World." A Santa Cruz County resident, finding out about the event, wrote me with the following comment:

As a long time worrier about the fate of our human species I've wanted to see a more precise use of language. I consider "the world" to be … something we human beings have created. We change it every day, along with our cultural inheritance….

I have often said that we live in two different "worlds," simultaneously, and the "world" we most immediately inhabit is in fact a human-created world, as my correspondent has just described it. In this human-created world, anything is possible, and because we have the gift of freedom, we are not bound by our past choices, but can decide again, and start anew.

The opportunity we have to create a new reality for ourselves and our children is clearly revealed in the realm of land use policy. If we have invested hundreds of billions of dollars creating a world totally dependent on hydrocarbon fuels and the automobile, it is not inevitable that we must continue to perpetuate this paradigm. We can, in fact, in this New Year (and anytime) start charting a new course, making new and different investments, and building a different reality.

For KUSP, this is Gary Patton.

More Information

PCL Website
http://www.pcl.org

Symposium Program and Registration
http://www.pcl.org/projects/2008symposium/index.html

I provide a written transcript of each one of these Land Use Reports on the KUSP website. If you hunt down the transcript for today's Land Use Report you'll find that it's titled, "Regulation is Freedom."

That's an intentionally Orwellian title, but I'm actually quite serious. Human beings are "free." We are not governed by external laws (like physical objects are subject to the law of gravity). We can choose what we want to do. We make choices individually, and we can make them together, as a community.

When we make choices as a community, we act "politically," and the process is called "self-government." It's really quite simple. First, there must be debate and discussion. Second, out of that debate and discussion must come a "decision." Finally, as we actually do what we have decided, we govern ourselves.

We govern ourselves by conforming our actual behavior to the written down instructions that represent the "decision" that came out of the political debate and discussion that begins the process of self-government.

First come politics; then law; then government. That's the order, and if our "regulations" are seen as a kind of "law" (which they are), then our legal enactments represent our freely made community choice about what kind of future we want. "Regulation is freedom."

The next time someone tells you that land use regulations are illegitimate, remember that.

For KUSP, this is Gary Patton.

This week, in the absence of much local government activity, I've fallen back on an explication of the philosophical framework underlying my claim that our land use regulations are the way that we, as a community, can change the future.

Human beings are not physical objects, subject to external laws. The laws we choose to obey or disregard are laws we make ourselves, and the process of self-government is of truly supreme importance, since all of the realities we create come, ultimately, from community and individual choice.

As Bob Dylan puts it, "we live in a political world." For those familiar with the song, you'll remember that the lyrics do not suggest much nobility in "politics," but it doesn't have to be that way. Our politics can reflect the best of the community, not the worst, but that won't happen if we don't get involved ourselves.

I prepare and present these Land Use Reports because my personal experience has convinced me that our involvement in politics, at the local, state, and national level can profoundly change the world. Listening to the Land Use Report, though, is no substitute for personal engagement. Maybe listeners would like to make a New Year's resolution that they'll get engaged, themselves, this year, in some land use related issue. If we live in a "political world," then let's start making our politics reflect our best hopes and dreams, and deepest aspirations!

For KUSP, this is Gary Patton.

More Information

Bob Dylan, "Political World"
http://bobdylan.com/songs/political.html