Rank and Revolution: Social Permaculture in Historical Context
https://justpaste.it/sp-r2
This companion reflection expands on the themes introduced in the article "Rank, Privilege & Social Permaculture". It places the concept of 'rank' — as explored in the documentary Learning from Sparrows — within a broader historical and philosophical landscape, and considers how this awareness may guide future societal shifts.
What is Rank — And What is It Not?
In social permaculture, “rank” is not a military title, though the word echoes that origin.
It refers to something far more subtle and omnipresent:
“The sum of one’s privileges and influence in a given context — whether visible or invisible, earned or inherited, acknowledged or not.”
It can be earned or unearned. It shifts depending on the setting. It can be cultural, linguistic, gendered, financial, educational, emotional, or even spiritual. And it often goes unspoken — particularly by those who hold more of it.
The practice of rank awareness invites us to reflect:
- How does power show up in a group?
- Who is seen, heard, deferred to?
- How can those with higher rank learn to listen, and those with lower rank be supported to lead?
This is not about guilt. It is about responsibility, relational clarity, and trust.
🌿 Just as permaculture observes relationships in ecosystems, social permaculture observes relationships in human systems.
Rank, Enlightenment, and the Seeds of Revolution
We’ve been here before — in different forms.
In 18th-century France, “rank” was explicit: nobility, clergy, and everyone else.
These roles were written into law and sustained by belief systems.
But the Enlightenment (through minds like Rousseau, Voltaire, Diderot) began to whisper a different logic:
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Power should not rest on birth.
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Authority must be justified.
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All people are capable of reason.
These were revolutionary thoughts — and they primed the ground for what followed in 1789.
But even in those days, change was carried by thinkers, writers, and underground networks of printers and salons. The feeling of injustice had to be matched with language to describe it.
So it is today. Rank awareness — like Enlightenment values once were — is still unfamiliar terrain for many. And yet, it may form part of the mental infrastructure for the next turn of history.
From Violent Uprising to Inner Cultivation
Today, revolutions rarely arrive with guillotines.
What we are learning instead — from the margins, in projects like Learning from Sparrows — is that:
Lasting change grows from relation, not rupture.
We are composting systems of domination not by toppling them violently, but by transforming the way we speak, decide, share, and lead.
In this light, rank becomes not a chain to break — but a lens to understand:
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Why some voices dominate unconsciously
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Why trust is unevenly distributed
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Why facilitation, empathy, and listening are revolutionary skills
And crucially: how privilege can be used responsibly, in service of others, without shame.
Can the Idea of Rank Reach the Wider Public?
There’s a real risk that “rank,” like “intersectionality” or “decolonisation,” becomes trapped in academic or activist circles — inaccessible to the people who live its realities every day.
But this concept is not esoteric.
A migrant struggling with paperwork feels rank.
A teenager excluded from decisions feels rank.
An elder dismissed in a meeting feels rank.
The work ahead is not just theoretical — it’s pedagogical and cultural.
We need:
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Exercises to explore power in groups
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Facilitators who name difference without shame
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Language that reveals — not obscures — shared experience
The French Revolution needed pamphlets.
This one might need podcasts, memes, gatherings, and permaculture courses.
A Different Kind of Revolution
In Learning from Sparrows, young people clean riverbanks, share meals, reflect on trauma, and build ritual sculptures from waste. Nothing grand. But everything intimate. The documentary becomes a quiet manual for:
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Power shared softly
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Decisions made through dialogue
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Art emerging from healing
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Awareness woven into practice
This is revolution by presence, not posturing.
Rank is not only about power — it’s about presence.
The next revolution may be felt before it is fought.
Return to the main article:
🔗 Rank, Privilege & Social Permaculture
More reading:
Why Polanyi and Not Marx? - Richard Sandbrook
He stressed the "economistic fallacy"—reducing all social life to economic mechanisms.
He posited that human behavior is also driven by social obligations, status, religion, and other non-economic forces—not merely class interest or „false consciousness“
https://sandbroo.faculty.politics.utoronto.ca/why-polanyi-and-not-marx/
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Learning from Sparrows - Social Permaculture at the Edge [this page]
Social Permaculture - Index: https://justpaste.it/pcspi