A contribution by Heide Goettner-Abendroth to the Declaration #MATRIFUTURE - The International Movement for a Balanced, Re-mothered Future!
At the Social Level
At the social level this means escaping the increasing fragmentation of society – which drags human beings down into a state of separation and loneliness, and renders them sick and destructive.
Rather, it means developing structures that foster various types of affinity or intentional communities, such as communes, alliances of neighboring communities, and networks.
The matriarchal principle here is that such affinity groups are generally initiated, supported and led by women.
The determining criteria are the needs of women and children, who are the future of humanity. Men will be fully integrated in the new matri-clans, but according to a different value system, that is, one based on reciprocal care and love, rather than on power.
At the Economic Level
At the economic level,
further increase in large-scale industry, in expanding military, and in so-called “standard of living” would not be possible, considering the danger of complete destruction of the biosphere, of the life on earth.
Here the perspective of alternative, local and regional subsistence economy arises, for the subsistence perspective means economic independence of the people.
Subsistence entities engage in self-sufficient and independent activities in which quality of life takes precedence over quantity. This does not only mean doing local gardening and agriculture, but also fostering regional communication, arts, trade, and technology. Even producing high technology is possible on the regional level, if the monopolizing by the transnational corporations will be finished.
Regionalization of agriculture, trade, etc. for the benefit of women and their families or clans is a matriarchal principle, because they are the basis of human life on earth.
At the Level of Political Decision-Making
At the level of political decision-making, the matriarchal consensus principle is basic for a truly egalitarian society.
It can be practiced here and now, immediately and everywhere.
It is the inspiring stimulus for creating any matriarchal community.
It establishes a balance between women and men, and also between generations, as the elderly as well as the youth are able to have their say.
In addition, it is really the basis of democracy, as it manifests what formal democracies promise but fail to deliver.
At the Spiritual-Cultural Level
At the spiritual-cultural level, it is mandatory that all hierarchical religions with belief in transcendent divinities and claims of absolute thruth – which have deeply debased the earth, humanity, and especially women – must be rejected.
Rather, we are looking at a new sacralization of the world, consonant with the matriarchal perspective that the entire world is divine.
This leads to freely and creatively honoring and celebrating life and the visible world.
Regionalism
In a new matriarchal society, bigger is not necessarily better.
The smaller units of society, responsible for engendering person-to-person and transparent politics, are given preference.
They must not become so big that people cannot see through them, and cannot participate in their decisions, as is the case in so many of today’s governments and super powers.
But they must be big enough to safeguard their self-sufficiency by a subsistence economy, and the diversity of their handiwork, technologies and arts.
The ideal dimension is that of the region.
Regional borders are formed by the decisions of the people themselves who want to live together on the basis of common cultural and spiritual traditions; this avoids any war of culture or religion.
Culture and Spirituality at the Interregional Level
Regarding culture at the interregional level, spirituality again is the connecting power.
Matriarchal spirituality is not institutionalized and is thus free, but it is not arbitrary. It has a binding foundation for all humankind: Mother Earth and the flow of life.
The interregional associations between matriarchal regions are of a purely spiritual kind, and expressed symbolically by visits and festivals.
In this way a free, horizontal network of sister regions can be created, completely distinct from today’s centralist, hierarchal state structures.
In the age of modern communications technologies, these cultural and spiritual alliances are not limited to neighboring regions, but can link to other countries and even other continents.
In this way, interregional associations among matriarchal communities, towns and regions could arise worldwide.
Global Structures
To solve global problems, these steps from below must nevertheless be supplemented with more comprehensive structures.
National states no longer fit the bill: they are too big for humane, transparent political processes. At the same time, they are too small to solve global problems related to advanced destruction of the biosphere on earth.
Such a structure could be a Global Council, which will be formed by the two halves of a Women’s Global Council and a Men’s Global Council. Today, the U.N.O. tries to form such a global council, but fails to fulfill its ideals.
Members of the Women’s Global Council and the Men’s Global Council are always elected delegates from each region, and are responsible to their region; they have no power to make decisions independently of their region’s determinations. They moderate and coordinate the decisions of all regions of the world in precisely the same sense that a regional or local council coordinates the decisions of the matri-clans.
Distribution of National Wealth
An initial and fundamental challenge towards a MatriFuture is to dissolve the financial wealth of the national state, first to the regions, and in the regions to the for matriarchal subsistence communities, traditional or new ones.
Exactly half of this wealth, that is 50 %, must go to women of the communities, and the other half, that is 50 %, must go to the men of the communities, and not more, as it is common in patriarchy. In that way, each sex can develop their respective area of the society and region.
However, this money is not a paying for motherhood and women’s work, but a small reward for all what women had done for free through long periods of time. With the division of financial national wealth, women would probably establish infrastructures to fulfil social needs, with the likely result that communities, culture, and education would flourish, according to maternal values.
And it should start just now
for women’s communal and cultural projects, so that the MatriFuture could begin!
See for the International Academy HAGIA for Modern Matriarchal Studies:
free picture from unsplash (kent pilcher)