EDE France 2021 | Écovillage Sainte Camelle

We had to wait 2021, against all odds, to see the very first French EDE. How come it was only the 1st? Why never before? Well, we know why. FHF. This is why making an EDE in France was a tough challenge to take on. And yes, we did it!

• The group of participants we had for this EDE was so diverse that no clan emerged. It is quite usual that people gather by affinity in small groups but here, the entire group stuck together no matter what. The glue was really strong. Some personalities were more extraverted of course, but with a real care for other’s presence and voice. To the extent to become a real counter-power: if we made any facilitation mistake, if we failed to propose in the most careful way and if it felt like we were imposing anything, we would be immediately in trouble. We knew it came from a childhood school trauma for these people, who were very open about it. It was an amazing journey to navigate the facilitation process with such awareness. This context led to something incredible during week two: a very quiet voice, Pauline, protested against the fact that they had agreed to community agreements on the first day but now, she said, they had to review them by themselves and check if it reflects who they really are. We, as EDE crew members, opened a space in the program for them to take the time to do it. They used Sociometry, a tool taught to them before, to assess the agreements. They counted in percentage who agreed or not for each topic. They even discussed about the structure of the program and finally approved it. It was a very beautiful real-life example of self-empowerment.

• One of the most iconic moment of this EDE was the Derdian roleplay in which they completely immersed themselves for three hours. The participants playing the indigenous Derdians went in the forest and created another set of social rules to add to the existing 10 social rules, making it even harder for the engineers to understand them. Howeve