Intelligent natural resource management, cutting-edge technology and science as the bases of a new society

In the time when economies worldwide are facing crises, when the exploitation of natural resources is causing natural disasters and wars, and when violence, unemployment, poverty, deprivation and other problems in society are increasing, the Venus Project offers a vision for a new social order. It stands for a classless society based on the idea that all global sources are common-pool resources, which means they are available to all. Contrary to communism or socialism, also based on the system of common ownership of property, Fresco and Meadows' vision of society does not include a financial system as one of the key sources of problems in our society.

Jacque Fresco, industrial designer, innovator, social engineer, and creator of the Venus Project, started thinking about ways to change the world years ago. Along with Roxanne Meadows he is developing the idea and design for homes of the future in his 21-acre research centre in Venus, Florida, which gave its name to the project. Their vision is spreading. 50 million people across the globe know the project, many of them support it, while some are already involved in concrete projects as part of the Zeitgeist movement.

A new society as proposed by Fresco is based on science, technology and intelligent use of natural resources, although science today is underrated due to various examples of misuse and application with harmful purpose. His vision of a society sees all people living in prosperity as natural resources, available in sufficient volumes for all, become public good, and in a cultural environment that does not allow for children to be raised in a way to become greedy, violent, full of hate, or to exhibit any kind of counterproductive behaviour. Only in such society can science and technology as available today be of benefit to people, and offer a chance to create a different society as we know it. The technological design of the living environment is fundamentally different to the existing one. Due to its modular design the living environment can be replicated anywhere in the world; elements may be added or taken away arbitrary and all latest alternative energy sources may be included in it.

Jacque Fresco calls himself a social engineer, a man changing the society. "To achieve this I have to be technical. I am working on methods to create prefabricated homes and solve the problems we face." Roxanne Meadows emphasizes the concrete steps Fresco takes to deal with social changes: "He worked with people to find a way to change them, in order to find a way to change the world. In Florida he joined the Ku Klux Klan, which, in turn, broke up a month and a half later. He joined the White Citizens Council, another organisation full or prejudice and hatred of all foreigners, and disintegrated it in a month's time. He worked with drug and alcohol addicts and changed them in the sense that they focused on socially beneficial causes."

In 35 years since its beginnings the project has been given no funding. Fresco and Meadows finance everything themselves, from the construction of a pilot building at the estate in Florida to film shooting and editing. "Only after Zeitgeist was released donations have started coming in. One of the reasons to go on this world tour was to raise funds to be able to support research in the Venus centre," Roxanne Meadows said.

For Jacque Fresco, intelligent natural resource management to the benefit of all people is one of the key phrases. In his opinion this requires research, which provides a way to plan further measures. "If you live in, let's say, France, you go online and check how many sources are available in the country, how much arable land, etc. With this information you can determine the number of residential units, hospitals, etc., that need to be built. Without a research you can only guess. The system is therefore not based on opinions, but on research, which allows you to check every step you make. When I design a city, for instance, I make a report about its benefits, while another group conducts a research about its drawbacks and limitations. If you build a dyke to prevent flooding you want to know what will happen in the area in the next 10 years. You can find this out with the help of a computer simulation. Computers can perform much faster operations that human."

All this seems utopian, especially the idea of natural resource management to the benefit of all people. "The rich will not give up their means, but the system is falling apart. Automotive industry, banks and financial management companies in the USA are going to ruin, even though US taxpayers have payed for their rescue. It will not work, because we have no products to compete with other countries. This is why we are on our way to collapse again," Meadows said with certainty. "Usually a war is a solution as a chance for people to make a lot of money. This time people are falling deeper and deeper in debt, they are losing their jobs, they can't find a way out. The rich who are losing their money are starting to look for different solutions." In the Netherlands, the next stop for Fresco and Meadows on their tour after Greece, they will introduce their idea to more than 300 directors within the framework of the Earth Charter Initiative.

A recent report of the Global Peace Index shows that the global cost of violence is USD 1.8 billion each year. If all this money was spent on building a different society, one without violence, poverty, social stratification, pollution and unsustainable exploitation of natural resources, the world would be closer to implementing a system like the one proposed by Fresco, Meadows and numerous advocates of their incentives and ideas.