Bioregionalism

After learning about bioregionalism from Alexander Baretich (designer of the Cascadian flag and lifelong bioregionalist activist), then reading and listening to old tapes from Peter Berg and speaking with Judy Goldhoft of Planet Drum, I designed an ideological flag for bioregionalism in the same vein as other ideologies like the different varieties of anarchism. This flag is designed to be flown by anyone anywhere who supports bioregionalism.

The green represents the ecology, flora and fauna, on the "surface" of the biosphere. The blue represents water, the liquid life force of the biosphere. The brown represents the soil, dirt, and mantle, the foundation of the biosphere. The red represents human culture and the unique role and responsibility we play in the biosphere. The sun in the middle is the same star used in the Kurdistan flag, to inject some modern ideology into this flag, and to represent the synthesis of all these forces coming together.

I think it's worth mentioning that bioregionalism is not defined by the definition of "bioregion" used by the WWF, so looking up a map of "bioregions" is not the same as inhabiting a bioregion in a bioregional manner.

"There is a need for a cultural concept of a "bioregion." If the biosphere is the issue then how one lives in place (because places are the anatomical parts of the biosphere) becomes a primary consideration. Your head can be any place, but your feet have to be some place. Bioregion is a cultural concept, really, not a scientific concept. It should be up to the people to define a bioregion rather than having it come down from the institutional scientific elite. There should be a planetarian feel to it: that we will become reinhabitory people and we will begin redefining our locations in planetary terms for ourselves. The goal of reinhabitation in a bioregion would be to succeed at living in place, a future primitive planetarian mode."

- Peter Berg, Bioregion and Human Location, Spring 1983

These "bioregions of the world" style maps are an excellent starting point, but ultimately a bioregion is defined by people living in a bioregional manner. In the same way this flag is a starting point: a seed to plant, and to water it you must walk the land and learn how to live in a bioregional manner, and once you've done that you can design a flag for your own bioreigon.