Bioregional Social Contracts
Description
Michael Haupt:
"A BSC is not just another governance framework—it's a practical pathway for communities to reclaim agency while honoring ecological boundaries.
A BSC recognizes that humans have naturally organized around watersheds and ecological systems, and provides the social architecture to make this organization explicit and intentional. We know that it's already emerging organically through climate adaptation efforts, local food movements, and watershed restoration projects.
The beauty of a Bioregional Social Contract is its practicality: it works with existing human tendencies rather than against them. When people are connected to place, understand their watershed's carrying capacity, and have real agency in decisions, stewardship becomes natural rather than forced.
A BSC isn't about adding new layers of governance—it's about recognizing and formalizing the relationships we already have with our places and each other. The metacrisis tells us what's broken; the Bioregional Social Contract shows us how to rebuild."
Example
- Cascadia has a BSC