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are explicitly anti-growth – is an important first step. This allows for a broader view – seeing

community projects as the emergent products of broader social relations, rather than as a
blueprint that can be replicated elsewhere.

Second, studying ecovillages from outside
Global North countries helps to confront the
social and economic disparities between
different groups of ecovillage residents.
Critics of ecovillages point out that not
everyone can “opt out” of fast-paced, high-
waste urban lifestyles to pursue an idyllic

rural life. To a large extent, they’re right –
owning land, having some degree of financial
resources, and social connections to like-
minded folks are elemental components of Opening ceremony of a festival held at an
getting an ecovillage off the ground. In order ecological community in Veracruz, performed by
to understand the prospect of supporting local indigenous groups. Photo by author
sustainable communities, it is also necessary to
understand why certain actors are foreclosed from these movements.

These different versions of sustainability are particularly visible in Mexico, which has
become a popular destination for long-term tourists and migration of citizens from more
affluent countries. The emerging possibilities of working remotely or working while traveling

(i.e. “digital nomads”) has led to many moving to Mexico in search of building sustainable
places for a fraction of the price in their home country. Migrants (“expats”) from Europe,
Canada, and the United States often take advantage of the relatively lower costs,
particularly for property and labor, in order to construct and maintain eco-friendly homes
and communities abroad. These initiatives, however, reveal deep divides between who is able
to pursue more sustainable, communitarian livelihoods, and who is not. Expats that dream of
creating their own “sustainable paradise” in Mexico largely rely on these lower prices of
labor and goods that have resulted from decades of socioeconomic inequality and Mexico’s
implementation of increasingly neoliberal policies. These policies, such as the privatization of
previously communal held lands called ejidos, quite literally created the conditions by which

foreigners could even begin to think about purchasing land in Mexico in the first place.

In post-COVID times, these speculative ventures and visions of a sustainable future are
more important than ever. We would do well to listen to voices from the Global South, which
resist a “return to normalcy” without critical examination of what this means in practice
(“normal” for whom?). One of the ways academics and activists can do this is by looking at
the unique ways that alternative movements envision and construct sustainable futures. By
recognizing the diversity inherent in these approaches, we can begin to see the future as a
diverse patchwork of possible approaches, rather than a unilinear track.

Olea Morris is a PhD candidate in the Department of Environmental Science and Policy at Central European
University. Her research focuses on the production of environmental knowledge in alternative community and
agricultural movements, primarily in Mexico.

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