January 8, 8:16 PM

Cyberspace and
Sustainable Community

Tell it, Jerry!

words by Karyn Goldstein
photo by Donna Compton

    It's the night before the Be-In and I'm trying to write a background piece on Jerry Brown and I, being admittedly a political softy, am really lost. Jerry will be speaking at the 9th Annual Digital Be-In on Community, San Francisco and Cyberspace, I think to myself in my best possible newscaster voice. I turn to my latest and greatest information resource: the Internet.

     "We The People is a membership organization dedicated to political reform and social justice. Our commitment is to speak truth to power and work change - in ourselves and in our communities - through study, citizen action and local organizing." This is what is written at the top of Jerry Brown's We The People Web site (www.wtp.org). We The People is located in Oakland, California. We The People believes in reestablishing the idea of a democratic community. They believe in equality, the common good and promoting accountability through citizen participation. This is good. People always act a little more responsible when they are accountable for their actions. "It demands government be put back into the hands of the people." We The People believes in sustainable communities.

     Okay, sounds good, but what the heck is a sustainable community? "The United Nation's definition of sustainability is: A sustainable society meets the need of the present without sacrificing the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." Well, this is sounding better all the time. I read on. Jerry Brown has some ideas about San Francisco as a sustainable community. On the Web page there are some ideas on how to accomplish this. Lots of verbiage to sort through.

Where does cyberspace fit in to all this?

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