In a sense, there is already a parallel polis in many countries, including The Netherlands. It’s just that the people living in this parallel culture haven’t yet discovered each other.

A parallel polis is not an escapist fantasy of retreating to communes and gated communities. It’s about building horizontal, convivial relationships with one another, which over time can give rise to a prefigurative new order. In a parallel polis, people can start where they are – with their local circumstances and personal talents and shared needs – and begin do what needs to be done.

I draw inspiration and guidance from Václav Havel, the Czech playwright.  When he and other cultural dissidents in the 1970s faced a totalizing, repressive system impervious to change – in his case, the totalitarian Czech government – Havel had a counter-intuitive response.  He called for the development of a "parallel polis." A parallel polis is a community-created safe space in which people can mutually support each other, directly produce what they need, and build a kind of shadow society – outside of the machinery of the dominant political system.