READERS GUIDE

Questions and Topics for Discussion

1. The book opens with the acronym TINA — “There Is No Alternative” — and promises to dethrone it.  Before reading, how fully did you accept TINA? Has the book changed your sense of what is actually  possible?
   
   
   
2. The author proposes three core principles of an ecocivilization: mutually beneficial symbiosis, fractal  flourishing, and the human evolutionary niche. In your own words, what does each of these mean — and which resonates most with you personally? 
   
   
   
3. The book argues that our civilization’s crises are not accidental bugs but structural features — designed into the system from the outset. Did this framing shift anything in how you understand  news stories, economic debates, or political choices?
   
   
   
4. Ecocivilization is described not as a blueprint but as a framework — a set of core principles with an  invitation for co-creation. What would you add to it? What feels incomplete or underdeveloped?
   
   
   
5. The book draws on eudaimonia — Aristotle’s concept of flourishing through living according to one’s  highest nature — as distinct from hedonic pleasure or consumerism. What does eudaimonia look  like in your own life? What conditions in our current society make it harder to achieve?
   
   
   
6. The Doughnut model asks us to imagine an economy that ensures everyone’s basic needs are met  while remaining within planetary limits. Do you find this a more compelling goal than GDP growth?  What would need to change to make it politically mainstream?
   
   
   
7. Costa Rica is cited as one of the closest real-world examples of living within the Doughnut — high  wellbeing with a relatively small ecological footprint. What can we actually learn from Costa Rica?  What are the limits of that example?
   
   
   
8. Where do you see “islands of coherence” — in your own community, profession, or life — that feel  like living hints of an ecocivilization?
   
   
   
9. Glenn Albrecht coined “solastalgia” for the grief of watching one’s home environment destroyed, and “Symbiocene” for the era of mutual flourishing that could replace the Anthropocene. How do these words affect you? Is there something powerful about naming what we have lost — and what we are working toward?
   
   
   
10. The book weaves together critiques of the present with concrete visions of alternatives. Did you find  the critical sections energizing or overwhelming? How did you hold both?