Successionism is the idea that social change follows a pattern comparable to succession in ecology.
In nature, when a fire or flood clears a landscape, the first life to return isn't the old forest. It's a variety of fast-growing, hardy species that stabilize the soil and make the ground habitable again. Those early communities determine the conditions for everything that follows.
Social ruptures work much the same way. After a disturbance—economic collapse, disaster, institutional failure—the first meaningful response is rarely top-down. It's local communities organizing themselves to meet immediate needs. Sharing food. Watching each other's kids. Patching each other's roofs. The cooperative habits formed in that period don't always fade when stability returns. Sometimes they stick, growing into institutions that carry on their initial momentum and shape local life for decades, if not centuries.
We're living through a season of disturbances. Isolation is up. Wages are stagnant. Public services are thinning. Ecosystems are degrading. The question is, what grows in the aftermath?
The Successionist is my attempt at an answer. Essays, poems, short stories. Practical crafts and workshop project instructions. Recipes for community gatherings, food relief, or maybe just for yourself. Useful things for making your corner of the world a little more resilient, whatever step you're at.