Living Walden Two

Living Walden Two by Hilke Kuhlmann, 245 pages

In 1948, then-obscure psychologist B F Skinner published his utopian novel Walden Two, which explored a fictional commune governed almost invisibly by a clique of psychologist-managers.  This was not intended as a mere intellectual exercise - Skinner saw such an arrangement as the only hope for global survival in the atomic age.  Although it attracted little attention at the time of its publication, the decades that followed would see a vast increase in both Skinner's reputation and general interest in communal living, leading to numerous attempts to start real communities modeled after the fictional Walden Two.


Living Walden Two is German sociologist Hilke Kuhlmann's study of some of these attempts, concentrating on one that survives to the present: Twin Oaks in Virginia.  Kuhlmann demonstrates considerable empathy in relating the genuine desire of her subjects to develop more humane ways of living without glossing over the fundamental, and often glaringly obvious, problems inherent in their approach.  The book is weaker when she discusses the community that perhaps came closest to success on Skinner's terms: Los Horcones in Mexico.  Conflicts apparently developed during Kuhlmann's time at the commune, cutting short her stay and leaving her analysis correspondingly shallower.

Altogether, a readable and relatable study of an interesting subset of North American communes, with some conclusions that involve broader issues in psychology and political theory.  Skinner imagined his Walden Two as, above all, an experiment, but the real world experiments he inspired do not seem to support his theories.