The Author

Dieter Duhm, born 1942 in Berlin, is an art historian and psychoanalyst and has a doctorate in sociology. He is the author of "Angst im Kapitalismus" (Fear in Capitalism) (1972), "Synthese der Wissenschaft" (Synthesis of Science) (1979), "Towards a New Culture" (1982), "Eros Unredeemed" (1991) and "Political Texts for a Non-violent Earth" (1992), and co-founder of the Healing Biotope 1 Tamera and the Institute for Global Peacework in Portugal.

In 1967 he became active in the Marxist left and was one of the intellectual leaders of the student movement. During that time, Dieter Duhm was already combining the ideas behind the political revolution and those related to the liberation of the individual. After the publication of his bestseller "Fear in Capitalism", he received many offers of professorial chairs, but declined them in order to prepare his own peace project.

From 1975 onwards he distanced himself publicly from leftist dogmatism and moved towards a more thorough, human alternative. "The anti-imperialist struggle and the attempts within this to develop new forms of community and real socialism failed because of human conflicts. Without building up a human basis that can support this load, the continuation of such political work no longer seems useful." (Dieter Duhm) While he was preparing his peace project, he visited many other initiatives, including the 'Friedrichshof' project set up by the Austrian 'action-artist' Otto Mühl, from whom Duhm parted company in 1979 because of unsolved conceptual conflicts.

After these "learning and wandering years", he and 40 other participants began work on the "Bauhütte" project (named after the guild of architects and craftsmen whose works included the great Gothic cathedrals). The theme of the experiment was "Founding a Community in Our Times" and embraced all issues relating to the origin, meaning and aim of human existence on Planet Earth. From this work, the participants sketched the outlines of a new possibility for existence that included the concepts of 'liberated love', 'spiritual ecology' and 'resonance technology'. The network MEIGA was established, with the aim of linking peace work to the establishment of new lifestyles and to create places where people could co-habit non-violently with all other creatures. An intensive co-operation developed between Dieter Duhm and the theologian Sabine Lichtenfels, which continues to this day. Together they founded in 1995 the cultural center Tamera, in Portugal, where the first Healing Biotope is in development.

The idea of the Healing Biotope is to realize a functioning model for human community and for non-violent co-operation between humans and Nature, with all her creatures. A group of about 50 people began work in 1995 on an almost undeveloped 350 acre site, setting up the "Mirja School for Peace", the "Institute for Global Peace Work" (IGP) and the Political Ashram, where future peace workers are being trained. The book "The Sacred Matrix" includes a description of the main subjects included in this training.

Dieter Duhm has been working for more than 30 years towards his goal of creating an effective forum for a global peace initiative that will be a match for the destructive forces of capitalistic globalization.