Power and the Utopian Assumption

Abstract

Kathleen Kinkade's thoughts on power in the alternative community are based on eight years of communal living, including six years at Twin Oaks, Virginia. Her experience is unusual in that she has founded groups which are profoundly egalitarian in philosophy and conduct, but she is 20 years older than the average member of these communities, a fact which almost inevitably places her in leadership roles. "The trouble with my theories on power," she admits, "is that I have never had the opportunity to be powerless in my communities, so I don't know how good my social theories are." Ms. Kinkade is a founding member of Twin Oaks Community in Louisa, Virginia, a communal group founded in 1967 and based on the ideas set forth in B. F. Skinner's Walden Two. Her account of the early years at Twin Oaks is contained in A Walden Two Experiment, published by William Morrow & Co.