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294 ANDRÁS TAKÁCS-SÁNTA The establishment of the New Koma Network is to be attributed at least as much to the changed social context, as to the systematic activity within the Microcommunity Program. Fairly unexpectedly, the discourse about the ecological crisis gained great momentum among the Hungarian public as well. In the past five years, it has remained on the agenda as a relatively weighty concern, though with varying intensity. Together with the — comparatively — active communication of the Microcommunity Program, this has inspired more and more communities (and nascent communities) to join the New Koma Network. The news bulletin of the Network, active as of the end of 2021, also tries to promote this expansion. Members of the Network The communities we primarily await in the New Koma Network are those which strive to live a complex ecological way of life, possibly acting at each of the three levels mentioned, instead of focusing on a single matter. Beyond that, the membership of the Network displays a fascinating diversity. There are scattered and eco-village communities, though the former are predominant. There are rural and urban members, more or less in equal proportion. Though the majority of the members were initiated in the second half of the 2010s, a few previously existing communities have also joined. The experiences of the latter are of great help for those who have recently entered this area. At the same time, our study tours and mapping efforts throughout the country have made it clear that there are hardly any local eco communities established prior to the mid2010s that would fit the New Koma Network. Finally, the diversity is also manifest in religiosity as well. Though the majority of the New Koma initiatives are not organized on religious grounds, they include an ecumenical (though mainly Catholic) Christian and two Krishna-conscious communities.’ The great majority of the New Koma Network communities are characterized by a firm core that includes the leaders (typically women) and two or three people who have assumed — this is no exaggeration — a prophetic role and who try to gather partners around them. This puts them to the test, as it is hard to find further committed and active people. However, not only functioning communities can join the Network but even individuals as well, those who are firmly determined to bring about a community and are already taking steps to this end. We try to help them with enhanced attention, because we have found that most ecocommunal initiatives die at the embryonic stage. To decrease this mortality rate, we initiated the Germinating program within the New Koma Network in 2022, to help inchoate communal undertakings. Our earlier community research also revealed (Takacs-Santa 2016a; 2017: chapter 7) that ecological local communities are usually initiated by graduates of universities or high-schools who are “outsiders” in a rural community. Such people mainly live around Budapest, in the agglomeration. Accordingly, the greater part of the current communities of the New Koma Network are situated around that area. At the same time, the poorest regions of the country are not represented in ’ — On the role of religion in the functioning of local eco-communities, see Takacs-Sdnta 2017: chapter 7.
