Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary, Second Edition,
Dorset & Baber publishers, gives us several definitions of
the word principle. The third and sixth seem well suited to defining
the term as we use it in permaculture.
prin'ci ple, n. [Fr. principe; L. principium, beginning.]
3. a fundamental truth, law, doctrine or motivating force, upon which all others are based.
6. an essential element, constituent or quality, especially one that produces a specific effect.
As used here, 'principle' is most related to the idea of a
'motivating force, a constituent or quality' of a design. From
the point-of-view of permaculture it is particularly relevant
that the principles be directly applicable to design, that they
provide specific guidance to our thinking and that design alternatives
or results can be evaluated against them. The point of having
principles is that they provide us with a framework for making
design decisions and they assist us in evaluation of design alternatives.
In the permaculture course we were presented with twelve principles.
Since then we have reviewed 'statements of principles' by Bill
Mollison and Reny Mia Slay, John Lyle, Sim Van der Ryn and Stuart
Cowan, Nancy Jack Todd and John Todd, the U.S. National Park Service
and Andropogon Associates. A review of a collective 64 'state-
ments of principles' from the course and by these authors resulted
in the distillation and consolidation of all
statement ideas into the 10 principles presented here.
The 10 Principles are: