[austinsharp]

Seems like the key shared characteristic of these examples are small communities where people care about each other. As you say, it works at smaller scales. But free rider problems are a lot tougher in a community of millions or more.

[drekipus]

I live in one of those communities (eco village in Australia) and all it takes is one old haggard lady to reduce the workforce to nothing, as no one wants to put up with her abuse.

I think one thing people keep forgetting is that all these problems have already been solved for hundreds and thousands of years. You will never reduce inequality, abuse, pain, suffering. It's much better to contribute and improve what we already have rather than to rip it out and try "yet another variation of the same utopia that we've all been thinking about".

Build towards it, not "start again "