Tertiary Societal Needs

• Recreation / Nature

Although it is arguable that greenspace is a secondary or even primary human need, our history tends to show us that cities and societies in general do not prioritize nature. It is still important, however, and the lack of space for parks, recreational activities (such as festivals, marathons or concerts), and oxygen-producing plants creates problems that are not easily measurable or fixable. Going stir-crazy is a good example of one problem.

• Shopping / Trade

Consumerism goes hand-in-hand with capitalism, which is the form of trade principle most western societies embrace today. That being said, when designing commercial districts it is beneficial to combine recreational space and nature with a nearby or connected shopping or trade space. The same goes for distribution centers.

• Transportation

In terms of societies, transportation is a vital tertiary need. The idea of transportation also includes the principles of traffic flow and dedicated use, which means that buses are not an effective catch-all of transportation. Highways are built with cars in mind, not large trucks, not buses, and not with any other mass-transit option. In other words, societies should be designed with dedicated passenger railways, streetcars, subways, light rail, monorail, etc. as their primary methods of transportation second only to walking. When an urban area is designed with walking in mind, it flourishes.

• Communication

Societal intercommunication means that no ideas are isolated from the rest of the world. Basically, this means that societies should include internet infrastructures and other telecommunications into the basic layouts in order for people to stay connected over long distances.

• Healthcare

Societies without healthcare tend to wane after a few years of high rates of death, injury, and illness. Like many things in any society, healthcare needs to be decentralized and simple to access. It also needs effective principles regarding how to treat people who cannot afford treatment, how to handle malpractice and price gouging, and how to make innovations to current inefficient treatments.

• Safety and Regulation

Theoretically, a society left totally without police enforcement will work just as well as a society with heavy police enforcement. Crime and injustice is contextually high in both scenarios. Laws regarding safety and regulation should be designed to help guide society towards minimizing the detriments of individual bad choices. Without enforcement, however, many laws will fall unheeded. Logically, it is good to have an effective system of enforcement and rehabilitation, but these systems should be highly reserved. Passive methods of enforcement are desirable.

• Company

This idea stems from people's inherent shyness and loneliness when living in a large, dense group of people. The best way of preventing or alleviating this interesting side-effect is to entice individuals into scenarios where they need to interact with others (in similar mindsets) to achieve some goal. Playing games or building something together, for example, are ways for people to find good company without being alienated by societal expectations.

• Religion

Another time-proven method of allowing people to find good company is religion. Indeed, it's one of religion's main purposes. From a societal standpoint, religion is necessary in the sense that it is a unifying force with a positive message. In other words, religion allows people to organize around weak points within a society in order to try and fill or fix them. Albeit, most religions have trouble with solving issues without creating more, but it is important to be an inclusive society, not an exclusive one.

• Education

Arguably the most progressive method of creating effective societies is the openness and inundation of information. Effective education programs mean unbiased teaching of a wide variety of (optional) subjects to people of all ages. Teachers should need to be certified that they know about what they want to teach, and then paid accordingly with a number of enticing compensation options. Young people should also be enticed, not forced, to attend schools which focus on various subjects. Societal placement should be a priority. In other words, it is in the entire society's best interest to find out what young people want to learn, and what they want to do with their lives. When they don't know, the best option is to simply have many available paths for them to try.

• Creative Outlets / The Arts

Akin to recreation and exercise, creative outlets allow people to relax through a form of work. Dance, music, painting, sculpting, writing, singing, etc. - these actions need to be backed by the whole of society and, just like education, need to be options for everyone to try. Without art, society quickly devolves and begins to phase out other societal needs, such as recreation and nature and entertainment, and other needs begin to suffer because of it.

• Risk

A substantial number of people in any society need to feel the adrenaline of risk. Without the ability to take risks and potentially reap rewards from said risk, these people begin to bite the hands that feed them. Good examples can be found in teen behavior. Doing risky things often involves breaking laws, making people upset, and generally being a nuisance to society. Like many other things, however, embracing this predictable behavior eventually results in quelling it. Casinos offer people the risk of losing all their money in return for possible gaining much more, and areas with casinos see drastic increases in crime. Having these institutions, however, centralizes the problem to a containable district instead of allowing it to rise up (unregulated and untaxed) in less governable areas.