Environmentalist thought and ideology Books

Book SynopsisA journey through Cambodia with the simple and romantic ambition to find the folkloric spirit trees, the powerful connecting force between man and nature, Ken Finn's travels turned out to be anything but simple. Back-wearing motos, immobilizing gastric assaults, unexpected road blocks, and monkish processions all contributed to the journey, but most dramatically, instead of enriching forests, destruction was found: the black market timber trade. A new voice was found as Ken followed the trees on their journey to the furniture factories of Vietnam and subsequently a house somewhere on the North Circular, London. The book chronicles his trip not just through Southeast Asia but the inner transition from traveler to activist. It charts the unlocking of a conscience and the discovery of a new sensitivity and passion showing that it is not a major shift in behavior to save the destruction and corruption of the planet and that it is important to care.

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Book SynopsisFor more than a decade Mikhail Gorbachev has been engaged in working to protect the earth and its inhabitants via the organization he founded in 1992, Green Cross International. In an age when ecological crises, poverty and military conflicts are humanity's chief challenges, Gorbachev urges us to stop regarding these problems in isolation. The man who changed the destiny of Russia, Europe and the world is now calling for a global perestroika (reform) of the twenty-first century. Based on many years' experience in international politics, Gorbachev appeals for urgent action based on a broad vision, including a strengthening of the UN and reforms to the World Bank, the World Trade Organization and the International Monetary Fund. To complement the Declaration on Human Rights and the Charter of the UN he has co-authored the remarkable Earth Charter that is based on four key principles: Respect and Care for the Community of Life; Ecological Integrity; Social and Economic Justice; and Democracy, Nonviolence, and Peace. "Manifesto for the Earth" is a courageous and thought-provoking work by a respected elder statesman. In a partisan and polar world, this is a 'manifesto' that does not compromise its integrity to political, ideological or national sympathies.

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Book SynopsisEconomists insist that recovery is at hand, yet unemployment remains high, real estate values continue to drop, and governments stagger under record deficits. "The End of Growth" proposes a startling diagnosis: humanity has reached a fundamental turning point in its economic history. The expansionary trajectory of industrial civilization is colliding with non-negotiable, natural limits. Richard Heinberg's latest landmark work goes to the heart of the ongoing financial crisis, explaining how and why it occurred, and what we must do to avert the worst potential outcomes. Written in an engaging, highly readable style, it shows why growth is being blocked by three factors: Resource depletion, Environmental impacts, and Crushing levels of debt. These converging limits will force us to re-evaluate cherished economic theories, and to reinvent money and commerce. "The End of Growth" describes what policy makers, communities and families can do to build a new economy that operates within Earth's budget of energy and resources. We can thrive during the transition if we set goals that promote human and environmental well-being, rather than continuing to pursue the now-unattainable prize of ever-expanding Gross Domestic Product.Trade ReviewRead this book and have the light switched on! - Caroline Lucas, MPTable of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction: The New Normal Why Is Growth Ending? The End of Growth Should Come As no Surprise Why Is Growth So Important? But Isn't Growth normal? The Simple Math of Compounded Growth. The Peak Oil Scenario From Scary Theory to Scarier Reality Bursting Bubbles What Comes After Growth? A Guide to the Book 1. The Great Balloon Race Economic History in Ten Minutes Economics for the Hurried 20th-Century Economics Business Cycles, Interest Rates, and Central Banks Mad Money I Owe You 2. The Sound of Air Escaping Houses of Cards Setting the Stage: 1970 to 2001 Shadow Banks and the Housing Bubble What Goes Up The Mother of All Manias Limits to Debt All Loaned Up and nowhere to Go Stimulus Duds, Bailout Blanks Actions by Other nations and Their Central Banks After All the Arrows have Flown Deflation or Inflation? The Bridge to nowhere 3. Earth's Limits: Why Growth Won't Return Oil Other Energy Sources How Markets May Respond to Resource Scarcity: The Goldilocks Syndrome Water Food Metals and Other Minerals Climate Change, Pollution, Accidents, Environmental Decline, and natural Disasters 4. Won't Innovation, Substitution, and Efficiency Keep Us Growing? Substitutes Forever Energy Efficiency to the Rescue Business Development: The Cavalry's on the Way Moore's or Murphy's Law? Specialization and Globalization: Genies at Our Command 5. Shrinking Pie: Competition and Relative Growth in a Finite World The China Bubble Currency Wars Post-Growth Geopolitics Population Stress: Old vs. Young on a Full Planet The End of "Development"? The Post-Growth Struggle Between Rich and Poor 6. Managing Contraction, Redefining Progress The Default Scenario Haircuts for All...or Free Money? Post-Growth Money Post-Growth Economics Gross national Happiness Our Problems Are Resolvable In Principle 7. Life After Growth Setting Priorities Transition Towns Common Security Clubs Putting the new Economy on the Map What Might a Sustainable Society Look Like? Perspective Notes Index About the Author

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Book SynopsisIn autumn 2006 an unnerving phenomenon hit the United States: honeybees were mysteriously disappearing from hives across the nation, with beekeepers reporting losses of between 30 and 90 per cent of their entire colonies. The problem soon spread to parts of Europe and even Asia, earning the name Colony Collapse Disorder. To this day nobody is absolutely sure why it is happening and what the exact causes are. However, in 1923 Rudolf Steiner, a scientist, philosopher and social innovator, predicted that bees would die out within 100 years if they were to be reproduced using only artificial methods. Startlingly, and worryingly, his prediction appears to be coming true. "Queen of The Sun: What Are the Bees Telling Us?" is a companion book to the critically-acclaimed film of the same name. Compiled by the film's director Taggart Siegel, it makes a profound examination of the global bee crisis through the eyes of biodynamic and organic beekeepers, scientists, farmers, philosophers and poets. Revealing the mysterious world of the beehive and the complex social community of bees, the book unveils millennia of beekeeping, highlighting our historic and sacred relationship with bees, and how this is being compromised by highly-mechanized and intensive agro-industrial practices. The bees are messengers and their disappearance is a resounding wake-up call for humanity! With full colour, stunning photography throughout, this engaging, alarming but ultimately uplifting anthology begins with an account of how Siegel's film came to be made. It continues with a wealth of articles, interviews and poems that offer unique philosophical and spiritual insights. Besides investigating many contributory causes of Colony Collapse Disorder, the book offers remedies as well as hope for the future. "Queen of the Sun" features contributions from Carol Ann Duffy, Taggart Siegel, Jon Betz, David Heaf, Gunther Hauk, Horst Kornberger, Jennifer Kornberger, Jacqueline Freeman, Johannas Wirz, Kerry Grefig, Michael Thiele, Raj Patel, Vandana Shiva, Jeffery Smith and Matthew Barton. These compelling voices signal a growing movement striving to found a culture fully in balance with nature.Table of ContentsForeword, Heidi Hermann Virgil's Bees, Carol Ann Duffy Introduction: How We Came to Make the Film, Taggart Siegel and Jon Betz PART ONE: THE BEAUTY OF BEES Moving the Bees, Jacqueline Freeman Bee Crisis - World Crisis, Horst Kornberger The Miracles of Honey, Kerry Grefig Golden Threads and the Golden Fleece, Johannes Wirz Drones: the Holiest of Bees, Jacqueline Freeman Preserving the Integrity of the Super organism: Individual and Social Immunity , David Heaf Is the Queen Still Royal?, Gunther Hauk PART TWO: BEES AND US: THE CRISIS Earth Poem, Jacqueline Freeman The Future Born from Crisis, Gunther Hauk How Are Genetically Engineered Crops Affecting Honeybees?, Interview with Jeffrey Smith Pesticides, GMOs and the War Against Biodiversity, Dr. Vandana Shiva The Web of Being, Interview with Vandana Shiva The Food Crisis and the Connection with Bees, Interview with Raj Patel PART THREE: FOR LOVE OF THE BEE The Beehive, Jennifer Kornberger Bees and the Human Heart, Matthew Barton The 'Bien': the Single Being of the Honeybee Colony, Michael Thiele Swarm Song, Jacqueline Freeman Notes/references About the contributors Picture Credits

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Book SynopsisThe global emergencies facing the inhabitants of our planet - climate change, biodiversity meltdown, ocean acidification, overfishing, land degradation and more - are symptoms of a common problem: the world is full. Humanity has already exceeded several planetary boundaries. The situation is without precedent and its manifestations are numerous. Ethics for a Full World argues that our dominant culture's anthropocentrism - our human-focused thinking - is an underlying cause of the world's problems, threatening life as we know it. The blights that endanger our planet are experienced by many today, particularly those who care about other species, as deeply personal tragedies. So why are we not acting to save the world? Some say that humans won't do anything until we feel the repercussions ourselves - but by then it would be too late. This book takes an uncompromising view on our culture, our democracy and us as human beings, and examines why it is so difficult to save the world from ourselves.In a globalized world, the most urgent issues are the ones that exhibit tipping points, as they are the ones that it may become too late to fix. Burkey argues that non-anthropocentric ethics and the people who hold them, could be key to turning the tide.In a cry for meaningful and effective engagement, he proposes a concrete first step to connect concerned individuals. This is a book for people who want to be part of the solution, and who aren't fooled by the feeble attempts for change that have been made so far.Trade Review'One of the shortest, sharpest, clearest and most compelling descriptions of the causes and cures of our environmental bankruptcy that I have ever read.' - Lloyd Timberlake, author of Environmental Politics for the 21st Century; 'A cure for narrow-mindedness, this provocative book should be required reading for politicians - and those who vote for them.' - Brian Czech, President, Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy, author of Supply Shock: Economic Growth at the Crossroads; 'A fine, concise book which should enlarge the discussion on what in my view is the most important need of humanity, an "Ethics for a Full World".' - Paul Ehrlich, Bing Professor of Population Studies Emeritus and President of the Center for Conservation Biology, Stanford UniversityTable of ContentsPreface - Ethics For A Full World - Why Are We Not Acting To Save The World? - We Need A New Ethic - A Different Ethic - OnTheTragic - Afterword: Can We Save The World? - Notes

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Book SynopsisMost people believe that they know what it means to be ''green''. But do they? This book explores what it means to live a ''green'' life for an individual human, and what it means for the human species to be a ''green'' species. The conclusion is a provocative one - that at the level of an individual human being ''green'' is about the possession of a particular attitude to life and the universe, whilst at the level of the human species being ''green'' is about the sustainability of the biosphere. This may sound like an obvious conclusion to reach, but it entails that high levels of human resource use and the development of increasingly complex human technologies are ''green'' actions which are necessary for sustainability. So, if you believe that being ''green'' is about minimising human impacts/minimising human resource use then prepare to have your beliefs challenged.

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Book SynopsisThe Mess What kind of trouble is our species and our planet in? What's likely to happen next? How can we think creatively about and understand the interconnected problems (climate, health, energy, governance, economy, etc.) that we face without getting overwhelmed by their complexity and uncertainty? How can we get ready for whatever is coming next? What can we do practically, at local, national and international level, in business and in the community? What sort of help does resilience offer? How can we design resilience? What happens when we do? As we pass the 7 billion mark, we are currently using the resources of about 11/2 Earths to support our collective lifestyle. But we only have one Earth. How can we design and vision one-planet living? Whether you help to run a country, a corporation, an NGO, a public service, a city, a school or a family - these are difficult questions. Particularly difficult when we can't even agree, for example, whether the climate is changing, whether we should build more nuclear power stations or close the ones we've got, and whether the free market offers the best hope or no hope at all for feeding and watering a population of 10 billion. Which is why, rather than face our problems, we too often bury our heads in the sand and pretend nothing is happening. The World System Model and IFF World Game: Working closely with the internationally-renowned International Futures Forum (IFF), futurist Tony Hodgson has developed, tried, tested and fine-tuned a model (The World System Model) and a practical application (The IFF World Game) that have already helped many different groups to ask these questions and generate their own answers. This book describes and explains The World System Model. The model offers the clearest way yet of examining and understanding the interconnected problems we face - and of formulating creative and transformative ways of approaching those problems. This book also explains how to make the model immediately accessible - in the form of The IFF World Game - to any group (school governors, city councillors, health service managers, concerned citizens, boards of directors, UN High Commission). It uses Case Studies to show how it has already been used in eight different situations from a national economics research council to a city school. Ready for Anything offers a clear and honest look at the state of the world today. It introduces The World System Model as a new and holistic way to gain an understanding our particular predicament - and The IFF World Game as a quick and effective way of involving others in the exercise. It goes on to examine the kind of resilient and adaptive solutions that can be most helpful to us - whether they are applied at the level of the school, the city or the Earth. Since so many of us (both human and other beings) have to live on this planet together, it sets out our best hope yet of finding sustainable ways of 'one-planet living'. Best of all, it helps ensure that we keep our heads out of the sand.Table of ContentsChapter 1, The Global Predicament, explains clearly and unemotively the resources currently available to us vs the amounts we are using each year. It outlines resource boundaries and looks at the assumptions we base our planning on (including those that are no longer valid). The conclusion: we need about 11/2 Earths to support the world population and its requirements at 2011 levels. This highlights the need to find ways to live on the resources of just one planet - one-planet living. Two main changes are proposed: 1) realise the folly of short-term, single-issue, quick fixes; 2) shift our thinking away from fragmenting things so as to make them easy (analysis) towards integrating them so as to make them real (synthesis). The need for an integrative approach becomes clearer in Chapter 2. We must increasingly expect major disruptions (whether financial, political, social, geological, medical or climatic) to occur simultaneously. Because the impact of synchronous crises is so huge, we must also look at how we respond as human beings. Three types of response are characterised, the most helpful being the 'transformational response'. Having considered the severity and complexity of the challenges we face, Chapter 3 looks at The Opportunity in the Challenge. Just possibly, the crises we face will weaken our old, dysfunctional habits and ways of living sufficiently to enable radically new and more effective ways to emerge. These approaches need to be generated through our collective intelligence, not through the heroic acts of outstanding individuals. This leads us to The World System Model in Chapter 4. The Model is a clear and memorable way of looking at all this in a way that keeps it together in our minds, helps us talk to others about it, and helps focus us on what really matters in generating positive ideas for the future. Chapter 5, The Twelve Nodes, explains the circular diagram (right), which is the main icon for The Model. It explores the twelve key issues and positions them as the nodes of sustainable living. Each node is described - and some of the main trends summarised - in terms of recent research. Now the book's attention switches from the Model to how we can apply it in practice. Chapter 6, From World System to World Game, introduces a way of getting groups of people to participate in using the Model. The game format challenges participants to co-operate to develop ideas about getting 'ready for anything' in their area. In particular, it invites awareness of how things are interconnected, whether the focus is on a community, a business, a public policy area, or a whole country/region. To explain The IFF World Game, Tony Hodgson gives examples of where it has been tried. Chapter 7 has examples of The Game being used by an intentional community in Scotland, by another group of concerned city residents, and by a group in San Francisco considering how they would run the USA. The chapter ends with a project where pupils from a London school and their family groups played a version of the game called '21st Century Hopscotch'. Chapter 8, Strategy and Policy Development, describes how the model was used to help generate an innovative public health strategy and a separate example is given of a design group exploring how their Mediterranean island community could regenerate itself and build in greater sustainability. In Chapter 9 read how a group of professors and senior researchers at a leading Indian economics institute used The IFF World Game to critique and develop their research strategy to contribute to 'rapid, inclusive, sustainable growth in India over the coming decade'. Whether playing The World Game or using The World System Model as a strategy method, the approach needs care. Chapter 10, Creative Facilitation to Engage the World System, analyses three levels of facilitation capability, corresponding to the level of difficulty being addressed. Here, the process is related to action learning and several key thinking skills are also described. Chapter 11, A Platform for Planetary Learning, takes us back to basics. We face a deluge of information in different areas of research into planetary sustainability and world governance. But the danger, in terms of survival, is that the noise makes the signals too hard to read. Experience also tells us that we are slow to learn. The World System Model can provide a framework for reading the 'weak signals' and compiling crucial information in a joined-up way. This chapter also leads us into considering 'futures' - How can we identify possible futures? How can we recognise when our responses to problems are locking us into the very patterns that got us into the mess in the first place? How can we envision a better future? The book presents IFF's three horizon model as a way of getting to grips with these questions. Finally, Tony Hodgson stresses that the huge scale and complexity of the challenges we face should not be an excuse to duck them. Chapter 12, Designing Resilience, affirms that we can create a sustainable form of one-planet living. This is, in fact, an exciting and energising task. But he ends with a warning that, if we simply improve our ability to 'bounce back' to normal after a crisis, we will keep facing more crises. We need to get smarter and wiser about learning to 'bounce beyond' to a truly sustainable world.

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Book SynopsisA train stops on the tracks in the middle of the night and a lone woman steps out, following a call from deep in the forest. In these six richly imagined short stories, Andrea Lundgren explores a liminal space where the town meets the wilderness and human consciousness meets something more animalistic. From foxes to blue whales to angels, the creatures that roam through these stories spark a desire for something more in their human counterparts: a longing for transformation. Whether dealing with familial tensions, romantic troubles, or a crisis of faith, their human anguish is explored with psychological depth and poetic insight in the earthy, evocative world of Lundgren’s northern borderlands.Trade Review‘A magical realist universe where anything can happen and not much can be explained.’ Vi Laaser; ‘Mesmeric...These are fascinating, haunting stories that stay with the reader.’ Alex Fleming, Swedish Book Review; 'Magical realism and environmental poetry spiced with elements of horror in the spirit of Jon Ajvide Lindqvist.' göteborgs-postenTable of ContentsThe Bird That Cries in the Night, The Cat, How Things Come to Seem, The Father Hole, The Girlfriend, On the Nature of Angels

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Book SynopsisWhy, with absolutely no idea what Brexit actually meant, did the UK vote for Brexit?Why, rather than vote for the best-qualified candidate ever to stand as US President, did voters opt for a reality TV star with no political experience?In both cases, the winning side promised change and offered hope. They told a story voters longed to hear. And in the absence of greater, more unifying narratives, then true or not, voters plumped for the best story available.Once upon a time our society was rich in stories. They brought us together and helped us to understand the world and ourselves. We called them myths. Today, we have a myth gap – a vacuum that Alex Evans argues powerfully and persuasively is both dangerous and an opportunity. In this time of global crisis and transition– mass migration, inequality, resource scarcity, and climate change - It is stories, rather than facts and pie-charts,that will animate us and bring us together. It is by finding new myths, those that speak to us of renewal and restoration, that we will navigate our way to a better future. Drawing on his first-hand experience as a political adviser within British government and at the United Nations, and examining the history of climate change campaigning and recent contests such as Brexit and the US presidential election, Alex Evans explores: *how tomorrow’s activists are using narratives for change, * how modern stories have been used and abused, * where we might find the right myths that will take us forwardTrade ReviewVery short, very sharp -- Bruce Clark * Economist *Pertinent… Evans is an attractive and persuasive writer … his book will strike many chords’ -- Allan Massie * Scotsman *An important book about the need to bring inspiring narratives back to the heart of progressive politics ... This has traction because it has truth, literally as well as metaphorically. * New Scientist *A really fascinating contribution to answering the question: how do we find new myths to live by. -- Dr Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of CanterburyEveryone should read this. * Tim Smit *

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Book SynopsisForest gardens are much in the news as an exemplary form of resilient, sustainable, small-scale agriculture and plenty has been written about them already. But little has been written about the role of those who 'look after' them. A forest garden is edible, fertile, abundant and beautiful because it functions as an ecosystem. The forest gardener is an integral part of this ecosystem - which raises the question of what exactly the forest gardener should be trying to do. This book answers that question. At the heart of a forest garden is the unique relationship between the garden and the gardener. The 'garden of equal delights' after which this book is named is Anni Kelsey's forest garden high on a wet and windy Welsh hillside. Rejecting control and a regimen of planned interventions in favour of a more intimate, knowing and connected relationship with her garden, Anni describes how she learned to garden as an intrinsic - and equal - part of the ecosystem. She uses her years of experience to formulate and explain in very practical terms a set of principles that other forest gardeners can follow in their own preferred way. So this is a challenging and inspiring story for experienced, new and would-be forest gardeners and for anyone with a love of nature and a longing to engage with it on a deeper level. A forest garden is a different garden which needs to be gardened differently by a different gardener.Trade ReviewThis is a book about how to be a forest gardener. It is not a 'how to' garden book. The emphasis is on being and becoming, rather than doing. Anni shows us that forest gardening is a different type of gardening from the horticultural norm; one which requires a different type of gardener. Her book shows how the garden and gardener can grow together in a process of co-creativity in which an abundant ecosystem emerges. The job of the forest gardener, suggests Anni, is largely one of learning to keep out of the way; to sit on ones hands. To watch, and wait, and learn from the garden about how it wants to grow. The gardener may then make gentle, informed interventions - a nudge here, a suggestion there - without being wedded to the outcome. But this isn't necessarily as easy as it sounds; it takes practice. By telling the story of her own garden, Anni shows us how she developed this practice. The work of the forest gardener, she suggests, shifts from traditional tasks of digging and weeding, to more observational 'tasks' of watching, waiting, and learning how the garden develops as an ecosystem. She acknowledges that watching and waiting can be uncomfortable, as the gardener gives up their enculturated urges to tidy or weed and lets the garden run rampant. The gardener allows this to happen. Their job is to watch carefully as an ecosystem slowly develops that no longer requires pest management, weeding, or added fertility. Only once the forest gardener begins to understand this ecosystem, and the many interactions occurring within it, can they begin to gently intervene.Table of Contentspreface introduction tribute to all gardeners part 1: a different garden 1 a different garden 2 how does the forest garden? 3 gardens of delight 4 principles of forest gardening 5 fertility, health and abundance part 2: is gardened differently 6 stop 7 don't do anything until you have to 8 the twin story of watching and waiting 9 only do the minimum 10 gardening with the forest 11 polyfloral polycultures 12 life cycle gardening 13 nature's transformational magic 14 harvest only enough 15 beauty and joy part 3: by a different gardener 16 polyculture learning 17 appreciation 18 the polyculture path to the heart of the garden 19 welcome the wild 20 gardening with life appendices 1 trees and plants in the garden of equal delights 2 discussion - David Holmgren's principles of permaculture

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Book SynopsisIn Tomorrow Is Too Late, Grace Maddrell collects testimonies of activism and hope from young climate strikers, from Brazil and Burundi to Pakistan and Palestine. These youth activists are experiencing the reality of the climate crisis, including typhoons, drought, flood, fire, crop failure and ecological degradation, and are all engaged in the struggle to bring these issues to the centre of the world stage. Their strength and determination show the urgency of their cause, and their understanding that the generations above them have failed to safeguard their environment. With contributors aged between eight and twenty-five, this is an inspiring collection of essays from the most vital generation of voices in the global struggle for climate justice, and offers a manifesto for how you can engage, educate, and inspire change for a more hopeful future. Trade ReviewVanessa Nakate (contributor) featured and quoted in ‘7 Young Planet-Saving Activists To Follow, Stat’ https://www.vogue.co.uk/news/article/climate-activists-on-instagram -- Emily Chan * Vogue *‘Bringing the Climate Crisis Home: How young people can educate their parents’ https://www.theguardian.com/parenting-your-parents/2021/jan/15/bringing-the-climate-crisis-home-how-young-people-can-educate-their-parents * The Guardian *'I've lost friends': the young climate strikers forced to go it alone’ ‘It was the power of social media that inspired Anna Kernahan, 17, Grace Maddrell, 14, and Helen Jackson, 21, to set up Solo But Not Alone, a Twitter page dedicated to sharing the stories of solo climate strikers.’ https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/feb/13/young-climate-strikers-go-it-alone -- Jessica Murray * The Guardian *Essay by Nasratullah Elham [Extract from Tomorrow Is Too Late] * The London Magazine *Book review: Tomorrow is too Late, ed Grace Maddrell -- Jeremy Williams * The Earthbound Report *How it feels to watch world leaders make catastrophic climate decisions -- Grace Maddrell * The Independent *Young activists speak out on the climate ‘[A] a remarkable book that shows how educated and passionate young people can be about saving the planet.’ -- Ibrahim Sawal * New Scientist *Gen Z on how to save the world: young climate activists speak out ‘After attending a first climate school strike as barely a teenager, Grace Maddrell, at just 16, has now published Tomorrow Is Too Late (Indigo Press), a book of essays and stories by young activists from around the world illustrating why it is imperative that we act now to avert climate catastrophe.’ * The Observer *Kicked out of School for Being a Freethinker [Extract: Ali Khademolhosseini’s essay from Tomorrow Is Too Late] * It’s freezing in LA! *It’s easy to set climate targets for a distant 2050 – but even tomorrow is too late ‘However you do it, I hope you’ll find a way to hear the voices of these young people, because every single one of them is vital to this fight.’ -- Grace Maddrell * The Big Issue *Vanessa Nakate Wants Climate Justice for Africa -- Vanessa Nakate (contributor to Tomorrow Is Too Late) * Time *

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Book SynopsisWith its wireless networks encompassing the globe, the Digital Revolution is altering the very fabric of our lives with alarming rapidity. New technologies are bringing about an ever closer union between human beings and machines, whilst at the same time transforming our planet into an increasingly hybrid ‘cyber-physical’ world. The current rollout of fifth generation wireless communication networks, or 5G, is central to the project to create a global ‘electronic ecosystem’, in which we will be obliged to live. This will provide the basis for an all-pervasive Internet of Things, and the widespread integration of Augmented and Virtual Reality into human experience. But what genuine human needs will this serve? Does the planet really need to be made ‘smart’? Will our health, and that of other living creatures, really be unaffected by exposure to escalating levels of electromagnetic radiation? As we enter a new era of extreme technology, driven by a momentum that seems beyond the constraint of any spiritual or moral consideration, both human beings and nature face an unprecedented challenge. Jeremy Naydler argues that it is a challenge that can only be met through a re-affirmation of essential human values and the recovery of a sacred view of nature. From this grounding, we can work towards a truly human future that, rather than creating yet more pollution and toxicity, will bring blessing to the natural world to which we belong.Trade Review‘Jeremy Naydler has become, in my judgement, one of the most interesting and original living writers in Britain.’ – Professor Bruce G. Charlton, author of Addicted to DistractionTable of ContentsIntroduction – Chapter One, TECHNOLOGY AND THE SOUL – Chapter Two, THE QUEST FOR THE PEARL – Chapter Three, THE ADVENT OF THE WEARABLE COMPUTER – Chapter Four, 5G: THE MULTIPLE ASSAULT – Chapter Five, BRINGING LIGHT TO THE WORLD – Notes – Sources – Bibliography – Index

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Book Synopsis'Once, we were one form among many in the garden. We learned to hear the voices of the mountains, the rivers, the sky, of silence. The mice spoke, the trees spoke, the stars spoke, the deer and the fox spoke, the snake spoke - and from these words we made being. These words formed great cities and their machines ever clamouring, and we let the silence slip and the words of the whispering world fall away beyond the mirror of our making.' (From the Prologue.) --- These eighteen meditations, amplified by Jerry Shearing's striking illustrations, offer luminous words enlivened with the weight of much listening. Through these 'conversations', Peter Owen Jones offers a pathway to reconnect with nature. Just a few sentences a day will provide sustenance for the soul.Trade Review'I will carry this little book in my pocket... I will read the words on London buses and in Dartmoor woods. These across-species conversations are more than reverie, they are participation.' - Martin Shaw, author of Smoke Hole and Courting the Wild TwinTable of ContentsForeword by Martin Shaw - Prologue - The Khamsin Speaks of the Storm - The Windflower Speaks of Flux - The Fox Speaks of Exile - The Mayfly Speaks of Impermanence - The Mouse Speaks of Courage - The Olm speaks of Khthonios - The Bear Speaks of Carnage - The Robin Speaks of Death - The Heron Speaks of Sadness - The Daisy Speaks of Receiving - The Turtle Speaks of Communion - The Jasmine Flower Speaks of Enchantment - The Hawthorn Speaks of Aphrodisia - The Painted Lady Speaks of Reverie - The Starling Speaks of Dancing - The Oak Speaks of Sanctuary - The Moss Speaks of Intimacy - The Pond Speaks of Peace - Glossary

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Book SynopsisDo we want to live in a world without birdsong? The pesticides, the coal mines, the clear-felling forestry industry, the industrial farmers are destroying the earth with their insistence on profit. But what point is profit on a dead and silent planet? In this enlightening yet devastating book, Susan Hawthorne writes with clarity and incisiveness on how patriarchy is wreaking destruction on the planet and on communities. The twin mantras of globalisation and growth expounded by the neoliberalism that has hijacked the planet are revealed in all their shabby deception. Backed by meticulous research, the author shows how so-called advances in technology are, like a Trojan horse, used to mask sinister political agendas that sacrifice the common good for the shallow profiteering of corporations and mega-rich individuals. The biotechnologists see the lure of cure, rising share prices and profits. She details how women, lesbians, people with disabilities, Indigenous peoples, the poor, refugees and the very earth itself are being damaged by the crisis of patriarchy that is sucking everyone into its vortex. Importantly, this precise and insightful volume also shows what is needed to get ourselves out of this spiral of destruction: a radical feminist approach with compassion and empathy at its core. Shame is an emotion of the powerless because they cannot change the rules. The book shows a way out of the vortex: it is now up to the collective imagination and action of people everywhere to take up the challenges Susan Hawthorne shows are needed. This is a vital book for a world in crisis and should be read by everyone who cares about our future.Table of ContentsPreface: The Year of the Pandemic Introduction A note on truth A note on words Key terms in this book Chapter One: The Crisis of Economics: Patriarchal Wars against People and the Planet Appropriation of politics How has criticism of globalisation shifted sides? The speeding vortex: every failure is a new business opportunity Understanding neoliberalism Resistance Markets, work and the Universal Basic Income Chapter Two: Less Than Perfect: Medical Wars against People with Disabilities Feminism Ruling classes Infantilisation Colonisation Harm minimisation Normalisation Erasure The technology of bodies Money The personal is political Chapter Three: Feminist Cassandras: Men’s Patriotic Wars against Women’s Intimate Lives War and the institution of heterosexuality intersect War and masculinity, torture and heterosexuality Intimacy and war To counter war is to counter the militarism embedded in daily life Postmodern war Money What would it take for a woman to be free of injury and to live without fear for her safety? Chapter Four: Biocolonialism and Bioprospecting: Wars against Indigenous Peoples and Women What is bioprospecting? What is biopiracy? Biopiracy of earth-based resources Biopiracy and value Biopiracy of body-based resources Separation Microcolonialism of Indigenous bodies Gynocolonialism Bodies with disabilities Heterocolonialism Intergenerational sustainability and cultural integrity Money What practices and laws can be implemented to prevent knowledge theft and biocolonialism? Chapter Five: Deterritoriality and Breaking the Spirit: Land, Refugees and Trauma Being homeless in the body Dispossession Land as relationship Land as relationship in prehistory Trauma Refusing refugees Money What systems could be put in place to end planetary theft? Chapter Six: Colonisation, Erasure and Torture: Wars against Lesbians Globalisation The politics of shame The phallus and the penis Origins of patriarchy and violence against lesbians Nationalism and exile Global recolonisation Lesbian refugees Money Guidelines for officials interviewing lesbian refugees Chapter Seven:Breaking the Spirit of the Women's Liberation Movement: The War against Biology Trans v cis Trans vs intersex Trans vs lesbian Trans vs women Women's Circus Oppression Postmodernism and queer theory Silence Trauma Hatred and shame Breaking the spirit Theft of a future and a past Commodification Strategies used by the trans lobby Violence against trans people Institutionalising trans laws Money for astroturfing and transgender causes Why sexual orientation not gender identity? Chapter Eight:Breaking the Spirit of the Planet: Climate Catastrophe Breaking the spirit of the planet Temperate zone: bushfires Dry zone: drought and water wars Wet zone: coral death, cyclones, floods Money Breaking the heart of the planet Chapter Nine: Sovereignty and the Spirit of Nature Uncultivated Sovereignty

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Book SynopsisOffering an exciting ride into how the world could be, this book is the one we have been waiting for. Feminists have long been saying we could do life differently, here is the local and global exploration of what needs to change, what must go and how together we can make a new reality. A visionary book with a focus on local and global politics and social movements, Wild Politics presents a powerful critique of global western culture. Susan Hawthorne unpicks the structures of power and knowledge, law and international trade rules, as well as probing issues that intimately affect our daily lives. Wild Politics concludes with a compelling vision for a world inspired by biodiversityTrade ReviewA work of breathtaking erudition. —Diane BellTable of ContentsAcknowledgements Permissions Preface to the 2022 edition INTRODUCTION A Feminist Critique of Western Global Culture Cultural Logic Decolonising Scholarship Biodiversity and Seeds The Seed of Culture Weaving the Strands Defining the Wild CHAPTER ONE The Principle of Diversity Beginnings Thesis, Antithesis, Synthesis Feminism Change Creating Feminist Knowledge Who is the Knower? Standpoint Theory Analysis Synthesis Dissociation Associative Thinking CHAPTER TWO Power and Knowledge: Global Monotony or Local Diversity? Power The Power of Violence The Power of Reward The Power of Backlash The Power of Obstacles The Power of Systems The Power of Attraction The Power of Attitudes Knowledge Assimilation and Appropriation A Clash of Knowledge Systems Not seeing The Perceptual Gap How Knowledge is Valued Cultural Homogeneity In Defence of Diversity CHAPTER THREE One Global Economy or Diverse Decolonised Economies? The Logic of Neoclassical Economics How Women Are (ac)Counted Economic Homogeneity and Globalisation Decolonising Economics Feminist Economics Ecological Economics Toward a Wild Economics CHAPTER FOUR Land as Relationship and Land as Possession Land as resource or relationship? Wilderness Land Dealing with Waste "Freeing" the Land, Enclosing the Commons Feminist conceptions of land Indigenous conceptions of land Land as possession Tourism: land and wilderness as commodity Urban land Urban land as wild space Steps to developing a wild politics of land CHAPTER FIVE Farming, Fishing and Forestry: from subsistence to terminator technology Farming in Kenya and Nigeria Forestry in Lithuania, the USA, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka Fishing in the Pacific Digitised and globalised farming: what the future holds The Kyoto Protocol, plantation forests and Terminator Trees Fishing wild fish to feed domesticated fish The commodification of "everything" Women as keepers of ecosystems CHAPTER SIX Production, consumption and work: global and local Production and disparity Consumption and disparity Work and disparity Global production Global consumption Global work Local production Local consumption Local work Military as gross producer and consumer Conclusion CHAPTER SEVEN Monocultures and multilateral trade rules Patents Multilateral trade agreements and the shape of international law Multilateral trade negotiations and the convention on biological diversity The World Trade Organisation (WTO) Trade related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs) Food security The Multilateral Agreement on Investment (MAI) Traditional Resource Rights (TRRs) and Community Intellectual Rights (CIRs) Human Genome Project (HGP) and Human Genome Diversity Project (HGDP) Conclusion CHAPTER EIGHT Wild Politics Wild Politics: A vision for the next 40,000 years Appendix Tables 1. World’s 100 largest economic entities (2001) 2. Companies, countries and name changes 3. Areas of highest cultural and biological diversity Glossary Abbreviations Bibliography

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Book Synopsis

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Book Synopsis

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Book Synopsis

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Book Synopsis

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Book Synopsis

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Book Synopsis

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Book Synopsis

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Book SynopsisThis book traces the history of life-concepts, with a focus on the vegetable souls of Aristotle, investigating how they were interpreted and eventually replaced by evolutionary biology. Philosophers have long struggled with the relationship between physics, physiology, and psychology, asking questions of organization, purpose, and agency. For two millennia, the vegetable soul, nutrition, and reproduction were commonly used to understand basic life and connect it to “higher” animal and vegetable life. Cartesian dualism and mechanism destroyed this bridge and left biology without an organizing principle until Darwin. Modern biology parallels Aristotelian vegetable life-concepts, but remains incompatible with the animal, rational, subjective, and spiritual life-concepts that developed through the centuries. Recent discoveries call for a second look at Aristotle’s ideas – though not their medieval descendants. Life remains an active, chemical process whose cause, identity, and purpose is self-perpetuation.Trade Review“Life Concepts, Mix (Harvard) provides a comprehensive treatise of the soul, emphasizing nutritive or vegetable souls, from the concept's beginnings with Homer and pre-Socratic philosophers to significant development of the disparate views of Plato and Aristotle. … As a philosophical and theological work, Mix provides a meaningful and engaging account of a deep, enduring subject.” (Z. B. Johnson, Choice, Vol. 56 (8), April, 2019)​Table of Contents1. Vegetable Souls? 2. Greek Life – Psyche and Early Life-Concepts 3. Strangely Moved – Appetitive Souls in Plato 4. Three Causes in One – Biological Explanation in Aristotle 5. Life in Action – Nutritive Souls in Aristotle 6. Plants versus Animals in Hellenistic Thought 7. The Breath of Life – Nephesh in Hebrew Scriptures 8. Life after Life – Spiritual Life in Christianity 9. Invisible Seeds – Life-Concepts in Augustine 10. Aristotle Returns – A Second Medieval Synthesis 11. Life Divided – Vegetable Life in Aquinas 12. Mechanism Displaces the Soul 13. Divided Hopes – Physics versus Metaphysics 14. Ghosts in the Machine – Vitalism 15. The Same and Different – Early Theories of Evolution 16. Vegetable Significance – Evolution by Natural Selection 17. “Vegetables” versus Modern Plants 18. Counting Lives- Regulators and Replicators 19. What Can Be Revived (and What Cannot)

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Book SynopsisThis book investigates the psycho-social phenomenon which is society’s failure to respond to climate change. It analyses the non-rational dimensions of our collective paralysis in the face of worsening climate change and environmental destruction, exploring the emotional, ethical, social, organizational and cultural dynamics to blame for this global lack of action. The book features eleven research projects from four different countries and is divided in two parts, the first highlighting novel methodologies, the second presenting new findings. Contributors to the first part show how a ‘deep listening’ approach to research can reveal the anxieties, tensions, contradictions, frames and narratives that contribute to people’s experiences, and the many ways climate change and other environmental risks are imagined through metaphor, imagery and dreams. Using detailed interview extracts drawn from politicians, scientists and activists as well as ordinary people, the second part of the book examines the many different ways in which we both avoid and square up to this gathering disaster, and the many faces of alarm, outrage, denial and indifference this involves. Table of ContentsChapter 1: Introduction; Paul Hoggett.- Part I: Mostly Methods.- Chapter 2: New Methods for Investigating New Dangers; Renee Lertzman.- Chapter 3: Children & Climate Change: Exploring Children’s Feelings about Climate Change using Free Association Narrative Interview Methodology; Caroline Hickman.- Chapter 4: An Integrative Methodology for Investigating Lived Experience and the Psychosocial Factors Influencing Environmental Cognition and Behaviour; Nadine Andrews.- Chapter 5: Emotional Work as a Necessity: A Psychosocial Analysis of Low-Carbon Energy Collaboration Stories; Rosie Robison.- Chapter 6: Climate Change, Social Dreaming and Art: Thinking the Unthinkable; Julian Manley & Wendy Hollway.- Chapter 7: Researching Climate Engagement: Collaborative Conversations and Consciousness Change; Sally Gillespie.- Part II: Mostly Findings.- Chapter 8: Emotions, Reflexivity and the Long Haul: What we do About how we Feel About Climate Change; Jo Hamilton.- Chapter 9: Leading with Nature in Mind; Rembrandt Zegers.- Chapter 10: Attitudes to Climate Change in some English Local Authorities: Varying Sense of Agency in Denial and Hope; Gill Westcott.- Chapter 11:We Have to Talk About….Climate Change; Robert Tollemache.- Chapter 12: Engaging with Climate Change: Comparing the Cultures of Science and Activism; Ro Randall & Paul Hoggett.- Chapter 13: Conclusion; Paul Hoggett.

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Book SynopsisThe North American Wildlife Conservation Model (NAM) is the driver of a strong anthropocentric stance, which has legalized an ongoing, annual exploitation of hundreds of millions of wild animals, who are killed in the United States through trapping, hunting and other lethal practices. Increasingly, the American public opposes the killing of wild animals for recreation, trophies and profit but has little—if any—knowledge of the Model. The purpose of this book is to empower the public with knowledge about the NAM’s insufficiencies and to help expedite the shift from lethal to compassionate conservation, an endeavour urgently needed particularly under the threats of climate change, human population growth and accelerating plant and animal species extinctions.With a focus on trapping, this book exposes the NAM's belief in human supremacy and its consequences for wild animals and their ecosystems, the same value that is driving the ongoing global destruction of nature and accelerating species extinction. Motivated by a deep concern for wild animals who suffer and whose lives are extinguished each year by 'sportsmen and women', this book exposes the violent treatment of wild animals inherent in governmental-promoted hunting and trapping programs, while emphasizing the importance of empathy and compassion for other animals in conservation and in our lives.Trade Review“In her new book about the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation, Anja Heister offers a historical view of wildlife management … . Heister’s work should be added to any curricula for students of wildlife management as well as history, as her work adds richness and depth to our shared knowledge and will teach critical thinking rather than train the next generation of NAM-based thinkers. … this book is certainly helping.” (Julie Marshall, The Denver Post, denverpost.com, December 30, 2022)Table of ContentsChapter 1: Introduction.- Chapter 2: The Animal Standpoint.- Chapter 3: The North American Model for Wildlife Conservation.- Chapter 4: The Existing Critique of the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation.- Chapter 5: The North American Model of Wildlife Conservation’s Selective Use of Ethics to Support Exploitation of Wild Animals.- Chapter 6: NAM’s Science and Impacts of Policies in Pacific and Mountain West Regions.- Chapter 7: Crime Scenes in the Woods: The NAM and Cruelty against Wild Animals.- Chapter 8: Abandoning Human Entitlement: Empathy, Compassion, and Rights for Nonhuman Animals.

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Book SynopsisNever before had the garden to fulfil so many demands as it does today. It is a refuge from digitalised life and acts as a bridge to nature. As a man-made place where plants grow, it is cultivated and untamable at the same time. While for centuries the gardener's ambition was to control and subjugate nature, today it serves more as a place for retreat, a possible surrogate for wilderness, a habitat for animals or it fulfils the dream of self-sufficiency. In this book, landscape architects, sociologists, architects, artists, philosophers and historians illuminate different aspects of the garden in the Anthropocene in six chapters: the garden as a place of community, garden as art, garden as a place of enchantment and rapture, opening up questions of what garden as a model could stand for.

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Book SynopsisTo explain the desperate state of our world, its functioning and malfunctioning, is the ambitious goal of this book by Ruedi and Vera Baur. To achieve this goal they have joined forces with the globalization-critical organization Attac, which has provided them with the data. The publication is a formal homage to the sociologist Otto Neurath and the graphic designer Gerd Arntz, who created the Isotype (International Education System by Typographical Images) in the 1920s. Ruedi and Vera Baur also recycled a figurine system originally developed for Manifesta 11, the European Biennial for Contemporary Art in Zurich. Our World to Change! not only explains figures related to economics, finance, ecology, nutrition, and immigration, but also presents suggestions and alternatives from specialists in these fields and from Attac. Visually deciphering the functions of our world system helps to show that another world is possible and necessary.

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Book SynopsisTowards Territorial Transition presents new spatial strategies, concepts, and approaches for shaping large-scale and transnational developments in architecture and urban design towards decarbonisation and ecological transition. The contributions investigate interactions between ecological and resource-related systems and landscapes. They also explore potential solutions to address and deal with the dramatic threats posed by climate change and the emerging social crisis. The book introduces six basic terms of territorial transition — territory, scale, transition, resource, platform, and uncertainty — and visualises them with spatial strategies elaborated at the École nationale supérieure d’architecture Versailles and at Graz University of Technology. Moreover, it presents a selection of transnational projects of territorial transition, such as Luxembourg in Transition (Luxembourg / France), Grand Genève (Switzerland / France), and Top Noordrand (Brussels / Flanders).

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Book SynopsisThis book provides a richly interdisciplinary assessment of the thought and work of Bryan Norton, one of most innovative and influential environmental philosophers of the past thirty years. In landmark works such as Toward Unity Among Environmentalists and Sustainability: A Philosophy of Adaptive Ecosystem Management, Norton charted a new and highly productive course for an applied environmental philosophy, one fully engaged with the natural and social sciences as well as the management professions. A Sustainable Philosophy gathers together a distinguished group of scholars and professionals from a wide array of fields (including environmental philosophy, natural resource management, environmental economics, law, and public policy) to engage Norton’s work and its legacy for our shared environmental future. A study in the power of intellectual legacy and the real-world influence of philosophy, the book will be of great interest scholars and students in environmental philosophy, public policy and management, and environmental and sustainability studies. By considering the value and impact of Norton’s body of work it will also chart a course for the next generation of pragmatic environmental philosophers and sustainability scholars grappling with questions of environmental value, knowledge, and practice in a rapidly changing world.Trade Review“Carl Griffin and Briony McDonagh have made an important contribution to the field of British protest studies. … in my view this is a very well-researched, informative and deeply committed collection, and it undoubtedly strengthens and enhances what is already a venerable canon of work on British protest history.” (Peter Jones, Family & Community History, Vol. 22 (2), July, 2019)Table of ContentsChapter 1. Norton on Sustainability as Such (Paul B. Thompson).- Chapter 2. Ecological Sustainability (J. Baird Callicott).- Chapter 3. Norton vs Callicott on Interpreting Aldo Leopold: A Jamesian View (Piers H.G. Stephens).- Chapter 4. The Language of Environmental Ethics: Escaping The Emotivist Trap (Daniel W. Bromley).- Chapter 5. Environmental Pragmatism, Decision Theory, and Systematic Conservation Planning (Sahotra Sarkar).- Chapter 6. Values Pluralism and “Sustainability” (Richard Howarth).- Chapter 7. Shared Values and Scientific Knowledge in Environmental Decision-making (Evelyn Brister).- Chapter 8. Adaptive Management as a Theory of Intergenerational Justice? (Clark Wolf).- Chapter 9. Leadership for Sustainability (R. Bruce Hull).- Chapter 10. The Power of Process: A Role for Norton’s Deliberative Approach to Sustainability in Building Constituencies for Change (Paul D. Hirsch) etc.

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