Ecological Debt
Global Warming and the Wealth of Nations
Millions of people in the West are running up huge ecological debts: from the amount of oil and coal that we burn to heat our houses and run our cars, to what we consume and the waste that we create, the impact of our lifestyles is felt worldwide.
Whilst these debts go unpaid, millions more living in poverty in the majority world suffer the burden of paying dubious foreign financial debts. Ecological Debt explores this great paradox of our age. Highlighting how and why this has happened, it also shows what can be done differently in the future.
Now updated throughout, this is a passionate account of the steps we can take to stop pushing the planet to the point of environmental bankruptcy.
Whilst these debts go unpaid, millions more living in poverty in the majority world suffer the burden of paying dubious foreign financial debts. Ecological Debt explores this great paradox of our age. Highlighting how and why this has happened, it also shows what can be done differently in the future.
Now updated throughout, this is a passionate account of the steps we can take to stop pushing the planet to the point of environmental bankruptcy.
Andrew Simms is the author of many books including The New Economics, Ecological Debt, Tescopoly and Cancel the Apocalypse and Economics: A Crash Course. He co-founded the New Weather Institute and coordinates the Rapid Transition Alliance. He is a research associate at the Centre for Global Political Economy, University of Sussex, a fellow of the New Economics Foundation (NEF), and is a frequent contributor to the Guardian and BBC. He co-founded the Green New Deal group in 2007, the climate campaign onehundredmonths.org that ran until 2017, and devised Earth Overshoot Day.
'A master at progressive thinking' - New Scientist
'An ebullient driving force,' listed as one of the UK's top environmentalists by the Independent on Sunday - Independent on Sunday
'(A) leading industry observer' - Financial Times
'Creative and compelling' - Larry Elliott, Economics Editor, Guardian
'Essential reading' - R K Pachauri, Ph.D, Director-General, TERI, Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
'A new phrase has entered the language' - Dame Anita Roddick, founder of The Body Shop
'This book describes the world as it really is. ... Read it, find out who really owes what to whom' - Tony Juniper, Executive Director, Friends of the Earth
Acknowledgements
Preface
1. A Short Walk to Venus
2. The Chemist's Warning: a Short History of Global Warming
3. The Heaven Bursters: Tuvalu and the Fate of Nations
4. The Great Reversal of Human Progress
5. Ecological Debt
6. The Carbon Debt
7. Rationalising Self-destruction (Or Why People Are More Stupid Than Frogs)
8. The Car Park at the End of the World
9. Pay Back Time: the Law, Climate Change and Ecological Debt
10. Data for the Doubtful: the Lessons of War Economies
11. The New Adjustment
12. Minerva's Owl
13. In the Footsteps of Stanley
14. Tick Tock Climate Clock
15. The Duck's Choice
16. How to Live on an Island
Notes
Index
Preface
1. A Short Walk to Venus
2. The Chemist's Warning: a Short History of Global Warming
3. The Heaven Bursters: Tuvalu and the Fate of Nations
4. The Great Reversal of Human Progress
5. Ecological Debt
6. The Carbon Debt
7. Rationalising Self-destruction (Or Why People Are More Stupid Than Frogs)
8. The Car Park at the End of the World
9. Pay Back Time: the Law, Climate Change and Ecological Debt
10. Data for the Doubtful: the Lessons of War Economies
11. The New Adjustment
12. Minerva's Owl
13. In the Footsteps of Stanley
14. Tick Tock Climate Clock
15. The Duck's Choice
16. How to Live on an Island
Notes
Index
Published by Pluto Press in Feb 2009
Paperback ISBN: 9780745327273
eBook ISBN: 9781783710591
eBook ISBN: 9781783710591
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