After Sustainability Denial, Hope, Retrieval is a new book by John Foster. The blurb says:
Dangerous climate change is coming. Some people still deny that it is happening, others that it is now too late to prevent it. Both denials spring from the same source: our pathological attachment to ‘progress’, of which sustainability has been one more version. But what if we stopped pretending?
The flier from Routledge has quotes from the great 'n' good:
An understanding of the bind we are in, why 'sustainability' has failed to get us out of it, and what an honest alternative might be is long overdue. This book looks beyond false hope and strained optimism to what that future might look like. Necessary and important. – Paul Kingsnorth
This book completely misses the central paradox of being a well-informed environmentalist: to keep the window of opportunity open for as long as possible necessarily entails some kind of continuing faith in progress. – Jonathon Porritt
Human societies continue largely to ignore the increasingly dire warnings coming from climate and other environmental scientists. Whether or not you agree with this book’s conclusions, it will make you think about the challenges and the scale of societal response that they demand. Such thought is currently in worryingly short supply. – Paul Ekins
... and from me:
Timely but discomforting ... examines the human myth of progress and finds it wanting. It will help climate change deniers understand the issues. More importantly, it will help environmentalists, most of whom deny their own failure, to shift from a morally bankrupt optimism to a more realistic hope – with learning at its heart.
Well done, Routledge, for including the Porritt comment. You really do need to read this book ...
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