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Red Sky at Morning: America and the Crisis of the Global Environment, Second Edition (Yale Nota Bene) PDF

348 Pages·2005·1.15 MB·English
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Preview Red Sky at Morning: America and the Crisis of the Global Environment, Second Edition (Yale Nota Bene)

Red Sky at Morning James Gustave Speth Red Sky    at Morning America and the Crisis of the Global Environment With a new Afterword on climate change        First published 2004 by Yale University Press. This Nota Bene edition published 2005 by Yale University Press. Copyright © 2004, 2005 by James Gustave Speth. All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations, in any form (beyond that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 ofthe U.S. Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press), without written permission from the publishers. For information about this and other Yale University Press publications, please contact: U.S. o‹ce [email protected] Europe o‹ce [email protected] The following publishers have generously given permission to use quotations from copyrighted works. From The Collected Poems ofWallace Stevens by Wallace Stevens, copyright 1954 by Wallace Stevens and renewed 1982 by Holly Stevens. Used by permission ofAlfred A. Knopf, a division ofRandom House, Inc. From The Rain in the Trees by W. S. Merwin, copyright © 1988 by W. S. Merwin. Used by permission ofAlfred A. Knopf, a division ofRandom House, Inc. From The Lorax by Dr. Seuss, copyright © by Dr. Seuss Enterprises, L.P. 1971, renewed 1999. Used by permission ofRandom House Children’s Books, a di- vision ofRandom House, Inc. All rights reserved. From Silent Spring by Rachel Carson. Copyright © 1962 by Rachel L. Carson, renewed 1990 by Roger Christie. Reprinted by permission ofHoughton Mi›in Company. All rights reserved. From “We Who Prayed and Wept” by Wendell Berry, from Collected Poems: 1957–1982, by Wendell Berry. Reprinted by permission ofNorth Point Press, a division ofFarrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC. From “Bank ofBad Habits” writ- ten by Jimmy Bu¤ett, Peter Mayer, Roger Guth, Russ Kunkel, and Jay Oliver © 1998 Little Flock Music (BMI)/Alsatian Music (BMI)/Administered by Bug Coral Reefer Music/MCA Music Publishing/Olas Music/Jay Oliver Music. All rights reserved. Used by permission. Printed in the United States ofAmerica. LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-Publicationdatawillbefoundattheendofthisbook. ISBN 0-300-10776-5 (pbk. : alk. paper) A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. This book was printed with soy-based ink on acid-free recycled paper that con- tains postconsumer fiber. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 For Cameron and The students ofthe Yale School ofForestry & Environmental Studies After the final no there comes a yes And on that yes the future ofthe world depends. Wallace Stevens Contents Preface ix Prologue: 1980 1 Part One. Environmental Challenges Go Global ... 11 1. A World ofWounds 13 2. Lost in Eden 23 3. Pollution and Climate Change in a Full World 43 Part Two. ... And the World Responds 75 4. First Attempt at Global Environmental Governance 77 5. Anatomy ofFailure 98 Part Three. Facing Up to Underlying Causes 117 6. Ten Drivers ofEnvironmental Deterioration 119 7. Globalization and the Environment 140 Part Four. The Transition to Sustainability 149 8. Attacking the Root Causes 151 9. Taking “Good Governance” Seriously 172 10. The Most Fundamental Transition ofAll 191 Afterword 203 Resources for Citizens 231 List ofAbbreviations 257 Notes 261 For Further Reading: A Bookshelf 299 Index 307 Preface As I write this preface, an unusually severe blizzard is bearing down on Connecticut. Yale is shutting down. My wife is worrying about the chil- dren driving, even though they have all been adults for years. The bliz- zard is forecast to continue through most ofthe night and to set records. It hardly seems the moment for me to begin fretting again about global warming, but I check the NASA Web-site, and there it is: the bitterly cold January we just su¤ered through in the Northeast was actually the second warmest January on record globally, going back to 1880. And only a fortnight ago, two Harvard scientists pointed out in an op- ed article in the Boston Globe that dramatically colder weather in the North Atlantic region is one possible consequence ofglobal warming because the warming could disrupt the GulfStream. There is a lesson here. To get it right we should trust science more than our senses, but the science is complicated, often confusing, and sometimes counterintuitive. It is easy to long for the clarity ofthe early days ofthe modern envi- ronmental movement when the problems could be seen and smelled and the villains were obvious. Those insults led me and others, fresh out oflaw school in 1969, to help found the Natural Resources Defense ix

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In this powerful book, a renowned environmental leader warns that despite all the international negotiations of the past two decades, efforts to protect Earth’s environment are not succeeding. He explains why this is so and presents eight specific steps that governments and citizens can take to ac
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