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Books > Earth & environment > The environment > Social impact of environmental issues > General
An accessible and hard-hitting look at the facts behind air pollution in everyday life. Take a deep breath. You'll do it 20,000 times a day. You assume all this air is clean; it's the very breath of life. But in Delhi, the toxic smog is as bad for you as smoking 50 cigarettes a day. Even a few days in Paris, London or Rome is equivalent to two or three cigarettes. Air pollution is implicated in six of the top ten causes of death worldwide, including lung cancer, heart disease, stroke, and dementia. Breathless gives us clear facts about air pollution in our everyday lives, showing how it affects our bodies, how much of it occurs in unexpected places (indoors, inside your car), and how you can minimise the risks. Rooted in the latest science, including real-time air-quality experiments in city streets and ordinary homes, it will allow you to make up your own mind about the risks and trade-offs of modern living - wherever in the world you are.
To address climate change fairly, many conflicting claims over natural resources must be balanced against one another. This has long been obvious in the case of fossil fuels and greenhouse gas sinks including the atmosphere and forests; but it is ever more apparent that responses to climate change also threaten to spur new competition over land and extractive resources. This makes climate change an instance of a broader, more enduring and - for many - all too familiar problem: the problem of human conflict over how the natural world should be cared for, protected, shared, used, and managed. This work develops a new theory of global egalitarianism concerning natural resources, rejecting both permanent sovereignty and equal division, which is then used to examine the problem of climate change. It formulates principles of resource right designed to protect the ability of all human beings to satisfy their basic needs as members of self-determining political communities, where it is understood that the genuine exercise of collective self-determination is not possible from a position of significant disadvantage in global wealth and power relations. These principles are used to address the question of where to set the ceiling on future greenhouse gas emissions and how to share the resulting emissions budget, in the face of conflicting claims to fossil fuels, climate sinks, and land. It is also used to defend an unorthodox understanding of responsibility for climate change as a problem of global justice, based on its provenance in historical injustice concerning natural resources.
The triple bottom line has become the standard modus operandi for assessing the sustainability of financial markets, industries, institutions and corporations. This Research Handbook provides the most recent developments, current practices and new initiatives related to sustainable finance and impact investing. In doing so, it demonstrates how the triple bottom line principle can be used to design sustainable strategies for firms, markets and the economy as a whole. The Handbook covers aspects of socially responsible investment, finance and sustainable development, corporate socially responsible banking, green bonds and sustainable financial instruments. Comprising 20 topical chapters from experts in the field, this Handbook is a comprehensive investigation of financial services and products that help cope with sustainable investing and climate risk management. Chapters discuss the role of regulation framework in guaranteeing the stability and resilience of financial markets and offer insight into governance issues including the management of organizational risks, CSR culture, and social-impact investing culture. An essential reference for scholars and students, the multidisciplinary approach covers business, finance, accounting, management and entrepreneurship. Practitioners such as financial analysts, rating agencies and regulators will also find this an accessible read for exploring the possibilities the triple bottom line principle can provide. Contributors include: M. Amidu, W.R. Ang, M. Ariff, F. Aubert, H. Bassan, F. Bazzana, K. Berensmann, N. Boubakri, E. Broccardo, F. Dafe, F. de Mariz, K. Delchet-Cochet, M. Dempsey, G.N. Dong, K.U. Ehigiamusoe, J. Fouilloux, R. Gabriele, J.-F. Gajewski, J. Grira, K. Gupta, H. Issahaku, L. Kermiche, H.H. Lean, K.T. Liaw, N. Lindenberg, J.R. Mason, M. Mazzuca, R. McIver, C. Nitsche, G. Porino, J.M. Puaschunder, J.R.F. Savoia, M. Schroeder, V. Tankoyeva, J.-L. Viviani, L.-C. Vo, O. Weber, A. Zarei
In this Element, the authors develop an account of the role of behaviour change that is more political and social by bringing questions of power and social justice to the heart of their enquiry in order to appreciate how questions of responsibility and agency are unevenly distributed within and between societies. The result is a more holistic understanding of behaviour, as just one node within an ecosystem of transformation that bridges the individual and systemic. Their account is more attentive to questions of governance and the processes of collective steering necessary to facilitate large scale change across a diversity of actors, sectors and regions than the dominant emphasis on individuals and households. It is also more historical in its approach, looking critically at the relevance of historical parallels regarding large-scale behaviour change and what might be learned and applied to the contemporary context action.
Altered Earth aims to get the Anthropocene right in three senses. With essays by leading scientists, it highlights the growing consensus that our planet entered a dangerous new state in the mid-twentieth century. Second, it gets the Anthropocene right in human terms, bringing together a range of leading authors to explore, in fiction and non-fiction, our deep past, global conquest, inequality, nuclear disasters, and space travel. Finally, this landmark collection presents what hope might look like in this seemingly hopeless situation, proposing new political forms and mutualistic cities. 'Right' in this book means being as accurate as possible in describing the physical phenomenon of the Anthropocene; as balanced as possible in weighing the complex human developments, some willed and some unintended, that led to this predicament; and as just as possible in envisioning potential futures.
Reaching net zero emissions will not be the end of the climate struggle, but only the end of the beginning. For centuries thereafter, temperatures will remain elevated; climate damages will continue to accrue and sea levels will continue to rise. Even the urgent and utterly essential task of reaching net zero cannot be achieved rapidly by emissions reductions alone. To hasten net zero and minimize climate damages thereafter, we will also need massive carbon removal and storage. We may even need to reduce incoming solar radiation in order to lower unacceptably high temperatures. Such unproven and potentially risky climate interventions raise mind-blowing questions of governance and ethics. Pandora's Toolbox offers readers an accessible and authoritative introduction to both the hopes and hazards of some of humanity's most controversial technologies, which may nevertheless provide the key to saving our world.
The last few years have witnessed a flurry of activity in global governance and international lawseeking to address the protection gaps for people fleeing the effects of climate change. This book discusses cutting-edge developments in law and policy on climate change and forced displacement, including theories and potential solutions, issues of governance, local and regional concerns, and future challenges. Chapters are written by a range of authors from academics to key figures in intergovernmental organisations, and offer detailed case studies of policy developments in the Americas, Europe, South-East Asia, and the Pacific. This is an ideal resource for graduate students and researchers from a range of disciplines, as well as policymakers working in environmental law, environmental governance, and refugee and migration law. This is one of a series of publications associated with the Earth System Governance Project. For more publications, see www.cambridge.org/earth-system-governance.
The last few years have witnessed a flurry of activity in global governance and international lawseeking to address the protection gaps for people fleeing the effects of climate change. This book discusses cutting-edge developments in law and policy on climate change and forced displacement, including theories and potential solutions, issues of governance, local and regional concerns, and future challenges. Chapters are written by a range of authors from academics to key figures in intergovernmental organisations, and offer detailed case studies of policy developments in the Americas, Europe, South-East Asia, and the Pacific. This is an ideal resource for graduate students and researchers from a range of disciplines, as well as policymakers working in environmental law, environmental governance, and refugee and migration law. This is one of a series of publications associated with the Earth System Governance Project. For more publications, see www.cambridge.org/earth-system-governance.
Open access edition: DOI 10.6069/9780295748733 Dominica, a place once described as "Nature's Island," was rich in biodiversity and seemingly abundant water, but in the eighteenth century a brief, failed attempt by colonial administrators to replace cultivation of varied plant species with sugarcane caused widespread ecological and social disruption. Illustrating how deeply intertwined plantation slavery was with the environmental devastation it caused, Mapping Water in Dominica situates the social lives of eighteenth-century enslaved laborers in the natural history of two Dominican enclaves. Mark Hauser draws on archaeological and archival history from Dominica to reconstruct the changing ways that enslaved people interacted with water and exposes crucial pieces of Dominica's colonial history that have been omitted from official documents. The archaeological record-which preserves traces of slave households, waterways, boiling houses, mills, and vessels for storing water-reveals changes in political authority and in how social relations were mediated through the environment. Plantation monoculture, which depended on both slavery and an abundant supply of water, worked through the environment to create predicaments around scarcity, mobility, and belonging whose resolution was a matter of life and death. In following the vestiges of these struggles, this investigation documents a valuable example of an environmental challenge centered around insufficient water. Mapping Water in Dominica is available in an open access edition through the Sustainable History Monograph Pilot, thanks to the generous support of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and Northwestern University Libraries.
The Quality of Air discusses the topic from both the environmental and human health points-of-view. As today's policymakers, academic, government, industrial researchers, and the general public are all concerned about air pollution in both indoor and outdoor scenarios, this book presents the advances in the analytical tools available for air quality control within social, political, and legal frameworks. With its multi-author approach, there is a wide range of expertise in tackling the topic.
Ever since Darwin, science has enshrined competition as biology's brutal architect. But this revelatory new book argues that our narrow view of evolution has caused us to ignore the generosity and cooperation that exist around us, from the soil to the sky. In Sweet in Tooth and Claw, Kristin Ohlson explores the subtle ways in which nature is in constant collaboration to the betterment of all species. From the bear that discards the remainders of his salmon dinner on the forest ground, to the bright coral reefs of Cuba, she shows readers not only the connectivity lying beneath the surface in natural ecosystems, but why it's vital for humans to incorporate that understanding into our interactions with nature, and also with each other. Much of the damage that humans have done to our natural environment stems from our ignorance of these dense webs of connection. As we struggle to cope with the environmental hazards that our behaviour has unleashed, it's more important than ever to understand nature's billions of cooperative interactions. This way, we can stop disrupting them and instead rely on them to renew ecosystems. In reporting from the frontlines of scientific research, regenerative agriculture, and urban conservation, Ohlson shows that a shift from focusing on competition to collaboration can heal not only our relationships with the natural world, but also with each other.
First published in 1994. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
By the early eighteenth century, the economic primacy, cultural efflorescence, and geopolitical power of the Dutch Republic appeared to be waning. The end of this Golden Age was also an era of natural disasters. Between the late seventeenth and the mid-eighteenth century, Dutch communities weathered numerous calamities, including river and coastal floods, cattle plagues, and an outbreak of strange mollusks that threatened the literal foundations of the Republic. Adam Sundberg demonstrates that these disasters emerged out of longstanding changes in environment and society. They were also fundamental to the Dutch experience and understanding of eighteenth-century decline. Disasters provoked widespread suffering, but they also opened opportunities to retool management strategies, expand the scale of response, and to reconsider the ultimate meaning of catastrophe. This book reveals a dynamic and often resilient picture of a society coping with calamity at odds with historical assessments of eighteenth-century stagnation.
Climate change is a key problem of the 21st century. China, as the largest emitter of greenhouse gases, has committed to stabilize its current emissions and dramatically increase the share of electricity production from non-fossil fuels by 2030. However, this is only a first step: in the longer term, China needs to aggressively strive to reach a goal of zero-emissions. Through detailed discussions of electricity pricing, electric vehicle policies, nuclear energy policies, and renewable energy policies, this book reviews how near-term climate and energy policies can affect long-term decarbonization pathways beyond 2030, building the foundations for decarbonization in advance of its realization. Focusing primarily on the electricity sector in China - the main battleground for decarbonization over the next century - it provides a valuable resource for researchers and policymakers, as well as energy and climate experts.
Following the groundbreaking 30 Easy Ways to Join the Food Revolution,
Ollie Hunter is back with his second book - and this time he's tackling
everyday sustainability.
Join the Greener Revolution is a manifesto calling us to come together, to take responsibility and strive to rebuild our relationships with our local communities, our individual connection to the world, and rediscover the joy in living and eating green.
Climate predictions - and the computer models behind them - play a key role in shaping public opinion and our response to the climate crisis. Some people interpret these predictions as 'prophecies of doom' and some others dismiss them as mere speculation, but the vast majority are only vaguely aware of the science behind them. This book gives a balanced view of the strengths and limitations of climate modeling. It covers historical developments, current challenges, and future trends in the field. The accessible discussion of climate modeling only requires a basic knowledge of science. Uncertainties in climate predictions and their implications for assessing climate risk are analyzed, as are the computational challenges faced by future models. The book concludes by highlighting the dangers of climate 'doomism', while also making clear the value of predictive models, and the severe and very real risks posed by anthropogenic climate change.
On a calm afternoon in March 2011, a force-nine earthquake jolted the Pacific Ocean seabed east of Japan. Forty minutes later, a tsunami 21 metres high crashed onto the coast of Fukushima, Miyagi, and Iwate prefectures. Towns collapsed, villages were destroyed, and 16,000 people were swept away. The earthquake and tsunami also resulted in another terrifying calamity -- explosions and meltdowns at a nuclear plant near the city of Fukushima. Fallout from Fukushima tells the story of Japan's worst nuclear disaster, and the attempts to suppress, downplay, and obscure its consequences. Former diplomat Richard Broinowski travelled into the irradiated zone to speak to those affected and to find out why authorities delayed warning the public about the severity of the radiation. Combining interviews, research, and analysis, he reveals the extent of the disaster's consequences: the ruinous compensation claims faced by electricity supplier TEPCO; the complete shutdown of Japan's nuclear reactors; and the psychological impact on those who, unable to return to their farms and villages, may become permanent nuclear refugees. In this illuminating and persuasive account, Broinowski puts this nuclear tragedy in context, tracing the path back through Tokyo, Three Mile Island, and Chernobyl. Examining what the disaster will mean for the international nuclear industry, he explores why some countries are abandoning nuclear power, while others -- including Australia, through its export of uranium -- continue to put their faith in this dangerous technology.
Cut off in traffic? Bumped without apology on the subway? Forced to listen to a profane conversation in a public space? In today's Western societies, many feel that there has been a noticeable and marked decrease in mutual consideration in both public and private settings. Are we less civil now than in the past? Benet Davetian's masterful study Civility: A Cultural History responds to this question through a historical, social, and psychological discussion of the civility practices in three nations - England, France, and the United States. Davetian's rich, multi-dimensional review of civility from 1200 to the present day provides an in-depth analysis of the social and personal psychology of human interaction and charts a new course for the study and understanding of civility and civil society. Civility addresses major topics in public discourse today regarding the ideals and practices of civility and the possibility of a future civility ethic capable of inspiring cooperation across cultural and national boundaries.
This interdisciplinary volume examines how nine arid or semi-arid river basins with thriving irrigated agriculture are doing now and how they may change between now and mid-century. The rivers studied are the Colorado, Euphrates-Tigris, Jucar, Limari, Murray-Darling, Nile, Rio Grande, Sao Francisco, and Yellow. Engineered dams and distribution networks brought large benefits to farmers and cities, but now the water systems face multiple challenges, above all climate change, reservoir siltation, and decreased water flows. Unchecked, they will see reduced food production and endanger the economic livelihood of basin populations. The authors suggest how to respond to these challenges without loss of food production, drinking water, or environmental health. The analysis of the political, hydrological, and environmental conditions within each basin gives policymakers, engineers, and researchers interested in the water/sustainability nexus a better understanding of engineered rivers in arid lands.
Open access edition: DOI 10.6069/9780295748733 Dominica, a place once described as "Nature's Island," was rich in biodiversity and seemingly abundant water, but in the eighteenth century a brief, failed attempt by colonial administrators to replace cultivation of varied plant species with sugarcane caused widespread ecological and social disruption. Illustrating how deeply intertwined plantation slavery was with the environmental devastation it caused, Mapping Water in Dominica situates the social lives of eighteenth-century enslaved laborers in the natural history of two Dominican enclaves. Mark Hauser draws on archaeological and archival history from Dominica to reconstruct the changing ways that enslaved people interacted with water and exposes crucial pieces of Dominica's colonial history that have been omitted from official documents. The archaeological record-which preserves traces of slave households, waterways, boiling houses, mills, and vessels for storing water-reveals changes in political authority and in how social relations were mediated through the environment. Plantation monoculture, which depended on both slavery and an abundant supply of water, worked through the environment to create predicaments around scarcity, mobility, and belonging whose resolution was a matter of life and death. In following the vestiges of these struggles, this investigation documents a valuable example of an environmental challenge centered around insufficient water. Mapping Water in Dominica is available in an open access edition through the Sustainable History Monograph Pilot, thanks to the generous support of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and Northwestern University Libraries.
SHORTLISTED FOR THE IRISH BOOK AWARDS 2018 Holding her first grandchild in her arms in 2003, Mary Robinson was struck by the uncertainty of the world he had been born into. Before his fiftieth birthday, he would share the planet with more than nine billion people - people battling for food, water, and shelter in an increasingly volatile climate. The faceless, shadowy menace of climate change had become, in an instant, deeply personal. Mary Robinson's mission would lead her all over the world, from Malawi to Mongolia, and to a heartening revelation: that an irrepressible driving force in the battle for climate justice could be found at the grassroots level, mainly among women, many of them mothers and grandmothers like herself. From Sharon Hanshaw, the Mississippi matriarch whose campaign began in her East Biloxi hair salon and culminated in her speaking at the United Nations, to Constance Okollet, a small farmer who transformed the fortunes of her ailing community in rural Uganda, Robinson met with ordinary people whose resilience and ingenuity had already unlocked extraordinary change. Powerful and deeply humane, Climate Justice is a stirring manifesto on one of the most pressing humanitarian issues of our time, and a lucid, affirmative, and well-argued case for hope.
'There's a new story in the making, one in which the consequences of our actions add up - and every contribution is meaningful.' If climate change is the biggest threat humanity has ever faced, then why are we doing so little? Will the corona pandemic make it worse or better? And where do we go from here? Drawing on the latest climate science, Jelmer Mommers helps you find hope in the midst of the climate crisis. He describes how we got here, what possible futures await us, and how you can help to truly make a difference.
We live in unprecedented times - the Anthropocene - defined by far-reaching human impacts on the natural systems that underpin civilisation. Planetary Health explores the many environmental changes that threaten to undermine progress in human health, and explains how these changes affect health outcomes, from pandemics to infectious diseases to mental health, from chronic diseases to injuries. It shows how people can adapt to those changes that are now unavoidable, through actions that both improve health and safeguard the environment. But humanity must do more than just adapt: we need transformative changes across many sectors - energy, housing, transport, food, and health care. The book discusses specific policies, technologies, and interventions to achieve the change required, and explains how these can be implemented. It presents the evidence, builds hope in our common future, and aims to motivate action by everyone, from the general public to policymakers to health practitioners.
Rapid and transformational actions are ever more urgently needed to achieve a just, resilient, and ecologically sustainable global society, as envisioned and supported by the Sustainable Development Goals. Moreover, dynamic governance approaches are vital for addressing changing and uncertain conditions. At many levels, governance needs to be responsive and flexible - in one word - adaptive. This book provides a state-of-the-art review of the conceptual development of adaptiveness as a key concept in the environmental governance literature, complemented by applications from global, regional, and national levels. It reviews the politics of adaptiveness, investigates which governance processes foster adaptiveness, and discusses how, when and why adaptiveness influences earth system governance. It is a timely synthesis for students, researchers and practitioners interested in environmental governance, sustainability and social change processes. This is one of a series of publications associated with the Earth System Governance Project. For more publications, see www.cambridge.org/earth-system-governance. |
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