Parution d'ouvrages

Contributing to the growing debate on the need for sustainable water use and management, with concrete examples of new approaches, concepts, arguments, methods and findings which illustrate how this can be achieved, this book will ...

   The most important book yet from the author of the international bestseller The Shock Doctrine, a brilliant explanation of why the climate crisis challenges us to abandon the core “free market” ideology of our time, restructure the global economy, and remake our political systems.

In short, either we embrace radical change ourselves or radical changes will be visited upon our physical world. The status quo is no longer an option.
   In This Changes Everything Naomi Klein argues that climate change isn’t just another issue to be neatly filed between taxes and health care. It’s an alarm that calls us to fix an economic system that is already failing us in many ways. Klein meticulously builds the case for how massively reducing our greenhouse emissions is our best chance to simultaneously reduce gaping inequalities, re-imagine our broken democracies, and rebuild our gutted local economies. She exposes the ideological desperation of the climate-change deniers, the messianic delusions of the would-be geoengineers, and the tragic defeatism of too many mainstream green initiatives. And she demonstrates precisely why the market has not—and cannot—fix the climate crisis but will instead make things worse, with ever more extreme and ecologically damaging extraction methods, accompanied by rampant disaster capitalism.
   Klein argues that the changes to our relationship with nature and one another that are required to respond to the climate crisis humanely should not be viewed as grim penance, but rather as a kind of gift—a catalyst to transform broken economic and cultural priorities and to heal long-festering historical wounds. And she documents the inspiring movements that have already begun this process: communities that are not just refusing to be sites of further fossil fuel extraction but are building the next, regeneration-based economies right now.
   Can we pull off these changes in time? Nothing is certain. Nothing except that  climate changes everything. And for a very brief time, the nature of that change is still up to us.

   Nous connaissons les termes d'écologie et même d'écologie politique, mais que recouvre celui, plus énigmatique, d'écologie sociale ? Cet ouvrage répond à cette question en revenant sur diverses acceptions de ce terme pourtant déjà ancien, que l'on rencontre notamment sous la plume d'auteurs aussi divers qu'André Gorz, Félix Guattari ou Gilbreto Freyre. Un enjeu théorique de fond unit ces diverses approches : reconnaître que les sciences de la nature et de l'environnement ne peuvent se détourner de questions qui touchent la culture, le politique et le social. Comme le soulignait avec vigueur le penseur américain Murray Brookchin, qui a popularisé la notion, la solution aux problèmes écologiques requiert avant tout de nouvelles formes d'institutionnalisation évolutives, devant épouser les dynamiques de participation citoyenne. Plus largement, les réponses aux problèmes écologiques nécessitent une réforme de nos imaginaires consuméristes, ainsi que de certaines représentations collectives dominantes relatives au fait technologique lui-même. Le développement d'un modèle de société plus écologique sera au prix d'un effort pour trouver un nouvel équilibre entre innovation technologique, résilience environnementale, et souci du commun.

   Humans are no longer spectators who need to adapt to their natural environment. Our impact on the earth has caused changes that are outside the range of natural variability and are equivalent to such major geological disruptions as ice ages. Some scientists argue that we have entered a new epoch in planetary history: the Anthropocene. In such an era of planet-wide transformation, we need a new model for planet-wide environmental politics. In this book, Frank Biermann proposes “earth system” governance as just such a new paradigm.

   Biermann offers both analytical and normative perspectives. He provides detailed analysis of global environmental politics in terms of five dimensions of effective governance: agency, particularly agency beyond that of state actors; architecture of governance, from local to global levels; accountability and legitimacy; equitable allocation of resources; and adaptiveness of governance systems. Biermann goes on to offer a wide range of policy proposals for future environmental governance and a revitalized United Nations, including the establishment of a World Environment Organization and a UN Sustainable Development Council, new mechanisms for strengthened representation of civil society and scientists in global decision making, innovative systems of qualified majority voting in multilateral negotiations, and novel institutions to protect those impacted by global change. Drawing on ten years of research, Biermann formulates earth system governance as an empirical reality and a

   Cities, and the built environment more broadly, are key in the global response to climate change. This groundbreaking book seeks to understand what governance tools are best suited for achieving cities that are less harmful to the natural environment, are less dependent on finite resources, and can better withstand human-made hazards and climate risks.
   In mapping, describing and evaluating nearly 70 traditional and highly innovative governance tools from Asia, Australia, Europe and North America, Jeroen van der Heijden uncovers the five most eminent contemporary trends in governance for urban sustainability and resilience. He also develops a series of 12 design principles that will help to develop better governance tools for improving the sustainability and resilience of today's cities and those of the future. The book is unique in drawing lessons from the theoretical literature on environmental and hazard governance into a broad empirical study.