Hope continues to be a headline theme.
This is highlighted by Bill McKibben’s Guardian article on Obama and the blocking of the Keystone XL pipeline.
Although it is a short article, it has a number of interesting threads, including the part played by indigenous people in mobilising resistance to the pipeline. Naomi Klein goes into this theme in some detail in the latter part of This Changes Everything.
Directly relevant to the campaign to stop keystone XL is a UCL report, discussed here by Carbon Brief. It offers fresh analysis to the carbon budget calculations, in terms of fossil fuel types and deposit regions. Some will declare the overall budget too generous, but the report will undoubtedly heighten the collisions of world view discussed in last month’s newsletter.
Previous newsletters have discussed Klein’s and Marshall’s books, as key publications in 2014. CPA is pleased to announce that George Marshall will be the guest speaker at our Members’ Day on 6th June. Please put this date in your diary now! George’s talk will come at the mid-way point between the Lima and Paris climate change meetings and a few weeks after the UK general election. His proposed theme is “Why is Climate Change so Toxic to [English-Speaking] Conservatives?” (report on this event) Ro Randall will be responding to his talk. As usual, the Members’ Day will be free to CPA members, but we hope to raise funds for CPA and COIN, so please encourage others to attend the morning session. Full details to follow.
The first weeks of 2015 will be marked by another important book: In Time for Tomorrow? by Rosemary Randall and Andy Brown (copies available here).
“This lovely handbook says it all…sage guidance on delving into climate debates, reducing your carbon footprint, and encouraging community action. It reckons honestly with a crisis that is too easy for us to deny in our everyday lives.”
Naomi Klein, author of This Changes Everything and The Shock Doctrine.
“…explores the landscape of hope and generates lasting enthusiasm.”
George Marshall, author of Don’t Even Think About It: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Ignore Climate Change.
The book offers empathy, encouragement and a practical path to anyone who is concerned about climate change, but who feels lost, angry or powerless. Written for their ground-breaking Carbon Conversations groups, it aims to help its readers minimize their impact, confront everyday denial, and give the courage to speak out. Inspiring stories and psychological understanding are carefully interwoven with the facts about climate change and practical advice about changes we can make in the way we live. What makes this book special are the strategies it offers to help us overcome the personal, social and emotional barriers to making those changes. More information on the process that inspired this book is available here on the Carbon Conversations website.
There are a number of launch events coinciding with the release, providing the opportunity to meet the authors and the team behind the publication, share refreshments and get your copy signed:
Cambridge: Monday 9th February 2015, Scott Polar Museum, details from Rosie Amos
Oxford: Thursday, 12th February 2015, 7:00 – 9:00 pm, Blackwell’s Bookshop, 51 Broad Street, Oxford OX1 3BQ
Edinburgh: Thursday, 19th February 2015, 5.00 – 7.00 pm, Edinburgh Centre for Carbon Innovation (ECCI), High School Yards, Edinburgh EH1 1LZ
Bookings are also beginning to come in for the CPA’s April 2015 conference in Bristol: ‘Radical Hope and Cultural Tragedy’. This event is the culmination of much collaboration, contact-making and imaginative effort and we believe it will offer a rich, stimulating and useful experience to all participants. Fees have been set as low as possible, to make it widely accessible. The full brochure is here and a booking form can be found here.
Wishing all CPA members and other readers a rewarding year and fulfilment of the hope expressed by Bill McKibben.
Adrian Tait
(On behalf of the Exec. Committee)