Climate Justice: Hope, Resilience, and the Fight for a Sustainable Future

by Mary Robinson, Caitríona Palmer Narrated by Ruth Urquhart

Overview

An urgent call to arms by one of the most important voices in the international fight against climate change, sharing inspiring stories and offering vital lessons for the path forward.



Former President of Ireland Mary Robinson's mission to bring together the fight against climate change and the global struggle for human rights has taken her all over the world. It also brought her to a heartening revelation: that 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. Robinson met with ordinary people whose resilience and ingenuity had already unlocked extraordinary change: from a Mississippi matriarch whose campaign began in her East Biloxi hair salon and culminated in her speaking at the United Nations, to a farmer who transformed the fortunes of her ailing community in rural Uganda.



In Climate Justice, she shares their stories, and many more. Powerful and deeply humane, this uplifting book 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.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

07/16/2018
Robinson (Everybody Matters: My Life Giving Voice), a former president of Ireland and United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, writes of global warming and climate justice in this succinct but powerful volume. She highlights communities “suffering the worst effects of climate change” that, more often than not, are “least responsible for the emissions causing change.” Robinson describes, for example, drought-stricken farmers in Uganda, who have endured extreme weather in recent years (longer rainy seasons followed by intense periods of drought) that has damaged maize, sorghum, and millet crops; weighed produce down with moisture and pests; and crippled yields. She recalls the havoc wreaked along the Gulf Coast in 2005 by Hurricane Katrina—more than 1,800 deaths and more than one million homes and businesses destroyed—which “weighed more heavily upon racial minorities and the poor.” She bemoans the Trump administration’s “unconscionable” decision to pull the United States out of the 2015 Paris Agreement, an accord “negotiated by more than 190 world leaders, over decades, in the interests of all people and the planet.” She remains hopeful, however, that humans will heed “personal responsibility for our families, our communities, and our ecosystems.” This brief but cogent account reminds readers that climate change is not academic or abstract; it is real and it has consequences. (Sept.)

From the Publisher

"As advocate for the forgotten and the ignored, Mary Robinson has not only shone a light on human suffering, but illuminated a better future for our world." - Barack Obama

"Addressing climate phenomena is the way to ensure justice for humanity. Mary Robinson, as UN Special Envoy on climate change & as UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, has been a global champion to bring justice for all. Her book inspires & guides us on what to do to protect humanity & our only world." - Ban Ki-moon, 8th UN Secretary General, Member of the Elders

"The most dramatic symptoms of our changing global climate—rising sea levels, extreme weather events, increasing desertification, and water scarcity—disproportionately affect vulnerable communities that are often far removed from the causes of human greenhouse gas emissions. Mary Robinson has been their champion for many years, and Climate Justice gives them a voice that we all should hear. Robinson makes a powerful and compelling case that the climate crisis is a crisis of humanity, requiring far more than mitigation and adaptation, but a renewed sense of shared destiny. Simply put, climate action must work for the good of all, or it won’t work for anyone." - Richard Branson

"Robinson’s lucid, direct style works because it gives a voice to those who have taken it upon themselves to tackle Earth’s most pressing problems. The book’s central message is a mantra worth repeating: individual local action can grow into a global idea, producing positive change." - Observer

"Sustainable development is at the heart of climate justice—protecting the planet, now and for generations to come. The stories in this book reveal the lived experience of people doing just that, adapting and strengthening their resilience in the face of climate change. They are courageous men and women whose lessons we all should heed." - Gro Harlem Brundtland

"This is a book about people: farmers and activists in Africa, Asia, and the Americas, people whose livelihood is ruined by climate change and climate injustice. Yet it is also a celebration of their fight back. I was moved by Mary Robinson’s account of amazing women leading the fight for their communities." - Mo Ibrahim

"Mary Robinson brings the power of the voice of those heavily affected by climate change—particularly women—to the center of the consciousness of decision makers to propel collective action." - Graça Machel

"Climate Justice is the antidote for your climate change paralysis . . . [Robinson] uses her powerful platform to highlight the work of mostly female climate activists in frontline communities that are already reeling from the effects of climate change . . . Written in a post-Trump world, Climate Justice burns with urgency. - Sierra Magazine

"Exceptionally informative and impressively organized and presented, ‘Climate Justice: Hope, Resilience, and the Fight for a Sustainable Future’ is an erudite and documented manifesto with respect to a critically important and universal humanitarian issue." - Midwest Book Review

"Robinson's humility and compassion resonates through her story-telling. [Her] stories provide a window into our own future." - Irish Times

"Robinson and Palmer highlight inspiring stories of ordinary people who are making a difference for the environment—especially women who have become ‘agents of change.' " - Foreword Reviews

"Robinson fights despair with inspiring stories of activists, politicians and others who are helping people mitigate and adapt to the changes . . . Putting a human face to those on the front lines and giving them a voice, Robinson illustrates the day-to-day impacts of climate change on those around the world, making the threat more real, more pressing, and, ultimately, more frightening . . . Climate Justice is a compelling, easy read that should persuade people to take personal responsibility for the problem" - Ms. Magazine

"Robinson puts a human face on this politically charged issue, adding to the climate change conversation. Highly recommended." - Starred review, Library Journal

"Robinson is uniquely qualified to write about the international fight for climate-change justice . . . A surefire winner." - Booklist

"Giving voice to the previously voiceless, providing seats at the table not only for the powerful who are proceeding heedlessly, but for those who have been suffering devastating consequences . . . Hopeful and optimistic . . . [Robinson] tells engaging stories of extraordinary accomplishments by ordinary people." - Kirkus Reviews

"An elegant and readable account of climate information and policy, embedded in ten powerful accounts of climate activists from around the world, eight of which focus on women . . . The accounts in Climate Justice share a trajectory of awakening, power, and the promise of deep, community-based change." - Women's Review of Books

Library Journal

★ 08/01/2018
As the UN secretary-general's special envoy on climate change, Robinson has traveled the world seeking evidence of how communities are reacting to extreme weather conditions. The author's earlier work on human rights campaigns convinced her that climate change is more than just an environmental issue. In this work, she shows how economic, political, and civil rights are directly connected to access to food, water, and healthy living conditions. Climate justice is the idea that we must intervene to halt the suffering of the most vulnerable populations caused by the actions of wealthy nations and corporations. Robinson reveals the stories of individuals who have faced devastating floods, drought, and pollution and who are organizing to bring change locally and globally. A farmer in Uganda, a small business owner in Mississippi, and a coal miner in Canada share a vision that there is hope for their communities. VERDICT Robinson puts a human face on this politically charged issue, adding to the climate change conversation. Highly recommended.—Catherine Lantz, Univ. of Illinois at Chicago Lib.

Kirkus Reviews

2018-07-31

The former head of the United Nations Commission for Human Rights details the human rights dimension of climate change, showing how neglect by the powerful is already affecting the underprivileged around the globe.

Previously the first female president of Ireland, Robinson (Everybody Matters: My Life Giving Voice, 2013) had become increasingly involved with climate change and its human toll when her editor for her American publisher told her, "I would love for you to write a storytelling book about climate justice." This is that book, a narrative of unlikely activists, mostly women, whose communities have experienced firsthand the devastating effects of global warming and have become proactive. The subtext here is giving voice to the previously voiceless, providing seats at the table not only for the powerful who are proceeding heedlessly, but for those who have been suffering devastating consequences: economic upheaval, starvation, and destruction inflicted by the policies of powerful countries on the other side of the globe. "In eastern Uganda there are no seasons anymore," explains a farmer in that country. "Agriculture is a gamble….It was not until I went to a meeting about climate change that I heard it was not God but the rich people in the West who are doing this to us." The book both begins and ends with Donald Trump's decision to pull the United States out of the Paris Agreement, which had been negotiated after decades of attempts and failures to reach accord. "It is unconscionable," writes the author, "that the United States has simply walked away from its responsibility to people both at home and abroad, in the interest of short-term fossil fuel profits." Nonetheless, Robinson's tone throughout is hopeful and optimistic, as one story after another finds accidental activists, primarily women, changing their own lives as well as those of their communities, accepting both the challenge and the responsibility of confronting the threat.

In a measured tone that is largely free of politicized rhetoric, the author tells engaging stories of extraordinary accomplishments by ordinary people.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940176330458
Publisher:	Tantor Audio
Publication date:	02/09/2021
Edition description:	Unabridged

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