How The Rich Are Destroying the Earth (Foreword by Greg Palast) - Softcover

Herv� Kempf

3.74

222 ratings by Goodreads

9781603580359: How The Rich Are Destroying the Earth (Foreword by Greg Palast)

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1603580352 ISBN 13: 9781603580359

Publisher: Chelsea Green Publishing, 2008

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A best seller in France, and already translated into Spanish, Italian, Greek, and Korean, Herv Kempf's "How the Rich Are Destroying the Earth" now appears in its first English edition. Bringing to bear more than twenty years of experience as an environmental journalist, Kempf describes the invincibility that many of the world's wealthy feel in the face of global warming, and how their unchecked privilege is thwarting action on the single most vexing problem facing our world.In this important primer on the link between global ecology and the global economy, Kempf makes the following observations: First, that the planet's ecological situation is growing ever worse, despite the efforts of millions of engaged citizens around the world. And second, despite environmentalists' emphasis that "we're all in the same boat," the world's economic elites--who continue to benefit by plundering the environment--have access to "lifeboats" that insulate them from the resulting catastrophes.Societies have not been able to effectively combat the expanding ecological crisis because it is intimately linked to the social crisis in which the ruling form of capitalism has been organized to impede democratic initiatives. This link explains the failure to make progress against the greatest emergency of our time, because in this relationship the oligarchy plays an essential and destructive role. For this reason, solving the ecological crisis depends on disrupting the power of the world's elite.We cannot understand the entwined ecological and social crises, Kempf argues, if we don't see them as the two sides of the same disaster--a disaster that comes from a system piloted by a dominant social strata that has no drive other than greed, no ideal other than conservatism, no dream other than technology. But Kempf also calls for measured optimism: "Despite the scale of the challenges that await us, solutions are emerging and--faced with the sinister prospects the oligarchs promote--the desire to remake the world is being reborn."

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About the Author:

Herv� Kempf has more than 20 years of experience as a reporter. He is the environmental editor of Le Monde, France's most influential daily newspaper, and the founder of Reporterre, a Web site devoted to discussion about the environment and social justice. He lives in France.

Review:

Publishers Weekly -

In this frequently iconoclastic, and surprisingly humorous book, Kempf, environmental editor of Le Monde, puts together familiar themes--ecological crisis, the widening gap between rich and poor, and the threat anti-terrorism poses to democracy--to point out the elephant in the room: the fact that the income and conspicuous consumption of the "hyper-rich" need to be reduced so the world's poorest can receive justice and the middle classes will "consume less; the planet will be better off; and, we'll be less frustrated by what we don't have." Kempf references Thorstein Veblen's Theory of the Leisure Class, arguing that Veblen's theories--once made obsolete by the narrowing of incomes in the twentieth-century--are relevant again due to the rise of a new international aristocracy. He may infuriate right-leaning American readers allergic to discussions of class warfare, but he's equally hard on the "wobbly" left, "pickled in the idea of progress as it was conceived in the nineteenth century." Although the book's message is deeply disturbing, its uniquely French style of lighthearted, even optimistic seriousness makes it a refreshing and entertaining read.

"Kempf's warning, from the perch of Le Monde, needs to be heeded. Ecologists must read it to see the centrality of political economy; Lefties must read it to get a sense of the ongoing eco-cide."--Vijay Prashad, author of The Darker Nations: A People's History of the Third World

"Herv� Kempf wastes no words and pulls no punches in showing how the planet's most privileged people are also its most dangerous. His book is to the early twenty-first century what The Theory of the Leisure Class was to the early twentieth--but with a couple of extra shots of much-needed adrenaline."--Stan Cox, author of Sick Planet: Corporate Food and Medicine

"In How the Rich Are Destroying the Earth Herv� Kempf has boldly dropped a mindbomb and broken a long standing taboo."--Kalle Lasn, Editor-in-Chief of Adbusters magazine and author of Culture Jam

"Kempf's elegant thesis puts a stake in the heart of neoliberalism, explains ecology like a poet, and unravels the self-serving economic theories of both the left and the right. Kempf is a modern day Lorax with a political conscience. He worries about the trees and the ad execs and the CIA, about ecology and economy and democracy--in short, he puts the pieces of the puzzle together. Santa's getting this one for all my friends."--John Passacantando, Executive Director of Greenpeace USA

"Speaks seldom-heard truths about economic growth, environmental destruction, poverty, and equity that hold the key to human survival and well-being. An important book." -- David Korten, author of The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community and When Corporations Rule the World

"At last someone is speaking the truth that so many know yet few acknowledge: the rich are destroying the earth. And people are listening, reading, understanding. Read this book, then stop the rich from destroying our only home, and while you're at it destroy the wretched system that allows the rich to do this. Thank you Herve Kempf, and thank you Chelsea Green." --Derrick Jensen, author of A Language Older Than Words and Listening to the Land

"Our biosphere is dying, and with it the livelihood of billions. But the global royalty that sets the rules for trade and commerce goes on in its bubble, oblivious to anything but its self interest. Filled with righteous anger, this book tells a truth that cannot be denied and may just save the planet and our lives."--Maude Barlow, author of Blue Covenant: The Global Water Crisis and the Coming Battle for the Right to Water

"Can global warming be reversed and our ecological balance restored? The answer is certainly yes. But as Herv� Kempf explains with great force and �lan, it will require a massive social transformation, in which the principles of ecology and social justice gain ascendance over corporate greed. How the Rich are Destroying the Earth presents brutal truths about our present-day reality, while also offering optimism in the struggle for a sustainable future."--Robert Pollin, Professor of Economics and Co-Director of the Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and author of Contours of Descent

"It's time we stopped pretending that the climate crisis is unrelated to market fundamentalism, because we cannot fix the climate until we fix the way power and wealth are allocated. Kempf reminds us of the verities we forgot when we became mesmerized by affluence."--Clive Hamilton, Professor of Public Ethics at the (Australian) Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics

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