Tag Archive for: sustainability

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Dirt | Laura Baggaley

 

In the near future, global food supply chains have failed: people live on rations, and supplement their food by growing as much as they can on government-allotted plots of land. For most people, farming is controlled by a huge agricultural company that dictates what crops they plant and how they manage them.

At the heart of the story are two teenagers, Sam and Avril: Sam lives in town, where he and his family follow the rules of the Green Cultivation Corporation, and Avril lives in a beautiful hidden valley where her extended family practices sustainable agriculture. The collision of their different ways of thinking about how to farm and how to live drives this touching romance about sustainable agriculture, community versus insularity, and sharing rather than hoarding.

 

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The Story of More: How We Got to Climate Change and Where to Go from Here | Hope Jahren

Degrowth 101 for young adults, The Story of More takes readers through the science explains how key inventions, like electric power and large-scale farming, have helped and harmed this world.  Readers learn about these processes that release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and the current and projected consequences of greenhouse gasses -and discover what action we can all take to avoid climate devastation.

Read our Librarian’s top climate choices for Young Adults here

The End of Nature | Bill McKibben

“The planet, for the first time, has been entirely reconfigured. It is as if there were no nature left.” McKibben’s classic 1989 work, which has had a profound impact on the environmental movement, makes a stirring plea for a fundamental philosophical shift in the way we relate to the non-human world. Emphasising the profound transformation of the planet through anthropogenic climate disruption and environmental devastation, McKibben explores how humans have disassociated from their natural environment, and come to see “nature as construct”. It is only through recognising our interconnectedness with the natural world, he argues, that we can find and implement sustainable solutions.

 

Read more of our Climate Classics: timeless works exploring themes of climate change and biodiversity loss.

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Active Hope | Joanna Macy

“Active hope is not wishful thinking….Active hope is waking up the beauty of life on whose behalf we can act.” The eco-philosopher Joanna Macy’s ground-breaking work explores how humankind can face the challenges of a turbulent age through the cultivation of interconnectedness and positive change. At the heart of reaching a more compassionate, spiritual, and sustainable world is the enactment of “The Great Turning”: a civilizational shift from industrial growth to ecological and social wellbeing.

Read more of our Climate Classics: timeless works exploring themes of climate change and biodiversity loss.

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Less Is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World | Jason Hickel

Our planet is in trouble. But how can we reverse the current crisis and create a sustainable future? The answer is: degrowth. By shining a light on ecological breakdown and the system that’s causing it, Hickel shows how we can bring our economy back into balance with the living world and build a thriving society for all.

 

Read more about degrowth at May 2022’s Rebel Library Recommends: A Degrowth Special

Purchase Less Is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World at Hive online bookshop