Scholars, advocates, and activists seeking to make the U.S. a more responsible global partner.
climate change
Fiddling on Climate

Fiddling on Climate

by | Dec 7, 2011

The image of Nero fiddling as Rome burned—albeit apocryphal– has stuck as the metaphor for willfully irresponsible government.  Government representatives, gathered at climate change talks in Durban, South Africa, have been fiddling for the past week. Of the hundreds of closed-door sessions, official meetings and informational seminars, all that’s come out so far is cacophony. By the looks of it, they plan to fiddle right through to the end, wasting one of the last opportunities to respond in time to a threat that affects not only their societies, but the entire planet.

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Seven Billion … And Rising

Seven Billion … And Rising

by | Nov 3, 2011

The world’s population surpassed 7 billion on October 31. But except for perhaps the anti-family planning lobby, this was a milestone that few were in a mood to celebrate.

Global capitalism is in a deep, deep funk, with the center economies caught indefinitely in the iron grip of stagnation and high unemployment. Extreme weather events have become a fact of life, yet any move towards a successor to the Kyoto Protocol continues to elude the world’s governments. Agriculture seems to be at the limits of its productive capacity, prompting many to ask: Have we walked into the Malthusian trap?

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Global Warming, Global Violence

Global Warming, Global Violence

by | Sep 15, 2011

Last month the journal Nature published a paper examining the link between local climate variations and civil conflict around the world. The first quantitative study of its kind, it has received a fair amount of attention for its conclusion that climate shifts do indeed correlate with greater violence. The authors found that the rate of armed conflict doubled — from 3 to 6 percent — during El Nino-associated climate swings, a statistically significant and sobering increase.

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Lines on Global Warming

Lines on Global Warming

by | Aug 31, 2011

Hopeless as swatting lies out of the White House
or trying to put out an oil field fire with a cup of water
is this war against the grasshoppers, who,
when I walk through weeds or rattle
the leaves on a pepper plant, leap
by the thousands to remind me
that power isn’t always held by Goliaths
but by the numerous and persistent.

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Feeding the World

by | Aug 16, 2011

Come October, Atlas won’t be shrugging, he’ll be groaning as global population passes the 7 billion mark. Until very recently, demographers predicted that these numbers would peak in 2050 at just over 9 billion and then start to decline. The latest research, however, suggests that despite declining fertility across much of the world, population will continue to rise through this century to over 10 billion people. With famine spreading in Somalia, another food crisis gripping North Korea, global food prices near a record high, and climate change threatening to reduce future harvests, the question continues to nag: are we outstripping our capacity to feed ourselves?

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