michael e mann on the environment
a distinguished climatologist and geophysicist, michael mann is director of the center for earth system sciences at pennsylvania state university. He is the author of more than 200 peer-reviewed and edited publications, as well as four books, including The Hockey Stick and the 2012 Climate Wars and his forthcoming publication The New Climate War: The Fight to Take Back Our Planet, to be published in January. 2021 (public affairs books).
for little creatures like ussasha sagan (murdoch books, 2019)
You are reading: Books to understand the world
carl sagan was possibly the greatest science communicator of our time. he inspired many, including me, to enter the world of science. he unfortunately he is no longer with us. But his daughter, Sasha Sagan, honors his legacy in his wonderful new book. Drawing its title from a line taken from Carl’s novel Contact (adapted into the 1997 feature film of the same name), Sasha invites us to appreciate the everyday wonders of life through the eyes of science, sharing a worldview. instilled by her unique upbringing, which she delightfully relates to us. read this book and feel a little better about our world, our universe, and our place in it.
the ministry for the futurekim stanley robinson (orbit, 2020)
The fatalistic frame can be disabling, and is all too common these days in popular climate change narratives. A refreshing counterbalance to the glut of apocalyptic visions of climate catastrophe is this latest novel from sci-fi novelist Kim Stanley Robinson (with whom I recently spoke about the effort). In Ministry for the Future, Stan uses the accounts of fictional future witnesses to convey the stark threat of climate change. but that future, to some extent, is already here. Instead of suggesting that our destiny is destined, he shows how we can rise to this extraordinary challenge. a dystopian future is possible if we do not act. but a utopian future is not out of reach if we get it.
all we can saveedited by ayana elizabeth johnson and katharine k wilkinson (penguin random house, 2020)
Climate change is a powerful “threat multiplier” that takes existing vulnerabilities and injustices and makes them worse. women and girls face a higher risk of displacement or death from extreme weather disasters, and there is a link between climate change and gender-based violence. Critical tasks for survival, such as collecting water and wood or growing food, fall heavily on the shoulders of women in many cultures. these are already challenging activities; climate change may increase the burden and with it the struggles for health, education and financial security. all we can salvage is a welcome collection of provocative and illuminating essays by more than 60 women, many of them friends and colleagues of mine, who are at the forefront of the climate movement.
the great upheavalamitav ghosh (chicago university press, 2016)
Are we upset? Acclaimed Indian novelist Amitav Ghosh argues that future generations may well think so. How else do we explain our imaginative failure in the face of global warming? In his first major nonfiction book since In an Ancient Land (1992), Ghosh examines our inability, at the level of literature, history, and politics, to understand the scale and violence of climate change. and he calls for collective action and transformative change as we rise up to meet the defining challenge of our time.
Resetting our future: what if solving the climate crisis was simple?tom bowman (changers, 2020)
Too often we encounter attempts to dismiss climate change as a “wicked” problem, that is, essentially intractable. but nothing could be more perverse than such a useless frame. Tom Bowman is a communication expert who has helped create museum experiences that engage and educate the public about climate change. In this simple and concise handbook on climate action, he explains why the only remaining obstacles are social and political will. And we have the ability to overcome those obstacles, if we simply commit ourselves, to paraphrase the great yoda, to not just try, but to do it.
anne applebaum on populism
a polish-american journalist and historian, anne applebaum is a staff writer for the atlantic and a senior fellow at the agora institute at johns hopkins university. In 2004, she won a Pulitzer Prize for Gulag: A Story. Her latest book is Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Appeal of Authoritarianism.
what is populism?jan-werner müller (penguin, 2017)
The movements that we have come to call “populist” are defined by a central idea: they reject pluralism. That is Jan-Werner Müller’s argument in What is Populism?, the definitive account of contemporary authoritarian populism. populists, müller explains, claim that they alone represent the people or the nation; that his opponents are traitors, foreigners, or unpatriotic elites; that there can be no neutral political institutions and symbols. if they gain power, authoritarian populists invariably argue that they need to change the rules of the system, undermining democratic norms and institutions in order to stay in power. if they can convince people that these rules and institutions are worthless, they can succeed.
The people against democracy: why our freedom is in danger and how to save ityascha mounk (harvard university press, 2018)
authoritarian populism, which he calls “democracy without rights”, is also a major focus of yascha mounk, the people against democracy. but mounk also identifies another phenomenon, that of “rights without democracy”: the rise of technocratic elites that effectively take what should be political issues out of public discussion. Mounk argues that to combat these two dangerous trends, a broader rejuvenation of democracy is needed: profound economic and cultural changes that can give people agency and control over their lives, as well as the conviction that their political leaders truly represent them. .
how democracies diesteven levitsky and daniel ziblatt (viking, 2018)
in how democracies die, steven levitsky and daniel ziblatt, scholars of the democratic breakdown, focus their formidable historical and political knowledge on the united states. pick up some of the warning signs that müller describes: the breakdown of “mutual tolerance” (respect for electoral results, respect for the media) as well as the growing number of political actors who are no longer convinced that their political opponents are legitimate. Using their study of other countries, they also offer some solutions. everyone, on all sides, must learn to talk to their political opponents; everyone, on all sides, must treat opposition parties and platforms as legitimate. As the US election approaches, the lessons in this bestselling book seem more relevant every day.
ruling the void: the hollowing out of western democracypeter mair (verso, 2013)
the late peter mair’s ruling on the void was something of a canary in the coal mine, a book that pointed out the real dangers of democratic decline before they were widely recognized and before populist movements in europe and the united states together were fully visible. Mair, a keen observer of political parties, noted that political participation was falling, that the public was less interested in democratic debate; like mounk, he too identified the dangerous rise of a separate class of professional politicians, isolated from the unions and church groups that had produced grassroots political leaders in the past. he explained why they were losing support and why this was dangerous, before they knew it themselves.
See Also: The Council of Nicaea and Biblical Canon – Phoenix Seminary
post-communist mafia state: the case of hungarybálint magyar (central european university press, 2016)
Authoritarian populism is generally associated with an increase in corruption. This is no accident, Bálint Magyar argues. once the government inspectors, courts and media are all politicized, run by people with ties to the ruling party, there will be no accountability and a mafia oligarchy will inevitably emerge. Magyar explains how this worked in Hungary, a country where cynicism and greed have led not only to the end of democracy but also to the end of fair markets. By contrast, Hungary has a rigged system, one in which the top layer of the economy is dominated by friends of the prime minister. Required reading for anyone who wants to understand not only how populism begins, but also where it ends.
jeffrey boakye in career
A writer and teacher from South London, now living in Yorkshire, Jeffrey Boakye is the author of Hold Tight: Black Masculinity, Millennials, and the Meaning of Grime, and Black, Listed: black british culture explored. His next book, I Heard What You Said, examines racism in British schools.
think like a white mandr. boulé whytelaw iii: as told by nels abbey (canongate, 2019)
Powerful exploration of racial politics is one thing, searing social commentary is another, and razor-sharp satire is a third. but put them all together? This is a book like no other, taking you on an exciting journey/exciting guide through the world of the default white domain. Nels Abbey has created a work of the darkest humor (pun intended) and it is unapologetically gratifying. thinking like a white man is a reminder that while the racial debate doesn’t come with a safety net, a sense of humor will soften the blow. or make it hit harder, I’m not sure. I’m still recovering. evil in every sense of the word.
brit(ish): on race, identity and belongingafua hirsch (jonathan cape, 2018)
afua hirsch takes a journalistic lens on his life, his times, and his own thoughts on race and identity, and the result is compelling. brit(ish) functions as a beautifully written and poignantly honest memoir, while simultaneously examining modern history and popular culture. Hirsch’s breadth of focus is impressive, highlighting everything from sports, the arts, and media to politics, education, and the history of capital. His insights are numerous and profound, large and small, woven into the details of a personal life from which we can all learn.
the good immigrant usesseveral, edited by chimene suleyman and nikesh shukla (dialogue, 2019)
“twenty-six writers reflect on america” may sound simple enough, but this collection of essays on the experiences of being “other” in the united states today quickly reveals itself to be a complex and varied tapestry of marginalized perspectives from numerous fascinating angles. the relationship of mainstream white Americans with minority groups always deserves serious attention, and space must be given to listen to narratives, plural, lived by first and second generation immigrants. this is a book that lays bare the fissures, cracks, and cavernous ravines that run through American identity politics, offering sensitive and generous debate and genuine insight.
I am not the mother of your babycandice brathwaite (quercus, 2020)
When you start with the sobering fact that black British women are five times more likely to die in childbirth than their white peers, you know this will be an essential exploration of the realities of black motherhood in the UK. Candice Brathwaite does the difficult job of packing insightful treatise and social commentary into one seriously readable memoir. This book not only lifts the lid on the racial biases and prejudices entrenched in our various institutions; it also invites you to make a new friend, one who has something important to teach you about being a) black, b) a mother, and c) British, at the same time.
natives: race and class in the ruins of the empireakala (two paths, 2018)
akala has set out to carve out a fairly narrow niche as a rapper (deep breath), producer, recording artist, theater producer, novelist, essayist, entrepreneur, historian, but he pulls it off with impressive confidence. natives is a vital interrogation of the myths of empire, namely the British empire, approaching the intersections of race and class, while exposing the realities of growing up black and British in the imperial shadows. Without sensationalism, Akala pulls back the curtain on parts of the empire he would rather not see, with insights that highlight where we stand today. enlightening.
helen lewis on feminism and gender
Formerly deputy editor of the new statesman, helen lewis is a staff writer at the atlantic and a regular presenter at bbc radio 4 week in westminster. Her first book, Difficult Women: A History of Feminism in 11 Struggles, was published earlier this year.
men who hate womenlaura bates (simon & schuster, 2020)
“Women have little idea how much men hate them,” Germaine Greer wrote in The Female Eunuch. well, the internet certainly fixed that. At first, it seems surprising that Laura Bates -perhaps the nicest woman in British feminism- chooses to dive into the worst sewers of online misogyny. But Bates has spent eight years giving talks in schools, and in that time she has seen children become “angry, resistant to the very idea of a conversation about sexism.” The book uncovers “incels,” pick-up artists and trolls whose sense of victimization can turn into threats and violence.
in the dark roomsusan faludi (william collins, 2016)
the life of susan faludi’s father, born istvan, became steven, died as stefánie, it would be incredible if it wasn’t true. In 1930s Hungary, young Istvan Friedman escaped Nazi death squads that pulled down men’s pants to see if they were circumcised. After the war, he was reincarnated as the American Steven Faludi. and at 76, faludi left for thailand to become stefánie, before returning to a homeland once again succumbing to authoritarianism in the early 2000s. today, the far right in eastern europe rails against “lgbt ideology” ; hungary recently banned citizens from changing their legal gender. Istvan Friedman’s generation of assimilated Jews found it hard to believe that acceptance can go backwards; before she died, stefánie faludi might have wondered if the same thing happened with gender nonconformity.
invisible women caroline servant perez (chatto, 2019) shameless nepotism – caroline is a friend – but for a good cause. simone de beauvoir’s book, the second sex, was a feminist landmark that unraveled how cultural codes designated women as the “other”. Here, Servant Perez updates that observation for a time when algorithmic bias matters as much as human prejudice. The pandemic has made her message even more relevant: Men are more likely to die from Covid-19, while many women have struggled with ill-fitting protective gear designed for male bodies. It will help women and men if medical trials and industrial design take biological sex and cultural gender into account.
noisy black girlsyomi adegoke and elizabeth uviebinené (fourth power, 2020)
Not every essay in this collection of young black British women writers is a knockout, it has plenty of undigested bits of biography, but it’s full of gems. My favorite contributions are from financial journalist Fiona Rutherford, about her struggle to get out of debt; writer charlie brinkhurst-cuff on conquering shyness; and influencer candice brathwaite on the time her father-in-law expected her daughter to serve him at the table. (“But grandpa, why?” the six-year-old boy innocently asked him. “There’s nothing wrong with your legs”). be heard.
See Also: 20 Simple Ways to Read More and Enjoy Books In 2021
how not to be a childrobert webb (canongate, 2017)
Men are often the forgotten half of the gender conversation, perhaps because they’re less likely to buy books that tell them what they’re doing wrong. Like Caitlin Moran’s feminist blockbuster How to Be a Woman, this book is a bittersweet memoir about growing up in the Midlands, about gender roles and the challenges of adolescence. webb is honest about his struggles with alcohol, his flirtation with bisexuality, and the importance of male friendship. Also like Moran, her success created a mini-industry: This year’s masculinity-themed memoirs include Alan Davies’ Just Ignore Him and Charlie Gilmour’s Fatherhood.
laura spinney on pandemics
a british science journalist based in paris, laura spinney is the author of pale rider: the 1918 spanish flu and how it changed the world. She has written for Nature, National Geographic, New Scientist and The Guardian, and has also published two novels.
the black death 1346-1353ole benedictow (boydell press, 2004)
Some excellent books have been written about possibly the worst pandemic of all time. I’m thinking of Philip Ziegler’s The Black Death (1969) and Barbara Tuchman’s A Distant Mirror (1978), in particular. unfortunately, they are outdated. If you want the latest facts about a calamity so terrible that the poet Petrarch lamented that no one in the future would ever believe it had occurred, check out Ole Benedict’s Complete History of the Black Death. A historian at the University of Oslo, Benedictow has revised the death toll dramatically, arguing that the plague wiped out 60% of Europe’s population. his review is based on a careful analysis of mortality data, rather than estimates, and he continues to strengthen his case. a new expanded edition will be published early next year.
28: AIDS stories in Africastephanie nolen (walker & company, 2007)
Similarly, some memorable books have been written about AIDS, such as David France’s How to Survive a Plague (2016), but relatively few non-fiction accounts of one of the other great pandemics of our time have addressed its impact beyond the united states of america. America. Stephanie Nolen’s 28 does just that, through 28 stories of Africans whose lives have been affected by AIDS. One thing her book brings home is how powerfully politics, society, and culture shape a pandemic, and thus how it takes on different forms depending on where it strikes.
the attraction of the stars emma donoghue (picador, 2020)
The other big one, sometimes referred to as the mother of all pandemics, is the “Spanish” flu of 1918. Contemporary fiction writers mostly ignored it, turning their sights to the first world war world, but lately their modern counterparts have been trying to catch up. Emma Donoghue’s novel is set in a flu-ridden Dublin maternity ward. pregnant women were extremely vulnerable to that flu, as were their unborn babies, and donoghue does something clever: she shows that her fight was no less dramatic or heroic than the one unfolding on the western front.
the rules of contagionadam kucharski (welcome collection, 2020)
“if you’ve seen a pandemic, you’ve seen… a pandemic” is a saying beloved by disease modellers. Covid-19 behaves differently from the flu, which behaves differently from any other disease that has caused a global outbreak, and yet they all obey a basic set of rules. Epidemiologist Adam Kucharski’s timely book explains those rules along with now-famous concepts like the R-number (reproduction) and herd immunity. one intriguing idea it explores is that a fake news pandemic like the one we are witnessing obeys the same internal logic as the disease it feeds on. kucharski is an accessible account of the science that guides our governments, when they choose to listen.
sulfuric utopiaslukas engelmann and christos lynteris (mit press, 2020)
Lest we forget how painful infectious diseases are and how much effort our ancestors put into keeping them at bay, the magnificently titled Sulfuric Utopias exist to remind us. A joy to read and also available through open access, it is the story of how the fumigation technologies of the early 20th century transformed maritime quarantine practices and inspired utopian visions of disease-free global trade. remember that?
john naughton on great technology
The Observer’s Technology Columnist, John Naughton is Emeritus Professor of Public Understanding of Technology at the Open University and Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences, and Information Sciences. University of Cambridge. humanities. His most recent book is From Gutenberg to Zuckerberg: What You Really Need to Know About the Internet.
steve jobswalter isaacson (small, brown, 2011)
steve jobs revolutionized five industries (personal computers, animated movies, music, phones, and tablets), so if you want to understand how our digital world evolved, this sprawling 630-page biography by a man who knew him well is a good guide. place to start. Although jobs cooperated with the author, he did not ask for control over what was written and did not put anything off limits. reading it, you wouldn’t want to work for jobs. On the other hand, you’re glad people like him exist.
the nature of technology: what it is and how it evolves with brian arthur (simon & schuster, 2009)
brian arthur is a brilliant economist who one day began to wonder what this force we call “technology” is. what is its nature, its essence? and how does it evolve? This remarkable book was the result of his search for an answer to these questions. it comes in the form of a theory about the origins and evolution of technology. In a way, Arthur did for our understanding of technological progress what Thomas Kuhn did for our understanding of how science advances. in his account, technology advances not at the “lightbulb” moments of popular imagination, but at points where a host of other seemingly unrelated developments suddenly come together to enable something entirely new. Which, of course, is also why technology often catches us off guard.
reengineering humanitybrett frischmann and evan selinger (cambridge university press, 2018)
We like to think that technology is there to serve humanity. but this sobering book by a legal scholar (frischmann) and a philosopher (selinger) hints at a darker possibility, which is that we have been building a world in which humans are being subtly redesigned to make them more receptive to logic-driven logic. machines. . our looming problem, they argue, is not so much the rise of “intelligent” machines as the dumbing down of humanity. incredible? maybe. And then you remember that the only response option Facebook offers its users is to “like” something: the entire spectrum of possible human responses is forced through a single, narrow opening. If that’s not nonsense, I don’t know what is.
human compatible: artificial intelligence and the problem of controlstuart russell (allen lane, 2019)
stuart russell is one of the leading experts on artificial intelligence and this book is a true tour de force describing the risks of increasingly powerful AI in an accurate and readable way. Russell believes that our current approach to designing intelligent machines is fundamentally flawed and, in fact, would lead to dystopian results if the evangelists’ visions of him were ever to come true. he’s very good at explaining how we got to where we are now, but he’s also able to make a persuasive case for how we can escape catastrophic superintelligence and ensure that machines augment human capabilities instead of making them redundant.
the age of surveillance capitalismshoshana zuboff (profile books, 2019)
a great book in every sense of the term. it is the first account of how capitalism was transformed to exploit the conditions of the digital age. it is “a new economic order that reclaims human experience as free raw material for hidden business practices of extraction, prediction, and sale.” What is most interesting about the book is the way it provides a historical context that makes the business models of Facebook and Google more intelligible. in a way, capitalism has not really mutated. he simply adapts to new opportunities and finds new types of resources to loot. except now it’s not the earth’s resources that are being appropriated, but our minds and behavior.
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