Divided Planet: The Ecology of Rich and Poor

US: University of Georgia Press, 1998. Paperback. Very Good. A copy that has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged. Global warming. Soil loss. Freshwater scarcity. Extinction. Overconsumption . Toxic waste production. Habitat and biodiversity erosion. These are only a few of our most urgent ecological crises. There are others as well and, d espite the popularity of good-news environmentalism, few of them are going away. In this wide-ranging, grimly entertaining commentary on the environme ntal debate, Tom Athanasiou finds that these problems are exacerbated, if n ot caused, by the planet's division into "warring camps of rich and poor." Writing with passionate intelligence, Athanasiou proposes a simple yet radical solutionâ??stop indulging easy, calming fantasies in which everything seems to change, but nothing important changes at all. Instead, do what needs to be done, now, while there is still time and goodwill. The bottom line, he concludes, is that there will be no sustainability without a large measure of justice. Without profound political and economic change, he argues, there can be no effective global environmental action, no real effort to save the planet.