Climate Management and Structural Ignorance in Ray Hammond’s Extinction

Abstract

In his dystopian novel, Extinction (2005), Ray Hammond envisions an image of the world in the near future where it is troubled by an extreme form of climate management that enables multi-national corporations and governments from the wealthier regions of the world to control the climate and make profits by selling climate services to the rest of the world. The invasive climate management practices of the capitalist system represented by corporations and governments interfere with and disrupt the natural rhythms of the Earth systems to the extent of the latter’s collapse. Moreover, the representatives of the capitalist self-prioritizing system such as the ERGIA Corporation and the US Government in the novel spread ignorance regarding the true nature of their practices by suppressing and/or obscuring scientific findings and evidence that prove the harmful effects of their relentless climate management. Accordingly, this paper aims at tracing the links between the perpetuated practices of the capitalist corporations and governments, and environmental degradation and collapse in Ray Hammond’s Extinction which presents a world where advanced climate management systems have been implemented in space and weather events are tightly controlled and scheduled. It further discusses how the environmental cataclysms brought about by deep interference with the Earth’s magnetic field via extreme climate management in the novel expose the self-interested and ruthless capitalist system’s failure to see or rather deliberate ignorance of the detrimental and irreversible effects and consequences of large-scale climate management which drives the world to extinction.