Localized Responses to Unsustainable Growth

Abstract

As another IPCC report about the causes and effects of climate change is under consideration by decision-makers everywhere, many question the scale of action best able to bolster resilience in the face of environmental crises and the always contested tragedy of the commons. How can individuals and societies live well under the constraints of a anite environment? This question points to the entanglement between local and global dynamics, endogenous and exogenous factors, and the intensiacation of multi-scale experiments in how to interpret and implement the slogan “think globally, act locally.” Three recent books attempt to provide responses in this debate. In The Localization Reader: Adapting to the Coming Downshift, editors Raymond De Young and Thomas Princen gather a collection of interdisciplinary historic and contemporary texts to advocate for the downscaling of human activities and the necessity of preparing for the consequences of downscaling through “positive localization.” Also focused on the local, Robert Scruton, in How to Think Seriously About the Planet: The Case for an Environmental Conservatism, puts forward a conservative response to environmental problems, rooted in territorial attachment and homescape. Finally, in Citizen Participation in Global Environmental Governance, Mikko Rask, Richard Worthington, and Minna Lammi contribute detailed accounts of a speciac case of place-based citizen mobilization with regard to inouencing environmental global policy-making, the 2009 World Wide Views on Global Warming (WWViews). All three books ascertain the root of the environmental crisis, propose solutions, and address challenges that may arise.