Books we're reading this month … The Life of V. Gordon Childe; The Tragedy of US Science; Four Billion Years of Life; Marx and Climate Crisis; Tell the Bosses We’re Coming; Essays on Red Rosa
Reading in Lockdown
New Study
Deadly combinations of heat and humidity increasing worldwide
'Previous studies projected that this would happen several decades from now, but this shows it’s happening right now'
Interview with Fred Magdoff
Pandemic: ‘This is a time for bold programs from the left’
Covid-19 exposes capitalism's gross inability to meet human needs. We must demand immediate measures to help people survive and recover.
New study
3.5 billion people may face ‘unlivable’ heat in 50 years
Every degree of global warming will push a billion people out of the human survival zone
Book Review
Capitalist Pigs: Pigs, pork, and power in America
How pigs became commodities and key elements of the interlocked social, economic and political institutions of US capitalism.
Movement Building
First meeting of Global Ecosocialist Network issues Covid-19 statement
Activists from four continents plan activity, elect steering committee, and call for solidarity with the workers who are risking their lives for us all
Pollution concentrates
Highest level of plastics found on seafloor
Ocean currents create 'microplastic hotspots' with up to 1.9 million pieces per square metre
Reading matters
Ecosocialist Bookshelf, April 2020
Six important new books: The Return of Nature … Deaths of Despair … Rebel Cinderella … August Bebel … The Green New Deal and Beyond … The Triumph of Doubt
Does Pandemic = Famine?
Covid-19 disrupts food systems; global hunger crisis looms
Global food price increases could be worse than in the 2008 crisis, causing major shortages and increased malnutrition in the global south.
Dutch manifesto
Five proposals for a better world after the pandemic
170 Dutch academics sign manifesto for sustainable, equal and diverse societies based on international solidarity
Biodiversity under pressure
Rising heat may crash entire ecosystems
New studies show global warming is raising the risk of sudden, near total collapse of the wild populations that sustain human society.
Dead End Strategies
The dangerous folly of eco-primitivism: A reply to John Zerzan and Derrick Jensen
Once icons of radical environmentalism, the views they now promote lead to a self-defeating mix of scapegoating, isolation and nihilist adventurism.
Our Viral Future
Covid-19: Will Big Oil emerge more powerful than ever?
Oil companies face severe problems now, but in the long run the industry giants may be bigger and even more dangerous to life on Earth.
Book Review
Making room for humans in scientific ecology
20th century ecology moved from racism and eugenics to studies of undisturbed natural ecosystems. Today, ecological science must integrate social sciences.
Global crisis
Angus interview in Peruvian indigenous newspaper
Lucha Indigena (Indigenous Struggle), edited by legendary Peruvian peasant leader Hugo Blanco, translates 'Ecosocialism or Barbarism' interview
Book Review
Making the case that green politics must be ecosocialist
Essays by pioneering ecosocialist Joel Kovel argue that radical social change is the only way to prevent ecocatastrophe
Pandemic
Pulverized: Capitalism, Africa and Covid-19
In the Global North it is a 'novel threat.' In the South, it extends the common experience of brutal assaults accompanied by waves of illness and death
Superbugs in the air
Burned or buried, garbage spreads antibiotic resistance
New research shows that breathing near a site where trash is burned or buried may be dangerous to your health.
Global crisis
Ecosocialism or barbarism: African journal interviews C&C editor Ian Angus
"A conscious and collective struggle to stop capitalism’s hell-bound train is our only hope for a better world."
Ecosocialists report from Manila
Philippines: A weak but authoritarian state confronts Covid-19
Instead of providing testing and basic care, the Duterte regime is attacking the poor. Cuba and Vietnam offer examples to emulate.