Overshoot - ReCoLectora

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Idioma English

Publicado el 2024 por Verso Books.

ISBN:: 978-1-80429-398-0

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(2 reseñas)

2 ediciones

Sinan reseñó Overshoot de Wim Carton

a long article spanning a range of concepts that generally suck the content out of the climate debates

5 estrellas

This is a long article spanning a range of concepts sucking the content out of the climate debates. The authors tidy up the political-economic meaning of words like "1.5ºC warming with limited overshoot scenario", "emissions offsetting", "stranded assets" and "carbon bubbles". Widely used in technical jargon as well as in press releases (by corporations, governments and/or NGOs), these terms exist to fulfill a specific historical political function at the specific conjecture in which they were introduced.

This is not an introductory book. So if you are not somehow engaged in the climate discussions, you might not grasp the necessity of this intellectual intervention. But if you have been involved in climate stuff in any form, the book also does not assume any prior knowledge of any of the concepts or facts, and avoids technical language.

Mysteriarch 📖 reseñó Overshoot de Wim Carton

Review of 'Overshoot'

5 estrellas

Yet another great Marxist analysis by Malm (and Carton, whom I didn't know before this). They don't shy away from confronting the dire situation and don't offer optimism - for which I'm grateful, we have enough of those tracts already and they have had zero results.

It's built around three parts: 1. Where and how the idea of overshoot came to be, and how it became hegemonic in contemporary neoliberal political discourse. They posit this as an 'anti-revolution': a move to cut off an as-of-yet non existent radical move to stop emissions. 2. What it would mean to stop emissions, and thus the fossil industry itself. What the impact of massive asset stranding would do (hint: the collapse of much of capitalism itself). They also explain how, on the one side, a energy transition is technically feasible, but economically improbable since prices and profits tend to collapse from a certain …

Yet another great Marxist analysis by Malm (and Carton, whom I didn't know before this). They don't shy away from confronting the dire situation and don't offer optimism - for which I'm grateful, we have enough of those tracts already and they have had zero results.

It's built around three parts: 1. Where and how the idea of overshoot came to be, and how it became hegemonic in contemporary neoliberal political discourse. They posit this as an 'anti-revolution': a move to cut off an as-of-yet non existent radical move to stop emissions. 2. What it would mean to stop emissions, and thus the fossil industry itself. What the impact of massive asset stranding would do (hint: the collapse of much of capitalism itself). They also explain how, on the one side, a energy transition is technically feasible, but economically improbable since prices and profits tend to collapse from a certain point on. The logic of capital dictates that it will seek those profits, and those are to be found in the fossil industry. And the more capital is sunk into it (which is necessary anyway to drive up extraction and access the more difficult sources), the less likely it is that fossil capital will divest itself from it. 3. A preliminary 'what is to be done?': why the situation demands forceful, radical action, why compromising with capital won't work, and a frontal attack on fossil assets is needed. The two options are: collapse of (fossil) capitalism, or civilizational collapse.