Climate Chronicles: Contrasting Narratives in Two New Releases

At the end of the hottest year on record, it is the time for bold statements and bolder questions about the climate, our society, and the role we play. Two books published this fall take opposing views on the matter. In Overshoot, Andreas Malm and Wim Carton offer a scathing critique of ideologies that ignore the reality of climate change and pander to entrenched interests; in What If We Get It Right, Ayana Elizabeth Johnson guides readers through a rich landscape of possibility, and showcases diverse, joyful voices that are already addressing a broad range of environmental issues.

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Overshoot – How the World Surrendered to Climate Breakdown opens with a sobering account of the past three years, written in the style of a historical recap. The authors do not pull punches when they describe this darkest time in our history: following a temporary dip in emissions due to the Covid-19 pandemic, nations and oil companies embarked on a gleeful, hell-bent-for-leather rampage of exploration, production, and burning of fossil fuels. ExxonMobil had its largest cash flow in a decade in 2021, while Saudi Aramco enjoyed $161 billion in profits in 2022, the “most a fossil fuel company … had ever made.” Not only did sales of fossil fuels explode, the authors state, but exploration did, too: “What all of this amounted to was a fossil fuel frenzy, instigated right on the threshold of 1.5°C of global warming.”

Theodor Adorno, say the authors, expressed it best when he said, “Society has lost control of itself.” 

This is one of the many pithy quotes from other experts included in Overshoot. A highlight of this volume is the extensive reviews of other works on the subject and the wonderful extracts from many of them: assembling the books cited in its bibliography would create a comprehensive library on climate change.

The book then jumps into a review of the lengthy and complex political processes, starting from the Montreal Protocol, which led to the goals on limiting global warming first to 1C, then 1.5C, and then 2C. However, it also posits that these early days of target-setting were enabled in the spirit of post-colonial combativeness, an era that has now ended, leaving few options today other than the upending of fundamental societal systems.

The book quotes Inger Andersen, executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme: “We had our chance to make incremental changes, but that time is over. Only a root-and-branch transformation of our economies and societies can save us from accelerating climate disaster.” The authors point out that the 2022 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report included, for the first time, an attack on root drivers such as capitalism, asymmetric power relations, colonialism, global inequality, and exploitation.

It is here that the authors reveal their core thesis: that the ideology of overshoot is best understood in the context of “constructive Marxism,” that there is no path to limiting warming within the current system, and that optimism as it is expressed today is nothing more than “incantory governance.” The latter term is an expression coined by Stefan Aykut, a professor at the University of Hamburg, in which magical thinking is substituted for reality. The authors aver that it has now been “fully established that as long as more CO2 is added to the atmosphere, the warming will continue and the crisis will get worse; and in the early third decade, no limits had yet been imposed on this process of addition.”

In the succeeding chapters, the authors dive into the concept of stranded assets – what oilfields might become after an energy transition – not only in the financial sense but also in the political sense of assets caused to be stranded after a political shift renders them unprofitable by fiat. As such, it is stated, stranded assets are something to be desired, despite gloomy warnings that such a move would cause the downfall of the current economic system. Additionally, the book shows how every move to mitigate or reduce the damage of CO2 emissions, such as carbon capture and storage (CCS), has been perverted from its original purpose to act as an excuse to push the problem down the road, leaving the it to the next generation to fix. Instead of acting as a “filter on the chimney” to prevent carbon emissions at the source, CCS is now considered as a post facto removal solution to reduce exposure to stranded assets.

In the latter part of the book, one author’s surprising statement – “I am writing this book in a spirit of optimism” – gains some credence with an outline of the accelerating adoption of renewable energy. The book acknowledges and then explains the paradox that “the closer the world edges to 1.5°C, the easier it becomes to avoid that fate by ditching oil and gas and coal for renewable alternatives.” The problem, they state, is the conflict between “flow” – the pricing of solar or other renewable energy based on a one-time setup cost followed by a continuous for free – and “stock”, where a product such as oil can be continuously sold and exploited. “Where there is nothing to be exploited in money, there can be profit,” the authors point out. 

Here is the crux of the authors’ argument: that climate change is, at its heart, a class struggle, not even a difference between developed and developing nations. After all, we are informed, between 1990 and 2019, per capita emissions of the poorest half of the populations of the United States and Europe actually dropped by a third. Meanwhile, private jets enjoyed record sales in 2021, and then again in 2022. 

The book ends by touching briefly on the potential solution, which is nothing short of the upheaval of our current society. Overshoot is not meant to comfort or inspire, but to enrage. While it sometimes uses too many words to explain concepts like the fact that oil is profitable and solar is not or that people do not like change, it remains a gripping read throughout, and is accompanied by extensive, very useful end notes and references. 

What If We Get It Right, on the other hand, provides a delightful and inspiring contrast to this dark message. From the vibrant colors of its illustrations to the joyful artwork and engaging conversations, it evokes a treasured scrapbook – a volume to be left on the coffee table to spark conversations, and to be dipped in and out of during thoughtful moments.

Unlike Overshoot, Johnson’s book extends beyond climate change; it explores a vast range of environmental challenges and solutions such as plastic, ocean acidity, and biodiversity. This holistic view provides a welcome reminder of the interconnectedness of environmental and social issues.

At the heart of the book are 20 transcripts of interviews with the author’s podcast guests. These experts range from supporters of regenerative farming and architectural justice to advocates of corporate action, finance specialists, and Hollywood filmmakers. The interviews, although they could stand alone, are here interspersed with a wide variety of art and photography, introspective essays, inspirational quotes, and several moving poems. There are also several lists, diagrams, and a proposed “Climate Oath” modeled after the Hippocratic Oath.

Beginning with a personal introduction expressing the author’s love for the planet as seen through the medium of her family background and her career as a marine biologist, the book then does its duty by presenting a pithy summary of the bad news: rising temperatures, ocean acidification, plastic pollution, and the other usual suspects. But it quickly moves to the “getting it right” aspects.

The opening section focuses on biodiversity, farming, food, and agriculture, followed by a thought-provoking exploration of the role that buildings and architecture play in shaping our environment. In both of these sections, identity, justice, and social aspects make a strong appearance, with the interviewees explaining clearly how they interact with environmental issues.

The section “Follow the Money” showcases the business aspect of environmental topics. One of the most intriguing parts of the book is “Culture is the Context,” which offers views from underexplored areas: how Hollywood does (or does not) contribute to understanding of climate change; the role of mainstream media (38% of Americans in 2023 reported that they only hear about the climate in the media a few times a year, maximum); and the power of student activism. 

One fascinating part of the book, “Changing the Rules,” offers a how-to guide in the American political lobbying system – a highly educational primer regardless of the topic. Here the reader also learns how lawsuits are used as a policy tool – for example, suing the US Post Office for not maximizing its use of electric vehicles. However, this section in particular is highly focused on the US; it is clear that such methods are specific to that jurisdiction.

The following section, “Community Foremost” provides a more global perspective, showing how climate migration and indigenous self-determination are happening in various communities and how this might be viewed in a different light. Finally, “Transformation” challenges readers to consider their own role.

At the beginning of each section, the author presents a series of provocative questions, such as “What if climate adaptation is beautiful?” or “What if we revere biodiversity and photosynthesis?” These are each followed by two lists of statistics. These provide a strong scientific underpinning to the book, which can sometimes come across as a bit gushy.

One unusual aspect of What If We Get It Right is the generous space given to intersectionality. While Overshoot is all about class, Johnson’s book investigates identity, background, and the drive to look for solutions from unexpected sources.

What If We Get It Right is bookended by the Venn diagram commonly used to explain ikigai (Japanese for a reason for living): the intersection of “What brings you joy?”, “What are you good at?”, and “What work needs doing?” – but instead of finding personal purpose, the diagram is used to help the reader discover “Your climate action.”

The final pages of the book stray slightly into self-help territory. However, since the purpose of the book is to inspire, this is not out of place.

It is tempting to view these two books as the yang and the yin of climate and environmental writing: Overshoot, written by male, European authors, focuses on politics, class structure, and money, while What If We Get It Right, by a Black female author, is a personal exploration that showcases and celebrates diverse views. The crux of the latter book is expressed in a poem by Ayisha Siddiqa, which asks “What if the future is soft and revolution is so kind that there is no end to us in sight?” while the former book declares, “Revolutionaries have no friends in the capitalist classes.”

But this division would be too simplistic: in fact, while they are excellent complements to each other, they also have a great deal in common. These commonalities include a view of the world and society as a holistic organism, the importance of looking outside the business-as-usual sphere for solutions, and a profound commitment to change. Both are important reads in a world where such change is necessary.

Overshoot: How the World Surrendered to Climate Breakdown
Andreas Malm, Wim Carton
2024, Verso, 416pp

What If We Get It Right?: Visions of Climate Futures
Ayana Elizabeth Johnson
2024, One World, 496pp

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