A Handbook for Climate Hopefuls with Veteran Environmental Journalist FRED PEARCE

About this episode

Fred Pearce discusses his optimistic perspective on climate change and environmental resilience after decades of journalism.

After 40 years of reporting on the world's most pressing ecological crises, you might expect Fred Pearce to be a cynic. Instead, he’s one of our greatest advocates for hope. If you follow the news about the environment, it’s easy to feel a sense of impending doom. We hear about accelerating extinctions, collapsing water cycles, and climate tipping points. But my guest today, environmental journalist Fred Pearce , says that if you look at the "ground-truth"—the stories of nature and people he has encountered—there is a surprising, even radical, case for hope. His work has taken him to more than eighty countries, from the logging concessions of Borneo to the radioactive exclusion zones of Chernobyl. He is the environment consultant for New Scientist and a regular contributor to The Guardian. In his latest work, Despite It All: A Handbook for Climate Hopefuls, he challenges the prevailing narrative of environmental collapse. He argues that the "population bomb" is being defused, that we are approaching "peak stuff" in developed nations, and that nature possesses a staggering capacity for resilience that we often ignore. He says that a "Good Anthropocene" is not only possible but is…

People in this episode

Host: Mia Funk

Guest: FRED PEARCE

Topics covered

• climate change
• environmental journalism
• hope
• ecological crises
• sustainability
• resilience

Keywords

• climate hope
• environmental journalism
• ecological crises
• sustainability
• resilience
• population bomb
• Good Anthropocene

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: New Scientist, The Guardian

Books & works: Despite It All: A Handbook for Climate Hopefuls

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