Collectivism

The author asserts throughout the collection that any effective response to the growing threat of climate change disaster will require collective thought and action in the form of different activist coalitions working together and individual people expressing their desire for progress through democratic channels. The protest by the youth climate movement described in the introduction is an example of such a collective response; students walking out en masse around the globe sent the message that young people are organized and serious about seeking a solution to climate change.

One of the author's principal theses is that neoliberalism and the unfettered capitalism it unleashed on the world caused a breakdown in society in which people were led to view the individual's needs as supreme. Similarly, these systems propagated the idea that individuals were incapable of bringing about change. (The weakening of the worker's union played a role in the...