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Naomi Klein: ‘We Face a Series of Radical Options’

Naomi Klein: ‘We Face a Series of Radical Options’

An exclusive Tyee preview of Klein’s sold-out climate talk in Vancouver.

Naomi Klein

Naomi Klein: ‘Steady as she goes’ is not an option.

For anyone with even a passing knowledge of climate change, Naomi Klein needs no introduction. Her 2014 bestseller This Changes Everything was described as “the most momentous and contentious environmental book since Silent Spring” by the New York Times. And its central message that climate change is a symptom of our broken economic system has become impossible to ignore. Last year, it got her an invitefrom Pope Francis himself to lead a climate forum with his senior advisor. So when SFU Public Square announced that Klein would be speaking tonight, March 11, at Vancouver’s Vogue Theatre, the event promptly sold out.

Earlier this week The Tyee chatted at length with Klein about the pivotal moment in history we are now living in. There are only a few short decades left to achieve the goal agreed to at the Paris climate talks of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels. (Which is considered safer than the less ambitious two degrees goal accepted at Copenhagen). To do so would mean a full transition off fossil fuels by 2050. But if we fail, a multi-metre sea level rise could wreak enough social and economic havoc to “make the planet ungovernable,” according toformer NASA climatologist James Hansen.

Which is why Klein is convinced that the only options we have left are radical. Read on in this exclusive Tyee interview to find out why hope is one of them. Her remarks are edited for length and clarity.

On what the Paris climate talks really achieved:

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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