This book does not set out once more to raise the alarm to encourage us to take radical measures to head off climate chaos. There have been any number of books and reports in recent years explaining just how dire the future looks and how little time we have left to act. This book is about why we have ignored those warnings, and why it is now too late. It is a book about the frailties of the human species as expressed in both the institutions we built and the psychological dispositions that have led us on the path of self-destruction. It is about our strange obsessions, our hubris, and our penchant for avoiding the facts. It is the story of a battle within us between the forces that should have caused us to protect the Earth - our capacity to reason and our connection to Nature - and those that, in the end, have won out - our greed, materialism and alienation from Nature. And it is about the 21st century consequences of these failures. Clive Hamilton is author of the bestselling Affluenza and Growth Fetish, of Scorcher, and most recently Freedom Paradox.

Reviews

'Listen to this Requiem and weep, if it helps. False hope is as dangerous as despair. But don't get mired in helplessness. Above all, Requiem is a call to arms; to the urgent task of overhauling democracy in pursuit of survival. At stake, the biggest prize of all: our own humanity.' Tim Jackson, author of Prosperity Without Growth 'I am afraid Clive Hamilton has it right about climate change - deeply afraid. Requiem is a brave and searingly honest book by a brilliant scholar. Ignoring it will only make a bad situation worse, so, please, read this book now.' James Gustave Speth, author of The Bridge at the Edge of the World: Capitalism, the Environment and Crossing from Crisis to Sustainability and Dean Emeritus, Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies 'Requiem for a Species is a remarkable publication which brings together the scientific imperatives of taking action in the field of climge. Hamilton highlights the political inertia which is currently acting as a roadblock. In the wake of the weak outcome of Copenhagen, this book assumes added significance in breaking the resistance to the truth about climate change.' R K Pachauri, Chair, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Director-General, TERI 'I find it hard to imagine what life would be like if I had genuinely come to the irrevocable conclusion that it was too late to do anything serious about preventing runaway climate change? For me, this ongoing internal dialogue gets a little bit more painful, every year ? And having just finished reading Clive Hamilton's excellent (but deeply disturbing!) Requiem for a Species, I'm now going to have to think it all through all over again.' Jonathon Porritt, Founder, Forum for the Future, and author of Capitalism As if the World Matters 'Requiem offers an insightful and informative look at why the human species can't come to terms with a chan...