Confronting Consumption

Download or read book Confronting Consumption written by Thomas Princen and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2002 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Essays that offer ecological, social, and political perspectives on the problem of overconsumption.

Download or read book Consumer Culture and Modernity written by Don Slater and published by Polity. This book was released on 1999-02-03 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides a comprehensive introduction to the issues, concepts and theories through which people have tried to understand consumer culture throughout the modern period, and puts the current state of thinking into a broader context. Thematically organized, the book shows how the central aspects of consumer culture - such as needs, choice, identity, status, alienation, objects, culture - have been debated within modern theories, from those of earlier thinkers such as Marx and Simmel to contemporary forms of post-structuralism and postmodernism. This approach introduces consumer culture as a subject which - far from being of narrow or recent interest - is intimately tied to the central issues of modern times and modern social thought. With its reviews of major theorists set within a full account of the development of the subject, this book should be of interest to undergraduate and postgraduate students in the many disciplines which now study consumer culture, including communications and cultural studies, anthropology and history.

Download or read book China Confronts Climate Change written by Peter H. Koehn and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-12-14 with total page 275 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: China is an integral actor in any movement that will stabilize the global climate at conditions suited to sustainable development for its own population and for people living around the world. Assessments of China’s climatic-system consequences, impact, and responsibilities need to take into account the strengths, weaknesses, and potential of subnational governments, non-governmental organizations, transnational non-state connections, and the urban populace in reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. A multitude of recent local initiatives that have engaged subnational China in actions that mitigate emissions can be enhanced by powerful framings that appeal to citizen concerns about air pollution and health conditions. China Confronts Climate Change offers the first fully comprehensive account of China’s response to climate change, based on engagement with the global climate governance literature and current debates over responsibility along with specific insights into the Chinese context. Responsible implementation of any overarching climate agreement depends on expanding China’s subnational contributions. To remain fully informed about GHG-emissions mitigation, China watchers and climate-change monitors need to pay close attention to bottom-up developments. The book provides a valuable contemporary resource for students, scholars, and policy leaders at all levels of governance who are concerned with climate change, environmental politics, and sustainable urban development.

Download or read book Sustainable Consumption, Ecology and Fair Trade written by Edwin Zaccaï and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2007-01-30 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This timely volume discusses the debates concerning sustainable consumption and the environment. Sustainable consumption stands as a wide objective that attracts a growing attention within sustainable development policy circles and academic research. The contributors examine a range of interesting and relevant case studies including: household energy consumption, sustainable welfare, Fair Trade, Oxfam Worldshops, cotton farming and consumer organizations. Sustainable Consumption takes an interdisciplinary approach and is well-balanced, presenting theoretical debates as well as empirical evidence in order to: characterize the basic problems and determiners of an evolution towards, and the obstacles to, more sustainable consumption patterns produce knowledge on the profile of consumers sensitive, and not sensitive, to these issues explore realistic modes of interaction and innovation for changes in which consumers are involved. This text will be of interest to students and scholars of politics, environment studies and sociology.

Download or read book The Global Environment written by Regina S. Axelrod and published by CQ Press. This book was released on 2014-02-25 with total page 441 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The new edition of Regina S. Axelrod and Stacy D. VanDeveer’s award-winning volume, The Global Environment: Institutions, Law, and Policy, reflects the latest events in global environmental politics and sustainable development while providing balanced coverage of the key institutions, issues, laws, and policies. The volume has been reorganized to better highlight global environmental institutions, major state and non-state actors, and includes an expanded set of cases such as climate change, biodiversity, hazardous chemicals, ozone layer depletion, nuclear energy and resource consumption. Based on reviewer feedback, the new edition broadens coverage of the growing global environmental agenda and explores the relationships between states, NGOs, and international organizations.

Download or read book The Shadows of Consumption written by Peter Dauvergne and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2010-09-24 with total page 333 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An environmentalist maps the hidden costs of overconsumption in a globalized world by tracing the environmental consequences of five commodities. The Shadows of Consumption gives a hard-hitting diagnosis: many of the earth's ecosystems and billions of its people are at risk from the consequences of rising consumption. Products ranging from cars to hamburgers offer conveniences and pleasures; but, as Peter Dauvergne makes clear, global political and economic processes displace the real costs of consumer goods into distant ecosystems, communities, and timelines, tipping into crisis people and places without the power to resist. In The Shadows of Consumption, Peter Dauvergne maps the costs of consumption that remain hidden in the shadows cast by globalized corporations, trade, and finance. Dauvergne traces the environmental consequences of five commodities: automobiles, gasoline, refrigerators, beef, and harp seals. In these fascinating histories we learn, for example, that American officials ignored warnings about the dangers of lead in gasoline in the 1920s; why China is now a leading producer of CFC-free refrigerators; and how activists were able to stop Canada's commercial seal hunt in the 1980s (but are unable to do so now). Dauvergne's innovative analysis allows us to see why so many efforts to manage the global environment are failing even as environmentalism is slowly strengthening. He proposes a guiding principle of “balanced consumption” for both consumers and corporations. We know that we can make things better by driving a high-mileage car, eating locally grown food, and buying energy-efficient appliances; but these improvements are incremental, local, and insufficient. More crucial than our individual efforts to reuse and recycle will be reforms in the global political economy to reduce the inequalities of consumption and correct the imbalance between growing economies and environmental sustainability.

Download or read book Waste Management and Sustainable Consumption written by Karin M. Ekström and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-12-17 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The accelerated pace of global consumption over the past decades has meant that governments across the world are now faced with significant challenges in dealing with the dramatically increased volume of waste. While research on waste management has previously focused on finding technological solutions to the problem, this book uniquely examines the social and cultural views of waste, shedding new light on the topic by emphasising the consumer perspective throughout. Drawing on a wide variety of disciplines including environmental, economic, social and cultural theories, the book presents philosophical reflections, practical examples and potential solutions to the problem of increasing waste. It analyses and compares case studies from countries such as Sweden, Japan, the USA, India, Nigeria and Qatar, bringing out valuable insights for the international community and generating a critical discussion on how we can move towards a more sustainable society. This book will be of great interest to post-graduate students and researchers in environmental policy, waste management, social marketing and consumer behaviour, as well as policymakers and practitioners in consumer issues and business.