Beyond Environmental Ethics w/ Dr. William Chaloupka

Environmentalists and climate scientists have done great work raising public awareness of the risks of climate change, but in moralizing against consumption, in insisting that the global poor cannot live as we live without ecological collapse, and in insisting that organics, recycling, and public transit are moral acts, greens have unwittingly created a powerful cultural backlash. Polling shows that more Americans than ever before prioritize economic growth over environmental protection and say that news of global warming is being "exaggerated."

Professor William Chaloupka, will argue that environmentalists be more self-aware, stop seeing nature and science as stable foundations and sources of authority for their politics, and halt their moralizing about carbon footprints and the like, which alienates potential allies. Instead, Chaloupka says, greens must embrace a new cultural politics, one that is nimble, strategic, and able to change to meet new conditions.