Want to know what books Mary Robinson recommends on their reading list? We've researched interviews, social media posts, podcasts, and articles to build a comprehensive list of Mary Robinson's favorite book recommendations of all time.
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Stephen Humphreys and Mary Robinson | 3.50
As the effects of climate change continue to be felt, appreciation of its future transformational impact on numerous areas of public law and policy is set to grow. Among these, human rights concerns are particularly acute. They include forced mass migration, increased disease incidence and strain on healthcare systems, threatened food and water security, the disappearance and degradation of shelter, land, livelihoods and cultures, and the threat of conflict. This inquiry into the human rights dimensions of climate change looks beyond potential impacts to examine the questions raised by... more As the effects of climate change continue to be felt, appreciation of its future transformational impact on numerous areas of public law and policy is set to grow. Among these, human rights concerns are particularly acute. They include forced mass migration, increased disease incidence and strain on healthcare systems, threatened food and water security, the disappearance and degradation of shelter, land, livelihoods and cultures, and the threat of conflict. This inquiry into the human rights dimensions of climate change looks beyond potential impacts to examine the questions raised by climate change policies: accountability for extraterritorial harms; constructing reliable enforcement mechanisms; assessing redistributional outcomes; and allocating burdens, benefits, rights and duties among perpetrators and victims, both public and private. The book examines a range of so-far unexplored theoretical and practical concerns that international law and other scholars and policy-framers will find increasingly difficult to ignore. less 
Mary RobinsonI was proud to contribute the foreword for Human Rights and Climate Change, edited by Stephen Humphreys and published in 2008. It provided the first major analysis of the impact of climate change on human rights, and in particular on social and economic rights. In the foreword I said, ‘What this collection does for the first time is think through the human rights implications of climate change,... (Source)
Mary RobinsonI was proud to contribute the foreword for Human Rights and Climate Change, edited by Stephen Humphreys and published in 2008. It provided the first major analysis of the impact of climate change on human rights, and in particular on social and economic rights. In the foreword I said, ‘What this collection does for the first time is think through the human rights implications of climate change,... (Source)
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2
"Open this book and James Garvey is right there making real sense to you... in a necessary conversation, capturing you to the very end."-Ted Honderich, Grote Professor Emeritus of The Philosophy of Mind & Logic, University College London, UK.
James Garvey argues that the ultimate rationale for action on climate change cannot be simply economic, political, scientific or social, though our decisions should be informed by such things. Instead, climate change is largely a moral problem. What we should do about it depends on what matters to us and what we think is right. more "Open this book and James Garvey is right there making real sense to you... in a necessary conversation, capturing you to the very end."-Ted Honderich, Grote Professor Emeritus of The Philosophy of Mind & Logic, University College London, UK.
James Garvey argues that the ultimate rationale for action on climate change cannot be simply economic, political, scientific or social, though our decisions should be informed by such things. Instead, climate change is largely a moral problem. What we should do about it depends on what matters to us and what we think is right.
This book is an introduction to the ethics of climate change. It considers a little climate science and a lot of moral philosophy, ultimately finding a way into the many possible positions associated with climate change. It is also a call for action, for doing something about the moral demands placed on both governments and individuals by the fact of climate change. This is a book about choices, responsibility, and where the moral weight falls on our warming world. less Mary RobinsonThis was published in 2008 and gives us a philosopher’s viewpoint on climate change and the attendant responsibilities. The author argues that while we must be informed by the economic, social, scientific and political realities of climate change it is largely a moral problem: so that individual, state and multinational responses to climate change are a function of values. The book is a very good... (Source)
Mary RobinsonThis was published in 2008 and gives us a philosopher’s viewpoint on climate change and the attendant responsibilities. The author argues that while we must be informed by the economic, social, scientific and political realities of climate change it is largely a moral problem: so that individual, state and multinational responses to climate change are a function of values. The book is a very good... (Source)
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3
Mary RobinsonThis was published in 2004 and was, and still is, a fascinating insight into the impact of climate change on real people in their communities. Lynas introduces us to people from places varying from Britain and the Americas to China and islands in the South Pacific and spells out the inter-relationships between the waste-of-energy lifestyles of many in the developed world and the famine and water... (Source)
Mary RobinsonThis was published in 2004 and was, and still is, a fascinating insight into the impact of climate change on real people in their communities. Lynas introduces us to people from places varying from Britain and the Americas to China and islands in the South Pacific and spells out the inter-relationships between the waste-of-energy lifestyles of many in the developed world and the famine and water... (Source)
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4
World Commission On Environment and Development | 3.72
In 1983, the U.N. General Assembly created the World Commission on Environment and Development, an independent committee of twenty-two members, headed by Gro Harlem Brundtland, the Prime Minister of Norway. Designed to examine global environment and development to the year 2000 and beyond, the commission seeks to reassess critical problems, to formulate realistic proposals for solving them, and to raise the level of understanding and commitment to the issues of environment and development.
Rather than presenting a gloom and doom report about the destruction of natural resources, Our... more In 1983, the U.N. General Assembly created the World Commission on Environment and Development, an independent committee of twenty-two members, headed by Gro Harlem Brundtland, the Prime Minister of Norway. Designed to examine global environment and development to the year 2000 and beyond, the commission seeks to reassess critical problems, to formulate realistic proposals for solving them, and to raise the level of understanding and commitment to the issues of environment and development.
Rather than presenting a gloom and doom report about the destruction of natural resources, Our Common Future offers an agenda advocating the growth of economies based on policies that do not harm, and can even enhance, the environment. The commission recognizes that the time has come for a marriage of economy and ecology, in order to ensure the growth of human progress through development without bankrupting the resources of future generations.
less Mary RobinsonWhat is of particular interest to me now is that he and I share a very real and personal concern: what future awaits our grandchildren if the world does not take appropriate action – now? (Source)
Mary RobinsonWhat is of particular interest to me now is that he and I share a very real and personal concern: what future awaits our grandchildren if the world does not take appropriate action – now? (Source)
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5
In Storms of My Grandchildren, Dr. James Hansen—the nation’s leading scientist on climate issues—speaks out for the first time with the full truth about global warming: The planet is hurtling even more rapidly than previously acknowledged to a climatic point of no return.
Although the threat of human-caused climate change is now widely recognized, politicians have failed to connect policy with the science, responding instead with ineffectual remedies dictated by special interests. Hansen shows why President Obama’s solution, cap-and-trade, which Al Gore has signed on to, won’t... more In Storms of My Grandchildren, Dr. James Hansen—the nation’s leading scientist on climate issues—speaks out for the first time with the full truth about global warming: The planet is hurtling even more rapidly than previously acknowledged to a climatic point of no return.
Although the threat of human-caused climate change is now widely recognized, politicians have failed to connect policy with the science, responding instead with ineffectual remedies dictated by special interests. Hansen shows why President Obama’s solution, cap-and-trade, which Al Gore has signed on to, won’t work; why we must phase out all coal; and why 350 parts per million of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is a goal we must achieve if our children and grandchildren are to avoid global meltdown and the horrific storms of the book’s title. This urgent manifesto bucks conventional wisdom (including the Kyoto Protocol) and is sure to stir controversy, but Hansen—whose climate predictions have come to pass again and again, beginning in the 1980s when he first warned Congress about global warming—is the single most credible voice on the subject worldwide.
Hansen paints a devastating, all-too-realistic picture of what will happen in the near future, mere years and decades from now, if we follow the course we’re on. But he is also an optimist, showing that there is still time to do what we need to save the planet. Urgent, strong action is needed, and this book will be key in setting the agenda going forward to create a groundswell, a tipping point, to save humanity—and our grandchildren—from a dire fate more imminent than we had supposed. less 
Al GoreWhen the history of the climate crisis is written, Hansen will be seen as the scientist with the most powerful and consistent voice calling for intelligent action to preserve our planet's environment. (Source)
Mary RobinsonI’ve chosen Storms of my Grandchildren by the leading climate scientist James Hanson. Some 20 years ago, testifying in front of the US Congress, Hanson brought global warming to the world’s attention. What is of particular interest to me now is that he and I share a very real and personal concern; what future awaits our grandchildren if the world does not take appropriate action – NOW. (Source)
Mary RobinsonI’ve chosen Storms of my Grandchildren by the leading climate scientist James Hanson. Some 20 years ago, testifying in front of the US Congress, Hanson brought global warming to the world’s attention. What is of particular interest to me now is that he and I share a very real and personal concern; what future awaits our grandchildren if the world does not take appropriate action – NOW. (Source)
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