Natural Catastrophe - by Brian Elliott (Paperback)

About the Book

Brian Elliott persuasively argues that climate change is not a natural phenomenon but a political phenomenon: a symptom of neoliberal governance. This explains why environmental concern has increasingly been framed as a consumer responsibility issue rather than as a matter of structural social-political transformation.

Book Synopsis

Brian Elliott persuasively argues that climate change is not a natural phenomenon but a political phenomenon: a symptom of neoliberal governance. This helps us to understand how, across wealthy liberal democracies, environmental concern has increasingly been framed as a consumer responsibility issue rather than as a matter of structural social-political transformation.
Thinking of a world truly beyond climate change requires us to reimagine the state beyond its current neoliberal configuration. Elliott argues that, in order to achieve this, environmental politics in the west needs to renew the Marxist challenge to the global market's benign production of social utility and construct a new non-apocalyptic politics of nature.

From the Back Cover

'Natural Catastrophe is an original contribution to the growing field of the environmental humanities. It offers an unorthodox reckoning with the narrative of natural catastrophe that sustains both environmental and neoliberal solutions to the problem of climate change and calls for a return to the radical experiments in political thought seen in the nineteenth century.' Janet Stewart, Durham University A lively introduction to the social and political dimensions of the current climate change and sustainability debates The voices proclaiming that climate change is a natural catastrophe grow ever more strident. This book offers the persuasive alternative argument that climate change is in fact a profoundly political phenomenon and a symptom of neoliberal governance. Viewing it as such helps us to understand how, across wealthy liberal democracies, environmental concern has increasingly been framed as a consumer responsibility issue rather than as a matter of structural social-political transformation. Thinking of a world truly beyond climate change requires us to reimagine the state beyond its current neoliberal configuration. This book argues that, in order to achieve this, environmental politics in the West needs to renew the Marxist challenge to the global market's benign production of social utility and construct a new non-apocalyptic politics of nature. Brian Elliott is Assistant Professor at Portland State University. His work applies contemporary European philosophy to problems in architecture, art, politics and the environment. Cover image: Snow storm, steam-boat off a harbor's mouth, 1842, by William Turner (c) akg-images / De Agostini / M. Carrieri Cover design: [EUP logo] edinburghuniversitypress.com [please note new web address] ISBN (cover): 978-1-4744-1049-6 ISBN (PPC): 978-1-4744-1048-9 Barcode

Review Quotes

Natural Catastrophe is an original contribution to the growing field of the environmental humanities. It offers an unorthodox reckoning with the narrative of natural catastrophe that sustains both environmental and neoliberal solutions to the problem of climate change and calls for a return to the radical experiments in political thought seen in the nineteenth century.--Janet Stewart, Durham University

About the Author

Brian Elliott is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Portland State University. He is the author of Benjamin for Architects (Routledge, 2011) and Constructing Community (Lexington, 2010). His research is situated at the intersection of political and urban theory.