Environment at the Crossroads: Aiming for a Sustainable Future

As individuals and as societies, we are living in dangerous and challenging times. The 2009 Gulbenkian Conference in Lisbon, 'Environment at the Crossroads: Aiming for a sustainable future', was designed to address the crucial issues we face, from the current international economic malaise to the state of the global environment. Anticipating the 2009 United Nations Copenhagen Conference, the conference papers collected in Environment at the Crossroads engage with climate change, biodiversity, environmental policy and the ethics of consumption. The writers are leaders in the fields of science, politics, economics and environmental studies whose intellectual clarity offers authoritative responses to the crisis we face.

Incorporating a range of disciplines and international perspectives, Environment at the Crossroads is an ambitious survey of the state of our planet today, and the urgent necessity to work towards a fair and strong international climate agreement. Only then will humanity be able to harness the creativity and ingenuity necessary to make the transition towards sustainability. What is at stake is nothing less than the quest for survival.