THE MINISTRY FOR THE FUTURE

This is an amazing book, going far and wide around the many fights, possibilities and opportunities there are in saving ourselves and all other life on this planet. Thoroughly realistic, both hopeful and scary.

Also a great introduction to post capitalism. KSR presents reality in a manner that demands one to reckon with the present, while giving us optimistic pathways for a future.

It's pretty overrated book. Fearmongering and again having anti India outlook. Would have liked if it at least had apocalyptic scenarios.

The book's author seems inspired by the far-left and evangelical concepts and rushed to blame India for climate change. He totally ignored the calamities in Europe and the US due to climate change and o only focused on painting an evil picture of India. Also talked directly about regime change India, basically to achieve his bosses Anti-india narratives.

Nothing would stop fear mongering white men with a mission at hand, calling them as heros and India as a victim. But wait... they dont know that history has the reverse in store. a bad book with bad taste

This book is a work of genius. I should declare immediately that I am a ‘doomer’. I consider that humanity is now too far down the road of climate altering action and general resource overshoot to make the effective U-turn that most fervently hope to be possible.The book is constructed as a very clever series of mostly short chapters that both educate and keep the plot moving.Some chapters follow the main characters as they struggle creatively and mightily to force the entrenched powers-that-be to take an increasingly more radical approach to the efforts needed to turn spaceship Earth around from unmitigated disaster. Other chapters provide haunting and jarring vignettes in the form of first-person accounts of events occurring around the world. Interleaved with the above are short, informative and insightful essays on various relevant topics such as capitalist economics, international politics. PTSD, geoengineering, climate refugees, species extinction and alternative economic mechanisms.The titular organization which came to be known colloquially as ‘The Ministry for the Future’ is started as a quasi-independent spin-off from the United Nations. Its charter was to represent, on the world stage, the future generations of humans (current children included) as if they were a significant country and constituency. To give them a voice.The book begins with Frank May, an aid worker in India, who is caught up in an extremely lethal heatwave. This event is quite traumatic, and it kills about twenty million people. The shock waves from this event set a lot of things in motion including a very bold and radical action taken unilaterally by India. Multiple geoengineering efforts are undertaken. A radical restructuring of the worlds deeply entrenched financial systems is both persuaded and forced with much pushback from financiers, central bankers, oligarchs and the wealthy elites.Eventually more than 100 million refugees all over the world are on the move and bold solutions have to be found for them. Airships replace planes for air travel and solar/wind powered multi-masted schooners reappear on the oceans. Large scale wildlife corridors are established all over the planet. The earth is allowed to heal.As a doomer and pessimist, I have to say that I was very impressed. This book gave me a lot of new perspectives. It made me feel a small chink of hope. Robinsons prose is excellent and is a pleasure to read. His arguments are mostly quite solid. However, Robinson often seems rather naïve (or else prone to wishful thinking) as to the feasibility of getting the entrenched power-elites to radically rethink their world views.On the other hand, perhaps the power of the masses really can be brought to bear if enough people wake up.As he says, “When push comes to shove, it’s always humans looking at humans; and when a thousand people stand looking at one person, it’s clear who has more power”.In the end, I was convinced that these are the kinds of things that we (humanity as a whole) *should* be doing and indeed should have started doing long ago. The book is particularly realistic in the sense that the events described take place over a period of some forty years. There is no quick fix to our predicament if indeed there is a fix at all.This is a significant book. The fact that it made a doomer like me stop and think “What if that could still work?” and “m..m..maybe” surprised me. Highly recommended.

This book is extremely interesting and engrossing. Even if you are not familiar or very interested in climate change the scenarios and characters Robinson includes in the book make it a very compelling story. The book is also incredibly well written, allowing all readers to understand any of the more technical economic or geoengineering components of the book.

Uma ficção social e ecológica sobre como as mudanças climáticas vão mudar o mundo. Um livro necessário para compreender não apenas para onde o mundo está indo, mas para onde tem que ir

De pesadilla inicial a posibles soluciones al cambio climático que, aunque las presenta en forma de ficción, podrían ser viables de verdad. Ojalá todos los políticos y banqueros leyeran este libro.

An incredibly detailed, well-researched and thankfully hopeful story full of practical ideas about how humanity might deal with climate change. Take the time to read it, it really might give you hope about the future of the planet. If people can write books with so much passion and creativity, they can find solutions to our problems.