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Leadership in Disaster
Learning for a Future with Global Climate Change
By Raymond Murphy
This century, the world is facing what is probably its biggest challenge to date: climate change, or the unequivocal rise in temperatures across the globe. The results include high levels of extinction, the melting of the polar ice caps and rise in sea levels, the destruction of ecosystems and systems of sustenance, and an increased risk of natural disasters. In 2007, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported that as temperatures around the world are likely to rise at least an average of 2˚ C over the next few decades, the risk of both natural and societal catastrophe will also rise dramatically.
In this context, Raymond Murphy argues that learning from how we adapted and coped with natural disasters in the last few decades is crucial. Learning, he argues, is “especially important if global warming turns out as predicted by consensus science to be a huge environmental problem affecting all others, with extreme weather disasters and slow-onset calamities the outcome”.
In Leadership in Disaster: Learning for a Future with Global Climate Change, Murphy studies the response of Canadian leaders to the most costly disaster in the country’s history- the 1998 ice storm- in the hopes of gaining a better understanding of effective leadership methods in situations of extreme weather. Interviewing major decision makers from Quebec, Ontario, Maine, and New York State, Murphy asks questions about the vulnerabilities of modern societies, the interaction between societal practice and nature, governmental efficacy, transparency, and decision-making, and our ability to prevent and mitigate future disasters. His book includes a comparison to more traditional Amish communities who were able to deal much more effectively with the same weather events. Throughout, Murphy studies the political, economic, ethical and cultural vulnerabilities which underlie our ability to cope with and adapt to climate change, and how we can draw on that knowledge to better face the challenges of the coming decades.
Raymond Murphy is emeritus professor of sociology, University of Ottawa, president of the Environment and Society Research Committee of the International Sociological Association, and the author of numerous books. He will be speaking at the American Sociological Association (ASA) annual meeting, which takes place in San Francisco from August 8-11th. He will also be speaking at the European Sociological Association (ESA) conference in Lisbon, from the 2-5th of September, and will be a keynote speaker at the German Environmental Summit in Leipzig, from November 5-7th.
I agree that we should always take precautions and learn from the past. However, I really don’t believe that “Global Warming” has a “consensus” in Science. I believe many scientist views on climate change are being censured.