More information for

Saleem Ali, October 2 [Fall 2009]

Treasures of the Earth: Need, Greed, and Sustainable Future

Dr. Saleem Ali's upcoming book, Treasures of the Earth: Need, Greed, and a Sustainable Future, will be published on October 27 -- join us on October 2 for a preview.

Here's some more information from a recent press release about the book:

Would the world be a better place if human societies, especially the most affluent ones, simply curbed their hunger for material goods? In Treasures of the Earth: Need, Greed, and a Sustainable Future, Saleem Ali argues that the human desire for the earth's mineral resources—our "treasure impulse"--cannot be so easily dismissed. While this impulse far too often yields environmental destruction and social inequity, Ali argues, it can also fuel creativity, the desire for discovery, and needed economic development. Properly channeled, the treasure impulse might actually propel us toward a fairer and better world.

Treasures of the Earth is in part a response to narrow and heated arguments in the resource wars, and it challenges those in hostile camps to consider a more nuanced view. While acknowledging the problems caused by resource extraction today, Ali offers hope that natural resource policy might become a tool for tackling seminal issues of poverty around the world, and he provides pragmatic guidance for reaching this ambitious goal.

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