As the World Burns: The New Generation of Activists and the Landmark Legal Fight Against Climate Change

by Lee van der Voo

Overview

“The story of Juliana v. United States and the committed young people behind it will give you hope in the next generation.” —Elizabeth Kolbert, author of The Sixth Extinction

Do our children have a right to inherit a livable planet? Is the government obliged to protect it?

Twenty-one young people from across America have sued the federal government over climate change, charging that actions promoting a fossil fuel economy violate their constitutional rights to life, liberty, and property. Their trial could be the civil rights trial of the century, but the government has used arcane legal tactics to stymie its progress at every turn.
 
As the World Burns follows the plight of the young plaintiffs, chronicling their legal battle as their childhoods are consumed by another year of drought and wildfire, floods and hurricanes, and the most tumultuous political season in modern history.

The plaintiffs wrenchingly describe personal experiences with recurring “thousand-year” floods, wildfire smoke so thick they can’t ride a bike to school, drought that threatens family farms, and disappearing coastlines that send waves lapping ominously at their doors. Along the way, journalist Lee van der Voo weaves their experience into a broader narrative of America, where politics and policy threaten the very existence of our youth and our way of life. While acknowledgement of climate change seems increasingly optional in an America resistant to inconvenience, what she found was a group of young people who could indeed articulate, not only their own intense fears about the climate impacts already upending their lives, but a clear understanding of how deeply counter-interests were entrenched in their government and society. And how personal that was beginning to feel.
 
And yet, theirs is ultimately a story of hope.

As the World Burns is climate breakdown like you’ve never seen it—through the eyes of the young.
 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781604699982
Publisher:	Timber Press, Incorporated
Publication date:	09/29/2020
Pages:	284
Sales rank:	566,661
Product dimensions:	6.30(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Lee van der Voo is an award-winning investigative and environmental journalist. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, The Atlantic, Slate, The Guardian, and others. Lee’s reporting has received the Logan fellowship, the Alicia Patterson Foundation Fellowship, an Investigative Reporters and Editors Award, and the Lizzie Grossman Grant for Environmental Health Reporting. Her first book, The Fish Market, won an Oregon Book Award for General Nonfiction. 

Table of Contents

1 October 29, 2018: A Crisis at Hand, a Nation Consumed 9

2 "The Country That We Want to Live In" 28

3 "Not a Problem Individuals Can Solve" 50

4 "You Don't Have the Right to Tell an Oil Company No" 66

5 Radical Corrective Streak 84

6 The Furious Paper War and the Direction of the Nation 98

7 Soon to Be Disrupted by Wind and Rain 114

8 "The Other Side of the So-Called 'End of History'" 132

9 November 2018: Doubling Down on Backward 151

10 Crashing the Official Narrative 164

11 The Zenith of Ridiculous 182

12 A Dislocation of the Soul 196

13 "I Will Be with You in the Streets" 211

14 "The Constitutional Question of This Century" 220

15 White Noise in a Land That Doesn't Care 230

16 November 4, 2019: Purposeful Procession 240

Epilogue 255

Acknowledgments 256

Appendix: About the Youth Plaintiffs 260

Endnotes 267

Index 291

Editorial Reviews

The young people who brought the Juliana case are each remarkable, and together they paint a portrait of the next America, the one demanding real action so they too can have a working future on a working planet.” —Bill McKibben, author of Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out?
 
“A gripping account of the Juliana case—and the twenty-one young plaintiffs who dared sue the US government for inaction on climate change. This book uncovers one of the most powerful forces shaping the contemporary world: youth activism.” —Liz Carlisle, author of Lentil Underground and winner of the Green Prize for Sustainable Literature
 
“This is no ordinary lawsuit—and no ordinary book. Reams will be written about the legal proceedings of Our Children’s Trust, but Lee van der Voo gives us the fully human story, exploring the emotional and psychological dimensions of each amazing young person’s participation. The lawsuit emerges as a defining moment in their lives—and in the life of this country.” —Dominique Browning, senior director and cofounder of Moms Clean Air Force
 
“Teenagers, trials, technicalities, Trump, and this ‘oncoming tsunami’ create a haunting tale of how climate change is increasingly disrupting our planet's future.” —Margaret Lowman, director of TREE Foundation, National Geographic Explorer
 
“The question of climate change is a simple one: Will our young people be allowed a future? This book details the struggles of young activists as they battle in the courts for the most basic right of all—the right to survive.” —Mark Lynas, author of Our Final Warning: Six Degrees of Climate Emergency
 
“A deeply human account of an extraordinary group of young people, a cast of characters whose courage, anguish, and idealism guide them through battle against entrenched power and a broken political system. Gripping, essential reading.” —Beth Gardiner, author of Choked: Life and Breath in the Age of Air Pollution
 
“A gripping account of the Juliana case—and the twenty-one young plaintiffs who dared sue the US government for inaction on climate change. This book uncovers one of the most powerful forces shaping the contemporary world: youth activism.” —Liz Carlisle, author of Lentil Underground and winner of the Green Prize for Sustainable Literature
 
“Lee van der Voo brings us into the lives and communities of the youth behind the case that exposed the inequitable impacts of climate change and elevated pressure for government action. The bravery of these young people and the urgency they sense should inspire us all in the global effort to create a more sustainable future.” —Lauren E. Oakes, author of In Search of the Canary Tree
 
“A well-paced, conversational narrative…a comprehensive look at the motivating factors that caused young adults to sue the government for a better future.” —Kirkus

“In 2015, 21 youth activists—including many from the Northwest—sued the federal government over its perpetuation of climate change. Oregon journalist Lee van der Voo follows the case, witnessing the fight for justice through the stories of the young.” —Seattle Met

“Like the repercussions of climate change itself, the book is heartbreaking as it’s not just the story of a lawsuit, it’s the story of the effects global warming has had on these children—some of whom have grown into adulthood over the years of the legal battle—and their communities.” —Eugene Weekly

“Readers who want to help move the needle beyond climate change denial can learn from the young people in As the World Burns.” —The Coast Weekend

“The heart of the book is the human story…it should inspire all Americans to consider what must be done to maintain a livable planet for the next, and the next, generation.” —Alaska Dispatch-News

From the Publisher

09/11/2020

Journalist Van Der Voo introduces readers to young environmental activists who filed the 2015 lawsuit Juliana vs. United States, hoping it would force the country to address climate change. The plaintiffs at that time ranged from eight to 19 years old. The lawsuit, using public trust doctrine, charges that the federal government has infringed upon the right of the plaintiffs to a future livable planet through its support of industries that lead to greenhouse gas emissions. A judge in Oregon declined to dismiss the case, but the Ninth Circuit Court later dismissed it. The attorneys for the plaintiffs filed an appeal, so while the young people profiled in this book are growing up, the case drags on. The author takes readers inside the lives of some of the young activists to show how climate change is already affecting them through phenomena such as floods in Louisiana, drought on Native American lands, and wildfires in California. The narrative follows the legal case to the present day, when it was dismissed by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in early 2020. The nonprofit Our Children's Trust is representing their case pro bono with help from climatologist James Hansen; their latest appeal is still pending. VERDICT Recommended for those interested in environmental justice and youth advocacy.—Caren Nichter, Univ. of Tennessee at Martin

Library Journal

2020-07-08
The story of the Juliana v. United States case regarding climate change.

In 2015, three years before Greta Thunberg became a household name, 21 young plaintiffs filed a lawsuit again the U.S. government demanding the “constitutional right to a stable climate. Its charge is that the government’s actions to cause climate change violate their civil rights to life, liberty, and property. Not only that, but also that the government has known about the risks of climate change for decades and persisted in helping to cause it anyway, failing to implement its own plans to regulate greenhouse gases while subsidizing, authorizing, and permitting a fossil fuel energy system that worsens global warm­ing every day.” Environmental journalist van der Voo spent more than a year researching and interviewing these young adults, many of whom are too young to vote, getting the behind-the-scenes moments that explain what they hope to achieve and why they continue to fight despite facing adversity at almost every turn. In this well-paced, conversational narrative, the author shares the youths’ small triumphs and their vast disappointments as the case progressed toward the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals and a potential ruling. Throughout, van der Voo includes examples of the variety of issues that drove the diligent work of the plaintiffs and their legal team—e.g., the extreme heat and drought that led to vast forest fires such as the one that destroyed Paradise, California, or the rising sea levels that are affecting residents of the Marshall Islands. For those eager to learn the backstory of the case, the author delivers a solid synopsis, and she also includes enough meaningful human-interest stories to keep the pages turning even when the outcome of the situation is already known.

A comprehensive look at the motivating factors that caused young adults to sue the government for a better future.

Kirkus Reviews

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