Sociology 130SD: The World in 2050: Sustainable Development and Its Alternatives

Syllabus for Spring 2017, course first taught in 2016 Visionary climate justice scholar-activist Naomi Klein has said: “There is no more potent weapon in the battle against fossil fuels than the creation of real alternatives.” For sociologist Constance Lever-Tracy: “We must ultimately aim for a thorough going de-carbonisation, a halt to all emissions, by a complete revolution in the way we produce and live.” This course starts with the current crisis of the Earth and humanity, marked by economic insecurity, a lack of faith in political parties, pervasive cultures of violence, and now, the wild card that makes them all scarier – climate change. But this course is about hope, imagination, and the roles all of us could play in building a far better world by 2050. Along the way we will encounter such ideas as sustainable development, degrowth, transition towns, resilience, and a slew of other alternatives to the present system, and we will read some of the best writing on these and other topics by their inventors, critics, activists, and others, including essays, fiction, and films, with a startlingly innovative culminating exercise or project at the end of the quarter!