Synopses & Reviews
We have released the genie from the bottle: climate change is coming, and theres no stopping it. The question, according to environmental economist Matthew E. Kahn, is not how were going to avoid a hotter future but how were going to adapt to it. In Climatopolis, Kahn argues that cities and regions will adapt to rising temperatures over time, slowly transforming our everyday lives as we change our behaviors and our surroundings. Taking the reader on a tour of the worlds cities from New York to Beijing to MumbaiKahns clear-eyed, engaging, and optimistic message presents a positive yet realistic picture of what our urban future will look like.
Review
Ray Fisman, co-author of Economic Gangsters"Figuring out why I disagree with Matt Kahn's arguments leaves me seeing the world in a different way. That's rare. And Kahn writes so well that it's always a fun ride regardless of where the journey ends. Climatopolis is no exception. Read it for one vision of our hot, humid, hazy future."
Richard Florida, author of Rise of the Creative Class, and Director of the Martin Prosperity Institute at the University of Toronto
"How will we cope with a hotter, more crowded, and spikier world of bigger and bigger cities? Let Matt Kahn's thoroughly researched and well-written Climatopolis be your guide to our collective urban future."
Review
Ray Fisman, co-author of Economic Gangsters"Figuring out why I disagree with Matt Kahn's arguments leaves me seeing the world in a different way. That's rare. And Kahn writes so well that it's always a fun ride regardless of where the journey ends. Climatopolis is no exception. Read it for one vision of our hot, humid, hazy future."
Richard Florida, author of Rise of the Creative Class, and Director of the Martin Prosperity Institute at the University of Toronto
"How will we cope with a hotter, more crowded, and spikier world of bigger and bigger cities? Let Matt Kahn's thoroughly researched and well-written Climatopolis be your guide to our collective urban future."
The Economist
"It is refreshing…to read books which look at the warming to come not as a frightful warning, nor as a fait accompli, but as something to which, at some levels of change, people will have to adaptand which in some settings they may adapt to rather well."
Edward L. Glaeser, New York Times Economix Blog
[E]ngaging and provocative.... Professor Kahns book provides a helpful middle ground between the extreme climate Cassandras and those who snort at climate change.”
Science News
[M]ore vivid and accessible than a typical policy tome on global warming. Perhaps many looming climate problems can be solved with a dose of the heady cocktail that is one part human ingenuity and one part profit motive.”
Foreign Policy
An increasingly realistic-looking thought experiment: What if we accept that environmental changes will occur, and look instead at how humanity would face a change in the planet's temperature?.... It would be wrong to downplay the role of market mechanisms in adapting to new environments. If indeed some form of climate change is inevitable, we will need to learn to adapt to the new conditions through responding to our own self-interest.”
Review
Ray Fisman, co-author of Economic Gangsters "Figuring out why I disagree with Matt Kahn's arguments leaves me seeing the world in a different way. That's rare. And Kahn writes so well that it's always a fun ride regardless of where the journey ends. Climatopolis is no exception. Read it for one vision of our hot, humid, hazy future."
Richard Florida, author of Rise of the Creative Class, and Director of the Martin Prosperity Institute at the University of Toronto
"How will we cope with a hotter, more crowded, and spikier world of bigger and bigger cities? Let Matt Kahn's thoroughly researched and well-written Climatopolis be your guide to our collective urban future." The Economist
“It is refreshing… to read books which look at the warming to come not as a frightful warning, nor as a fait accompli, but as something to which, at some levels of change, people will have to adapt—and which in some settings they may adapt to rather well.”
Edward L. Glaeser, New York Times Economix Blog
“[E]ngaging and provocative… Professor Kahn’s book provides a helpful middle ground between the extreme climate Cassandras and those who snort at climate change.”
Science News
“…[M]ore vivid and accessible than a typical policy tome on global warming. Perhaps many looming climate problems can be solved with a dose of the heady cocktail that is one part human ingenuity and one part profit motive.”
Foreign Policy
“…an increasingly realistic-looking thought experiment: What if we accept that environmental changes will occur, and look instead at how humanity would face a change in the planet's temperature? . . . .it would be wrong to downplay the role of market mechanisms in adapting to new environments. If indeed some form of climate change is inevitable, we will need to learn to adapt to the new conditions through responding to our own self-interest.”
Synopsis
One of the world's leading urban and environmental economists argues that cities and regions will adapt to rising temperatures over time, slowly transforming our everyday lives as we change our behaviors and our surroundings.
Synopsis
One of the worlds leading urban and environmental economists tells us what our lives will be like when climate change arrives
About the Author
Matthew E. Kahn, one of the worlds leading experts on both cities and the economics of the environment, is a Professor at the UCLA Institute of the Environment, the UCLA Department of Economics, and the UCLA Department of Public Policy. He is also research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. Before joining the UCLA faculty in January 2007, he taught at Columbia University and the Fletcher School at Tufts University. He has served as a Visiting Professor at Harvard and Stanford. He blogs on environmental and urban topics at greeneconomics.blogspot.comone of the Wall Street Journals top 25 economics blogs.