Fleeing Vesuvius
Feasta is launching its new book, Fleeing Vesuvius: Overcoming the risks of economic and environmental collapse, on Saturday, November 20th, in Dublin. Our most important book to date, it draws together many of the ideas our members have developed over the years and applies them to a single question - how can we bring the world out of the mess in which it finds itself?
Fleeing Vesuvius confronts this mess squarely, analysing its many aspects: the looming scarcity of essential resources such as fossil fuels - the lifeblood of the world economy; the financial crisis in Ireland and elsewhere; the collapse of the housing bubble; the urgent need for food security; and the enormous challenge of dealing with climate change.
The solutions it puts forward involve changes to our economy and financial system, but they go much further: this substantial, wide-ranging book also looks at the changes needed in how we think, how we use the land and how we relate to others, particularly those where we live.
While it doesn't discount the complexity of the problems we face, Fleeing Vesuvius is practical and fundamentally optimistic. It will arm readers with the confidence and knowledge they need to develop new, workable alternatives to the old-style expanding economy and its supporting systems. It's a book that can be read all the way through or used as a resource to dip in and out of.
You can find out about the book's 27 authors here. The table of contents includes summaries of each article, and you can also read the preface by Eamon Ryan, the Irish Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources, and the introduction by Richard Douthwaite.
If you would like to get your hands on a copy of Fleeing Vesuvius before the launch, you have the opportunity to order it online. From now til November 11th you can order directly from us (with free p+p within Ireland or a 3 euro discount on p+p outside Ireland.)
You can pay via PayPal on the Feasta website. If you live in Ireland and would prefer to pay by cheque, send your address and a cheque/PO/bank draft (payable to Feasta) for €20 per copy to the address below.
Of course it may suit you better to buy copies in person at the launch on November 20th (details of this will follow shortly). If you live in the United States or Canada, you'll be interested to know that New Society Publishers has just bought the North American publishing rights and are rushing to get the book into shops there before Christmas.
We are very excited about this book. We hope that you will be excited about it too.
Feasta, AE House, Main St., Cloughjordan, Co. Tipperary, Ireland.
