Hard Green: Saving the Environment from the Environmentalists: A Conservative Manifesto FROM THE PUBLISHER
A strongly-argued critique of environmentalism from the right - the conservativeﾽs answer to Al Goreﾽs Earth in the Balance.Libertarian activist Peter Huber argues that liberal or "Soft Green" environmental policies do exactly the opposite of what they intend, and lays out the conservative or Hard Green approach to the problem. While both groups share the larger objectives, the Hard Greens disagree with and reject most of what the Softs diagnose as the source of despoliation and environmental decay, and accordingly reject most of the solutions that Softs prescribe. Chapter by chapter, Hard Green takes on the big issues of environmental discourse from scarcity and pollution to efficiency and waste disposal. Designed to radically change the terms of environmental debate, Hard Green will be a manifesto for every conservative who cares about the environment. This book sets out the case for Hard Green, a conservative environmental agenda. Modern environmentalism, Peter Huber argues, destroys the environment. Captured as it has been by the Soft Green oligarchy of scientists, regulators, and lawyers, modern environmentalism does not conserve forests, oceans, lakes, and streams - it hastens their destruction. For all its scientific pretension, Soft Green is not green at all. Its effects are the opposites of green. This book lays out the alternative: a return to Yellowstone and the National Forests, the original environmentalism of Theodore Roosevelt and the conservation movement. Chapter by chapter, Hard Green takes on the big issues of environmental discourse from scarcity and pollution to efficiency and waste disposal. This is the Hard Green manifesto: Rediscover T.R. Reaffirm the conservationist ethic. Expose the Soft Green fallacy. Reverse the Soft Green agenda. Save the environment from the environmentalists.
"Hard Green...moves the environmental debate beyond the trenches that the right and the left have been defending for two decades. Those in either camp who approach it with a halfway open mind may find that after reading Peter Huber, the idea of a new approach no longer sounds so crazy." -Chicago Tribune
"Mr. Huber persuasively and cleverly punctures conventional thinking." -The Wall Street Journal
"[Huber is an] excellent writer and provocative thinker." -Reason Magazine
"Peter Huber's brilliant exploration of the ideology of environmentalism takes the breath away by its ingenuity, intensity, and polemical artistry. It is the richest contribution ever made to the greening of the political mind." -William F. Buckley, Jr., Founder and Editor-in-Chief of The National Review and Recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom
"Peter Huberﾽs Hard Green will be a landmark in thinking about the environment. It is wise, witty, and wonderfully well written and is essential reading for all who care about the environment. All of my 30 years experience in cancer prevention and environmental issues tells me that the conventional environmental wisdom is wrong, and harmful to both the poor and the environment, and that Huber is right on the issues. Huberﾽs extraordinary scholarship and intelligence illuminates the mists of muddle-headedness that obscures the road we must travel to a green, healthy, and wealthy world." -Bruce N. Ames, Director Environmental Health Sciences Center, University of California Berkeley
"This book is a must read for anyone who really cares about preserving the environment. Peter Huber has combined his knowledge of true science with a lawyerﾽs logic to destroy old myths and chart new pathways to keeping the planet truly green." -Walter Wriston, author of The Twilight of Sovereignty and former Chairman of Citicorp
SYNOPSIS
Huber lionizes Theodore Roosevelt and his policies of conservation as the key to liberating wilderness from fuzzy liberals and their mushy thinking. There is no shortage of anything but wilderness, he says, pollution can be addressed by privatizing it, and high technology is greener than organic approaches. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
FROM THE CRITICS
Library Journal
Huber, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, has written an ultraconservative manifesto aimed at exposing the fallacies of soft green environmental policy and reinvigorating the conservationalist ethic of Theodore Roosevelt. In his introduction, he outlines the difference in thought between Hard and Soft Greens in four important areas; Part 1 surveys the present and future of environmental issues from a capitalist green perspective, and the final section sets forth a conservative environmental platform, with regard to scarcity, pollution, politics, and ethics. A strong believer in free markets, Huber argues throughout that Soft Green modeling results in prescriptions akin to alchemy. His choice of language in differentiating between the advocates of a liberal philosophy vs. a conservative viewpoint is often abrupt and some what offensive, e.g., "rough riders" vs. "wonks," and he tends to generalize from a few examples and a limited bibliography. But this book promises to encourage further debate among environmental policy makers. The paucity of conservative environmental writing prevents comparison of this book to similar titles. Recommended for larger academic libraries.
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