374. David Orr: Reforming Democracy for a Warming World — Pathways to Thriving in a Post-Fossil Fuel Era

374. David Orr: Reforming Democracy for a Warming World — Pathways to Thriving in a Post-Fossil Fuel Era

Author: Town Hall Seattle September 21, 2024 Duration: 1:08:59

Headshot of David Orr (with grey hair, light skin, and dark green jacket)Democracy in a Hotter Time calls for reforming democratic institutions as a prerequisite for avoiding climate chaos and adapting governance to how Earth works as a physical system. To survive in the "long emergency" ahead, the book suggests ways to reform and strengthen democratic institutions, making them assets rather than liabilities. Edited by David W. Orr, this collection of essays proposes a new political order that would enable humanity to thrive in the transition to a post-fossil fuel world.

Orr gathers leading scholars, public intellectuals, and political leaders to address the many problems confronting our current political systems. Few other books have taken a systems view of the effects of a rapidly destabilizing climate on our laws and governance or offered such a diversity of solutions. These thoughtful and incisive essays cover subjects from Constitutional reform to participatory urban design to education; together, they aim to invigorate the conversation about the human future in practical ways that will improve the effectiveness of democratic institutions and lay the foundation for a more durable and just democracy.

David W. Orr is Professor of Practice at Arizona State University and Paul Sears Distinguished Professor of Environmental Studies and Politics Emeritus at Oberlin College. He is the author of eight books, including Dangerous Years: Climate Change, the Long Emergency, and the Way Forward and Down to the Wire: Confronting Climate Collapse. He is a founder of the Atlanta Environmental Symposium, the Meadowcreek Project, the Oberlin Project, the journal Solutions, and of the State of American Democracy Project. He headed the effort to design, fund, and build the Adam Joseph Lewis Center which was named by an AIA panel in 2010 as "the most important green building of the past thirty years." His current work at Arizona State University is on the repair and strengthening American democracy.


Recorded live from a historic venue in the Pacific Northwest, the Town Hall Seattle Civics Series podcast brings the stage to your headphones. Each episode captures a vital conversation from Town Hall Seattle's ongoing programming, where experts, activists, and thinkers grapple with the ideas shaping our collective life. You’ll hear historians reframe our past, legal scholars dissect constitutional questions, and community organizers explain the mechanics of emerging movements. This isn't just theoretical discussion; it's a direct engagement with the policies and cultural shifts that touch our neighborhoods and the wider world. Tuning in feels like finding a seat in a thoughtful, often provocative public forum. The series operates on a belief that an informed community is an empowered one, and this audio archive makes that process accessible to anyone, anywhere. By focusing on the substance of live civic dialogue, this podcast provides the context and depth often missing from daily headlines, fostering a deeper understanding of how society functions and changes.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 100

Town Hall Seattle Civics Series
Podcast Episodes
344. Fei-Fei Li with Todd Bishop: Using AI to Empower Humans [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:09:43
Depending on who you overhear, conversations surrounding the controversial AI Chat Bot, Chat GPT, may be punctuated with terms like, "groundbreaking!" "paradigm-shifting!" "innovative!" or conversely might be filled with…
339. Michael Harriot with Marcus Harrison Green: America Unredacted [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:15:43
Have you ever wondered if there was another version of this country besides the one that was taught in schools? For many Americans, especially Black Americans, the answer is yes. The backstory that most of us were taught…
338. Rebecca Clarren with Rena Priest: The Cost of Free Land [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:06:00
Growing up, Rebecca Clarren only knew the major plot points of her tenacious immigrant family's origins. Her great-great-grandparents, the Sinykins, and their six children fled antisemitism in Russia and arrived in the U…
337. Martin Baron with Frank Blethen A Marriage of Press and Politics [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 1:15:16
If you've felt like the news cycle has been out of control in the past few years, imagine being the editor of one of the most prominent papers in the US. Martin Baron had over a decade of newsroom experience before he to…