Alastair McIntosh, Hell and High Water: Climate Change, Hope and the Human Condition.

Kerber, Guillermo

Alastair McIntosh, Hell and High Water: Climate Change, Hope and the Human Condition, Edinburgh, Birlinn, 2008, 290 pp, 8.99 [pounds sterling].

The central thesis set out by the author in this book is that climate change cannot be tackled by technical, economic and political measures alone--that we need to look to ourselves and address the inner world of psychology and spirituality.

This doesn't mean that science and politics are not relevant. On the contrary, the whole first part of the book (pp. 13-103) studies some of the complexities of the current debate on climate change, global scenarios and technical options to mitigate climate change and concludes with a chapter that analyzes why our current world is unable to make the necessary changes.

While being aware of various sceptical positions on climate change, this first part builds on what the author considers the scientific consensus about the state of the world's climate. This includes data provided by the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) as well as other independent appraisals carried on by research institutions and government departments worldwide.

Some of the topics dealt with are the melting of glaciers, rising sea levels, in creased rainfall, water shortages, food and desertification, economic impacts, declining biodiversity and ecological resilience. There is particular consideration of Scotland, the author's home country. A whole chapter examines the challenges of energy, starting with oil and then considering nuclear fission and fusion, solar and other renewable energies.

It is, however, the second part of the book that is perhaps the most interesting. Quite a number of books review and focus on the different aspects of climate change and the scientific data. But few, like this one, try to analyze and respond to deeper questions, targeting the cultural, psychological and spiritual dimensions of climate change. To do so, McIntosh takes the story of Noah in the Bible (Gen. 6)--hence the "high water" reference in the title of the book--as a psychohistorian, concluding that violence is the problem addressed in Noah's story and the problem that must also be taken up today.

A crucial thesis of the book is the identification of the hybris of wanton violence in many of the biblical stories that follow the story of the flood, such as the story of Babel. The author then proceeds to analyze other texts that echo flood narratives, such as the Epic of Gilgamesh. Looking into Plato's dialogues "Critias", "The Timaeus" and "The Statesman", the author sums up with this formula: Hybris = pride [right arrow] violence [right arrow] ecocide (p.131). Today, our societies throughout the whole world are living through an "ecocide": the death of nature, the extension of violence into nature.

The rest of the book unfolds and responds to this formula, assuming that the sustained onslaught of hybris and its current intensification diminish the human collective capacity to sustain a rich inner life. We are, the author argues, colonized by death, which is expressed in propaganda and consumerism. The roots of climate change touch many aspects of our lives; only a "journey into the soul" will allow us to respond adequately. This journey should help us to go beyond the myth of redemptive violence and discover the nursing of our planet to which humanity is called. In this sense, modern climate change will be marked not only as a phase in geological evolution, but also as a turning point in human consciousness.

The last chapter, "Towards Cultural Psychotherapy", offers a 12-step programme to reconnect with reality. Written in a "we must" style, the author nevertheless intends these steps to be just suggestions, faltering and contestable ones at that.

McIntosh provides an in-depth analysis of present-day Western society's values, which permeate the current world well beyond so-called Western countries. Through this analysis, he calls for a new consciousness based on non-violence, mutuality and spirituality adequately to respond to the challenges that climate change poses to us. His constant references to the Scottish context (stories, examples, poetry) can be seen as a limit to non-Scottish readers. Nevertheless, I believe this is an honest and fruitful discourse that invites readers to contextualize his reflections into other situations.

DOI: 10.1111/j.1758-6623.2010.00061.x

Dr. Guillermo Kerber (Uruguay) serves as programme executive on climate change at the World Council of Churches in Geneva.