This book is a comprehensive and fascinating account of the energy security and climate change challenges confronting humanity. Brown and Sovacool illustrate these problems in painstaking detail. They also masterfully demonstrate how polycentric forms of energy and climate governance offer one of the best solutions to them. A rich, interdisciplinary work that should be on the reading list of all those who are seriously concerned about energy and governance issues.
Elinor Ostrom, Arthur F. Bentley Professor of Political Science, Indiana University; Nobel laureate in Economic Sciences (2009)
In this engagingly written and painstakingly researched volume, Brown and Sovacool tell one of the most pressing stories of our time. Tracing back from the twin crises of mounting climate disruption and crippling energy insecurity, they offer incisive new solutions, rooted at the intersection of technology, policy, and social behavior, for forging a better and more prosperous clean energy economy. Essential reading for technologists, policy makers, business leaders, students, and anyone else with a stake in the future.
Bracken Hendricks, Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress; co-author of Apollo's Fire
One of the reasons that energy problems have proved so hard to manage is that they have deep roots in the structure of the economy, the availability of technology, and human values. Marilyn Brown and Ben Sovacool look at all those dimensions and show that managing today's energy-related problems will require a 'polycentric' approach that works at many different levels. The local facts matter, but a global strategy is equally important. Unlike many studies in this area, which focus on the US and other Western nations, Brown and Sovacool emphasize the central roles of China, India, and other emerging countries in the global energy and climate challenge.
David Victor, Professor and Director, Laboratory on International Law and Regulation, School of International Relations and Pacific Studies, University of California, San Diego
...An innovative look at the issue of climate change and energy policy that face the world today...It should make for an interesting read for anybody interested in the subject of climate change and energy policy.
Robert Tierney
Technological Forecasting and Social Change
This book offers a levelheaded discussion of possible measures to abate greenhouse gas emissions and the economic, social, and political obstacles to adopting those measures.
Foreign Affairs
CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title, 2012
