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A review by teokajlibroj
The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson
2.0
This is a book about ideas - but unfortunately the ideas aren't well thought out. The fundamental problem is that the author is convinced that his ideas are the best that he is unable to imagine why anyone would oppose them. Thus the book is full of wishful thinking where all the author's ideas get implemented with little opposition and they are all immediately successful.
For example, there's a chapter about how climate change damaged India so much that a new political party was formed that fairly represents all regions, languages, religions, classes, ages, genders etc of the country. Also they immediately end all caste discrimination. How do they manage this immense feat? The book doesn't bother to explain, we're just told they do.
This alone could be a good premise for a book, I would like to read about someone trying to manage such a large coalition of people with different interests. Instead, the book just waves a magic wand and tells us this new party is popular with all people everywhere. Also, they invent a new form of agriculture that produces more food, using less and chemicals and also allows more space to be returned for wildlife. How do they achieve this utopian solution that solves all problems with no tradeoffs? Who knows, because the book certainly doesn't try to explain.
Politics is the art of compromise and economics is the art of managing scarce resources. This book has a strong disregard for both. Every time economists are mentioned, we are told they don't know what they are talking about. Questions like "how much will this cost?" and "how will we pay for it?" are treated as too ridiculous to answer. Anytime a bold new solution is proposed, if someone asks "will it work?" they are given the snarky answer "does the current system work?".
Sorry, but that's not good enough. You can't write a serious book about tackling problems and then refuse to explain how you would tackle the problems.
This constantly happens throughout the book. The question of whether it is justified to use terrorism to fight climate change is considered for about a page and then never considered again. This could have been a really interesting discussion but the book doesn't bother. Instead the magic wand is waved and the terrorists are super-virtuous people who avoid innocent civilians, only target the rich and never get caught. Also they don't inspire any negative backlash or anti-environmentalism violence.
One of the core ideas of the book seems to be that climate change is mainly caused by small elite. One character suggests that assassinating 100 people would solve the problem. We never get any details of who these people would be because it doesn't make any sense. Assassinating the CEO of an oil company doesn't make the oil disappear. The fact that working class people also cause pollution is too uncomfortable for the book, instead it is easier to blame all the problems on the super-rich.
Final point: why does the main character have the awful name of Mary Murphy? Did the author google "most common Irish first name" and "most common Irish last name" and just stick them together?
For example, there's a chapter about how climate change damaged India so much that a new political party was formed that fairly represents all regions, languages, religions, classes, ages, genders etc of the country. Also they immediately end all caste discrimination. How do they manage this immense feat? The book doesn't bother to explain, we're just told they do.
This alone could be a good premise for a book, I would like to read about someone trying to manage such a large coalition of people with different interests. Instead, the book just waves a magic wand and tells us this new party is popular with all people everywhere. Also, they invent a new form of agriculture that produces more food, using less and chemicals and also allows more space to be returned for wildlife. How do they achieve this utopian solution that solves all problems with no tradeoffs? Who knows, because the book certainly doesn't try to explain.
Politics is the art of compromise and economics is the art of managing scarce resources. This book has a strong disregard for both. Every time economists are mentioned, we are told they don't know what they are talking about. Questions like "how much will this cost?" and "how will we pay for it?" are treated as too ridiculous to answer. Anytime a bold new solution is proposed, if someone asks "will it work?" they are given the snarky answer "does the current system work?".
Sorry, but that's not good enough. You can't write a serious book about tackling problems and then refuse to explain how you would tackle the problems.
This constantly happens throughout the book. The question of whether it is justified to use terrorism to fight climate change is considered for about a page and then never considered again. This could have been a really interesting discussion but the book doesn't bother. Instead the magic wand is waved and the terrorists are super-virtuous people who avoid innocent civilians, only target the rich and never get caught. Also they don't inspire any negative backlash or anti-environmentalism violence.
One of the core ideas of the book seems to be that climate change is mainly caused by small elite. One character suggests that assassinating 100 people would solve the problem. We never get any details of who these people would be because it doesn't make any sense. Assassinating the CEO of an oil company doesn't make the oil disappear. The fact that working class people also cause pollution is too uncomfortable for the book, instead it is easier to blame all the problems on the super-rich.
Final point: why does the main character have the awful name of Mary Murphy? Did the author google "most common Irish first name" and "most common Irish last name" and just stick them together?