Christian Parenti

An investigative journalist visits the economically and politically battered post-colonial nations around the earth's mid-latitudes and reveals how extreme weather in the era of climate change is breeding banditry, humanitarian crises and state failure.

Climate Change and the New Geography of Violence

Tropic of Chaos

Bryan Alexander

Tropic of Chaos examines the “catastrophic convergence of poverty, violence, and climate change.” (5) . The title refers to a sprawling geographic area, between the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn (8). Chapters look at Africa, central Asia, India, Mexico, and Brazil. Parenti sees them experiencing escalating political violence driven by climate change.

How this works: global warming means rising temperatures which can cause a drop in precipitation which leads to drought. Also, climate change can screw up local information about water events' timing and location (floods, droughts, water levels), which messes up agriculture, urban planning, and more (139). That drives political instability, insurgency, gang violence, and civil war.

What is to be done? Within the titular tropic locals are scrambling to either control or benefit from unfolding chaos. For example, in central Asia Parenti finds financiers funding the production of inedible products, like cotton, because workers can’t consume it in bad times, unlike food (146). Beyond the tropic, the rest of the world is responding with "[o]pen-ended counterinsurgency on a global scale” (10). 

Looking ahead, the book implies a choice. Either we pursue the “politics of the armed lifeboat” or 
“mitigation: we must decarbonize our economy.” (11-12)

Tropic of Chaos is good journalism. It introduces and follows compelling stories, weaving them together to draw out interlinked forces. Recommended.

Tropic of Chaos Climate Change and the New Geography of Violence

Reviews