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Plan B: Rescuing a Planet under Stress and a Civilization in Trouble Lester R. Brown W. W. Norton and Co. 285 Pages
Plan B, a strategic and multifaceted plan, offers hope for implementation of adaptive international policies based on ecological market signals. Demanding momentum comparable to U.S. mobilization for WWII, Plan B implementation requires a severe adjustment in the current federal budget. Two years prior to writing his book, Lester Brown and the Earth Policy institute published Eco-Economy: Building an Economy for the Earth, in which Brown argued that the environment was not part of the economy but that the economy was part of the environment. Building on his previous work, Plan B not only calls for further restructuring of the economy, but also for it to be executed in wartime speed.
Since the events of September 11, 2001, the U.S. federal defense budget has expanded to over 343 billion dollars, dwarfing that of all other countries. Advocating a reduction in defense spending, Brown leverages key global-social challenges, issues with rising temperatures and the seas, problems with eroding soils and shrinking cropland, and struggles of emerging water shortages against current federal spending. Clearly suggesting a mismatch between national spending and international priorities, Plan B offers specific strategies in response to these top global environmental challenges.
One of the most convincing strategic proposals offered by Brown includes a 62 billion dollar international budget incorporating seven initiatives to be shared by the U.S. and other industrial nations. These initiatives include universal primary education, the adult literacy campaign, reproductive and family planning, closing the condom gap, school lunch programs for the 44 poorest countries, assistance to preschool children and pregnant women in the 44 poorest countries, and universal...