Deep Adaptation

Jem Bendell is Professor of Sustainability Leadership at the University of Cumbria and the originator of the Deep Adaptation movement.
Rupert Read is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of East Anglia, a Green Party campaigner and former spokesperson for Extinction Rebellion.

'Deep adaptation' refers to the personal and collective changes that might help us to prepare for - and live with - a climate-influenced breakdown or collapse of our societies. It is a framework for responding to the terrifying realization of increasing disruption by committing ourselves to reducing suffering while saving more of society and the natural world. This is the first book to show how professionals across different sectors are beginning to incorporate the acceptance of likely or unfolding societal breakdown into their work and lives. They do not assume that our current economic, social and political systems can be made resilient in the face of climate change but, instead, they demonstrate the caring and creative ways that people are responding to the most difficult realization with which humanity may ever have to come to terms. Edited by the originator of the concept of deep adaptation, Jem Bendell, and a leading climate activist and strategist, Rupert Read, this book is the essential introduction to the concept, practice and emerging global movement of Deep Adaptation to climate chaos.

Introduction: what now the limits are breached?
 
Jem Bendell and Rupert Read
 
Part I: The Predicament
 
1. The scientific case of global over-heating and the root of denial
 
2. Deep Adaptation: a map for navigating climate tragedy
 
Jem Bendell
 
3. The reasons for anticipating collapse
 
Pablo Servigne, Raphaël Stevens, Gauthier Chapelle, Daniel Rodary
 
Part II: Shifts in Being
 
4. Climate Psychology and its Relevance to Deep Adaptation
Adrian Tait
 
5. Deeper implications of societal collapse: co-liberation from the ideology of e-s-c-a-p-e.
 
Jem Bendell
 
6. Unconscious addictions: mapping common responses to climate change and potential climate collapse
 
Rene Susa, Sharon Stein, Vanessa Andreotti, Tereza ajkova, Dino Siwek, and the Gesturing Towards Decolonial Collective
 
7. Facilitating Deep Adaptation - enabling more loving conversations about our predicament
 
Katie Carr and Jem Bendell
 
8. The Great Turning: Reconnecting through Collapse
 
Sean Kelly and Joanna Macy
 
Part III: Shifts in Doing
 
9. Leadership and management in a context of deep adaptation
Jonathan Gosling
 
10. What Matters Most? Deep Education Conversations in a Climate of Change and Complexity
 
Charlotte Von Bulow and Charlotte Simpson
 
11. Riding two horses: The future of politics and activism, as we face potential eco-driven societal collapse
 
Rupert Read
 
12. Relocalisation as Deep Adaptation
 
Matthew Slater and Skeena Rathor
 
Concluding the Beginning of Deep Adaptation
 
Jem Bendell and Rupert Read