When I was asked whether I would like to write a review of the new book by climatologist Dr. Friederike Otto, I immediately said yes. After all, I have been following the topic of climate change for more than 30 years.

The book "Klimaungerechtigkeit" was published by Ullstein-Verlag on December 19, 2023. In February 2024, when this review was written, it was top of the German non-fiction bestseller list compiled monthly by Deutschlandfunk Kultur, Zweite Deutsche Fernsehen and the weekly newspaper Die Zeit.

The author Prof. Dr. Friederike Otto was awarded the German Environmental Prize in 2023 for her achievements in climate research. She is one of the few climate scientists who are able to accurately evaluate human impact on climate change, or exclude it, during extreme weather events . She has been instrumental in developing the methods of calculation used in attribution research, as it is known. Together with Geert Jan van Oldenborgh - the two co-founded the World Weather Attribution Project in 2015 - she was named one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time Magazine in 2021. Since 2021, Friederike Otto has been working at the internationally renowned university, Imperial College London, where she leads a team in her specialist discipline.

Friederike Otto | Climate Injustice - What the Climate Catastrophe has to do with Capitalism, Racism and Sexism | Ullstein Verlag | 300 pages | 22.99 EUR

"Klimaungerechtigkeit" opens with an introductory chapter that can be regarded as a preface. There follows four sections, each with two chapters, and a final chapter under the heading, loosely based on Lenin, "And now?" The subdivision into four main sections - heat, drought, fire, flood - is one of the strengths of this book. Using eight specific examples from around the world, the author explains climate extremes and their consequences. It is these natural disasters that will increasingly concern us in the future and will affect us more and more. The key scientific findings on heatwaves, droughts, wildfire and floods are presented clearly, with Friederike Otto reiterating the importance of preparing for and adapting to climate change.

In the very first chapter, she describes extreme weather events as instructive moments. Understanding these can help us not only in the fight against climate change, but also in confronting its consequences. As the saying goes, "a burnt child fears the fire",  we should, as a matter of urgency, take a much closer look at the real consequences of climate change that are happening right now. The climate scientist rightly complains that too many political and economic decision-makers are neglecting to take precautions against actual risks with fatal consequences and is primarily addressing the management teams of companies that promote fossil fuels. She pays little attention to their customers, i.e. those who buy fossil fuels and whose lives sometimes even depend on them. This one-sided approach is a major shortcoming of the book. The subtitle already hints at this - "capitalism, racism and sexism as well as widespread social injustice are to blame for the climate crisis."  Other factors are ignored.  Friederike Otto allows her personal view of human society to be the measure of all things. In the introductory chapter, she summarises : "So, what extreme weather events have taught me above all is that the climate crisis is mainly characterized by inequality and the still unchallenged dominance of patriarchal and colonial structures, which also prevent serious climate protection from being pursued. [...] Climate change is a symptom of this global crisis of inequality and injustice, not its cause." In my naivety, I had always thought it was due to human CO₂ emissions, one third of which, roughly speaking, can be attributed to the two billion or so car drivers that our species has produced.

Life experience , political knowledge and my studies of history and literature have taught me that humans beings and their life -forms are no less complex than our planetary climate. I therefore find the above quoted assessment by the author negligently simplistic and scientifically untenable.

I found the book difficult to read due to the constant confusion between personal views and scientific facts. If I hadn't felt obliged to write a review, I would have put it aside early on, which, given my great respect for books, happens only rarely. 

For Friederike Otto, human history seems to begin only with the Western colonization of the world. Yet justice (which we should always strive for) existed to a limited degree before the development of scientific civilization. The author shifts all responsibility onto the old industrialized countries, as if ,since the invention of the steam engine, their elite has been deliberately poisoning the atmosphere with the aim   of oppressing others.  The African elite, to name just one example, are practically absolved of any guilt against the backdrop of Western colonization. She tries to create the impression that the colonial relationship still exists. The fact that many of the elite there (and not only there) have mercilessly plundered their populations in recent decades is not worth a single sentence to her. However, despite the many cultural differences, human nature is essentially the same.

Things become impossible when, for example, she calls on fathers in an almost rude tone to take their sons to soccer training by bike rather than by car. She is assuming of course that everyone lives close to a soccer pitch. Several pages later, however, she vehemently rejects any criticism of climate researchers who travel by plane to conferences.  It does not occur to her that global climate change could be combatted much more effectively and CO₂ emissions more cost effectively within the framework of the G20 if other or non-Western populations were also willing. After all, around two thirds of the world's population are represented in the G20 and therefore all those countries with the highest CO₂ emissions.

The term "colonial fossil" is used throughout the book. While reading it, I wondered whether Mother Earth (see "The Gaia Principle" by James Lovelock) had carefully considered, over the course of her billions of years of history, that fossil fuels would be created in areas that would become Western colonies for a relatively short period of time. The author seems to have overlooked the oil and coal deposits in the USA, those in Germany and China and the oil in the North Sea. Only shortly before the end does the reason for this become clear. The phrase "colonial fossil", coined by Friederike Otto, is, for her, synonymous with "neoliberal."

Other insights are more important than such digressions. Friederike Otto openly admits that she could not have imagined the devastating fires in Lytton, Canada, during the great heatwave of 2021, even though understanding climate change is her profession. She is no doubt like most of us ; psychologically, we are far from prepared for what is to come. The Lytton fires broke out when the global average temperature was around 1.2 °C. The European Union's Copernicus Earth observation program measured a global average temperature of 1.52 °C for the first time for the period from 1 February 2023 to 31 January 2024. The challenges facing humanity as a result of climate change are much greater than Friederike Otto estimates. We are not merely facing a political and technical challenge, but an evolutionary one. Never before has humanity had to work so closely together to maintain its level of civilization. If we can master climate change, we will learn to control the planet's atmosphere. If we fail to do so, huge setbacks in civilisation cannot be ruled out. As things currently stand, it seems likely that our planet will be overrun by wars in the coming decades.

Friederike Otto is right that the poor are generally more affected by the consequences of climate change than the rich. This has probably been the case with natural disasters since the beginning of mankind. The climate scientist's call for justice is understandable, but unfortunately, I fear, in vain. (However, we must always fight for justice.) The lens through which she explains the horrors of reality filter out far too much of the essence of humanity. As a physicist, she is scientific and still adheres to the credo of the past: "I think, therefore I am." However, another motto has long since replaced René Descartes' principle: "I believe, therefore I am."

The fact that Friederike Otto is not free of this "virus" is all too clear from one example. On page 289, she writes: "If, for example, we perceive not having a car today as unreasonable, this is not due to our personal needs, but to the car lobby, which has ruthlessly acted against the many-voiced protests of people who would have loved to live in cities without exhaust fumes and noise." She cites the 2019 article The Hidden History of American Anti-Car Protests by Peter Norton as her source. If you look at the source, you will learn that the fight for traffic light-protected intersections and safer bike lanes in the 1950s and 1960s was much more successful in the Netherlands than in the USA. The first picture in the cited article shows an American intersection, surrounded by a human chain of mothers, with the caption that traffic lights were installed there following this protest. The handling of this source is misleading. Furthermore, Friederike Otto's arguments cannot explain the sense of personal freedom that I experienced, firstly with a Vespa and then with my first car in the late 1970s. The fact that lobbying exists is undeniable. It exists on all sides. The work of Greenpeace or Oxfam, to name just two "good" organizations, is also lobbying. Even in this context, it is not always flawless.

For readers who subscribe to the motto "I believe, therefore I am" currently popular again, the book "Klimaungerechtigkeit" will be a valuable read.  However, the mixing of science and personal worldview throughout this book means that for most others it will not be a worthwhile venture .