Is Wildness Over?

by Paul Wapner

Selected as one of The Progressive’s ‘Favourite Books of 2020’

Wildness was once integral to our ancestors' lives as they struggled to survive in an unpredictable environment.  Today, most of us live in relative stability insulated from the vicissitudes of nature. Wildness is over, right? 
 
Wrong, argues leading environmental scholar Paul Wapner. Wildness may have disappeared from our immediate lives, but it’s been catapulted up to the global level. The planet itself has gone into spasm - calving glaciers, wildfires, heatwaves, mass extinction, and rising oceans all represent the new face of wildness.  
 
Rejecting paths offered by geoengineering and de-extinction to bring the Earth under control, Wapner calls instead for ‘rewilding’. This involves relinquishing the desire for comfort at all costs and welcoming greater uncertainty into our own lives. To save ourselves from global ruin, it is time to stop sanitizing and exerting mastery over the world and begin living humbly in it.

160 pages, Paperback

Published May 4, 2020

Reviews

[Kasper Heijink · Rating 4 out of 5]

Een kort boek over de geschiedenis van de mensheid en haar poging tot het in de ban doen van 'wildernis'. Volgens de schrijver heeft deze dominantie over de natuur geleid tot huidige problemen als klimaatverandering.

Wapner roept tot een 'rewilding' van de mensheid en het accepteren van discomfort.

(Onderdeel van de teksen die ik lees voor mijn masterscriptie)

[Ashley]

the author signs my paychecks so i can’t really give a rating but i’ll be leading zoom breakout rooms discussing this book tomorrow 9:45-11:00 and 11:20-11:35

[Christy Holliday · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had to read this book for my college writing class and it was greatly informative. As an environmentalist, I am always open to learning more about the different solutions we can use to ease the effects of climate change. To be honest, “rewilding” had never crossed my mind as a solution until I read this book. It makes sense that the whole reason why we have climate change is from humanity’s want to control nature; I agree with Wapner’s perspective that we should stop trying to control it and just live with it.

I think anyone who is interested in climate change should read this book. It went over the history of humanity’s want to control nature (which dates all the way back to the Agricultural Revolution) and it goes over present day problems that have brought about this new global wildness. I really enjoyed it!!! I feel like I’ve learned so much and broadened my perspective on environmental issues!!! 5/5!

[Twagner · Rating 2 out of 5]

After the great content of "Living Through the End of Nature" I thought his latest work would be insightful and progress a little further into the solutions. Instead it was bog standard environmental cries to consume a little less. The idea that wildness is not diminishing, just getting squeezed into bigger and bigger problems is baseless. The complaints that current technology is acceptable but new technology is an abomination (geoengineering, deextinction, crop gene engineering) is confused. The message that we should appreciate nature more, crave comfort less, and rewild the world is not wrong but this book doesn't do anything to explain it or turn it into a coherent position. It's just complaining that we don't act and think the way the author says we should. Disappointing.

[Joe · Rating 5 out of 5]

This short, accessible book builds on Wapner's previous work, particularly "Living Through the End of Nature" (2010), to advocate an interesting thesis: that as we've sought to push wildness from our daily lives, we've unleashed global wildness in the form of climate change and mass extinction. Wapner argues that the way to reduce this global wildness is to let more wildness into our individual lives, a trade that would result in greater localised discomfort and uncertainty in return for greater global stability and justice.

Though written before the COVID-19 outbreak, the pandemic appears to prove Wapner's point: greater human encroachment on wildlands increases the likelihood of transmission of new diseases from wild animals to humans, while modern transportation systems allowed it to spread rapidly around the globe. The lockdowns to curb the pandemic have, ironically, forced people to be inside even more than normal, further depriving us of what little wilderness we did have in our lives.

Wapner's question in the final chapter - how will we comport ourselves as the world unravels? - is so relevant to our present situation. On the one hand the pandemic has revealed extreme levels of selfishness and denial, but on the other it has elicited new expressions of care and sacrifice. This book is full of wisdom for those thinking about how humanity can emerge from this crisis more resilient and aligned with nature.