This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. The Climate

by Naomi Klein

In addition to the newly formed Friends of the Earth (created in 1969) and Greenpeace (launched in 1971), the movement also included groups like the Environmental Defense Fund, then an idealistic gang of scrappy scientists and lawyers determined to heed Rachel Carson’s warnings. The group’s unofficial slogan was, “Sue the bastards,” and so they did. The EDF fought for and filed the original lawsuit that led to the U.S. ban on DDT as an insecticide, resulting in the revival of many species of birds, including the bald eagle.25 This was a time when intervening directly in the market to prevent harm was still regarded as a sensible policy option. Confronted with unassailable evidence of a grave collective problem, politicians across the political spectrum still asked themselves: “What can we do to stop it?” (Not: “How can we develop