Environmental Injustice And The Risk Society In Kim Stanley Robinson’s Climate Fiction

Kim Stanley Robinson is a science fiction writer who focuses on the subject of climate change,and his novel New York 2140 set in the near future is narrated primarily in terms of risk.The subsequent publication of The Ministry for the Future continues to explore injustice and the risk factors in a near-future world.Based on a chronology of past,present and future,these two books vividly expose the underlying causes of climate problems and environmental injustice,through presenting the risk scenarios incurred by climate change beyond time and space and focusing on the political and economic measures to address climate change issues.Representing risks and crises is a common theme in the cli-fi.Interpreting New York 2140 and The Ministry for the Future from the perspective of environmental injustice and the risk society,this thesis attempts to give an in-depth analysis of the causes of climate change and its derivations,in hopes of finding the ingenious ideas of Robinson and providing a new interpretation of these two novels.What is more,these novels touch upon solutions to climate change and environmental problems,which might hopefully have both literary and social benefits.This thesis is divided into three chapters,in addition to an introduction and a conclusion.After a brief account of Kim Stanley Robinson and his works in the Introduction,Chapter One uses climate change in New York 2140 and The Ministry for the Future as an entry to discover the persistent environmental injustice in times of climate change.While there are many factors that contribute to environmental injustice,these two climate novels focus on the injustice caused by the inequality in economic development,resource inequality and the uneven status of species.Chapter Two analyzes risk societies in both novels.Based on the theory of Ursula K.Heise’s eco-cosmopolitanism and Ulrich Beck’s world risk society,the thesis points to the centrality of the imagination of risk in climate fiction.At the same time,this chapter analyzes the various ways in which the risk society is presented in climate fiction and the causes of risks by interpretation of risk scenarios.Chapter Three focuses on viable solutions to environmental injustice and risk societies,and analyzes the political and economic measures to explore sustainable development paths out of risks.Conclusion generalizes the environmental injustice in times of climate change.And future societies are in a variety of risks and climate crises.This thesis argues that the writer calls for de-anthropocentricism and global cooperation in reaction to the injustice and risk factors for future societies.