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Rating: 
Summary: Practical Bottom Line on Saving Planet--Do It or Lose It
Review:
Having read perhaps 20 of the best books on global issues and environmental sustainability, water scarcity, ocean problems, etc, over the past few years (most reviewed here on Amazon) I was prepared for a superficial summary, political posturing, and unrealistic claims. Not this book--this book is one of the finest, most intelligent, most easily understood programs for action I have ever seen. The book as a whole, and the 20 problem statements specifically, are concise, illustrated, and sensible.
The author breaks the 20 issues into 3 groups. Group one (sharing our planet)includes global warming; biodiversity and ecosystem losses, fisheries depletion, deforestation, water deficits, and maritime safety and pollution. Group two (sharing our humanity) includes massive step-up in the fight against poverty, peacekeeping-conflict prevention-combatting terrorism, education for all, global infectuous diseases, digital divide, and natural disaster prevention and mitigation. Group three (sharing our rule book) includes reinventing taxation for the 21st century, biotechnology rules, global financial architecture, illegal drugs, trade-investment-competition rules, intellectual property rights, e-commerce rules, and international labor and migration rules. The author's core concept for dealing with these complex issues intelligently, while recognizing that "world government" is not an option, lies with his appreciation of the Internet and how global issues networks could be created that would be a vertical complement to the existing horizontal elements of each national government. The footnotes and index are professional, but vastly more important, the author's vision is combined with practicality. This is a "doable-do" and this book is therefore my number one reading recommendation for any citizen buying just one book of the 360+ that I have recommended within Amazon. Superb.
Rating:
Summary: Twenty Global Problems, Twenty Years to Solve Them
Review: Amazon's observation is interesting - "No previous book has presented such a unified appraisal of this century's global problems or offered such a consistent and well-defined approach to solving them." If that is so, this book is important. Rischard's issues are not and do not pretend to be all inclusive, but they are self-evidently urgent and of global import. The book also left me thinking that Rischard's tentative solution framework may relate to other issues... High Noon deserves the attention of all well meaning and globally minded people.
Rating:
Summary: Twenty Global Problems, Twenty Years to Solve Them
Review: Having moved from Wall Street to become the World Bank's vice-president for Europe, Rischard proclaims that the decline of national sovereignty, the death of local economy, and corporate dominance of the world are inevitable. He considers how to deal with environmental problems within that context.
Rating:
Summary: Highly Recommended for Those Interested in the Future
Review: I attended a lecture the author gave summarizing his book. If you're interested in globalization, the environment, or any other global problems, I highly recommend reading this book. It was deliberately limited in length, so it is a really quick read... about 5 pages for each of 20 problems and an additional 100 pages or so presenting the general problems and his proposed solution.
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