The Best Books on Green and Sustainability

"He cannot live without a world."
-Ralph Waldo Emerson


Ignorance is the greatest obstacle preventing the world from collectively engaging the crisis of climate change. That is why information is the most important tool we have to combat climate change. Large scale collective action will only come once people understand the issues and the concomitant solutions. No one epitomized the effort to educate the business community on the subject of sustainability more than the late Ray Anderson who died in 2011. Anderson tirelessly promoted the idea that sustainability is good for business. He advocated an approach that “takes nothing from the earth that cannot be replaced by the earth.” As the founder and chairman of the commercial carpet company Interface, Anderson cut the company's greenhouse gas emissions by 94 percent, cut fossil fuel consumption by 60 percent, cut waste by 80 percent, increased sales, doubled earnings and re-invented the way carpets are made, sold and recycled. That is why Anderson's books are on the top of the list of the 100 most sustainable books in the world.

Business Lessons from a Radical Industrialist by Ray Anderson

Confessions of a Radical Industrialist: Profits, People, Purpose–Doing Business by Respecting the Earth by Ray Anderson

Mid-Course Correction: Toward a Sustainable Enterprise by Ray Anderson

Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things by William McDonough

Natural Capitalism by Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins and Hunter Lovins

The Ecology of Commerce by Paul Hawken

Blessed Unrest – How the Largest Movement in the World Came into Being and Why No One Saw it Coming by Paul Hawken

Strategy for sustainability: A Business Manifesto by Adam Werbach

Whole Earth Discipline: An Ecopragmatist Manifesto by Steward Brand

The Green Collar Economy: How One Solution Can Solve Our Two Biggest Problems by Van Jones

The Responsible Business by Carol Sanford

The Sustainable MBA: The Manager’s Guide to Green Business by Giselle Weybrecht

Climate Capitalism: Global Warming and the Transformation of the Global Economy by Peter Newell and Matthew Paterson

Strategies for the Green Economy: Opportunities and Challenges in the New World of Business by Joel Makower

The Business Guide to Sustainability: Practical Strategies and Tools for Organizations by Darcy Hitchcock and Marsha Willard

Green Outcomes in a Real World by Peter McManners

Mindfully Green: A Personal and Spiritual Guide to Whole Earth Thinking By Stephanie Kaza

Sustainable Value: How the World’s Leading Companies Are Doing Well by Doing Good by Chris Laszlo

Making Sustainability Work: Best Practices in Managing and Measuring Corporate Social, Environmental, and Economic Impacts by Marc Epstein

Sustainable Excellence – The Future of Business in a Fast-Changing World by Aron Cramer and Zachary Karabell

Strategy for Sustainability – A Business Manifesto by Adam Werbach

Green Recovery by Andrew Winston

The Next Sustainability Wave: Building Boardroom Buy-in by Bob Willard, Hunter Lovins

Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature by Janine Benyus

Green to Gold Daniel Esty, Daniel and Andrew Winston

The Green to Gold Business Playbook by Daniel Esty and PJ Simmons

Thinking in Systems: A Primer by Donella H. Meadows

Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future by Bill McKibben

Eaarth – Making a Life on a Tough New Planet by Bill McKibben

The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community by David C. Korten

The Civil Corporation: The New Economy of Corporate Citizenship by Simon Zadek

Making Sustainability Work: Best Practices in Managing and Measuring Corporate Social, Environmental and Economic Impacts by Marc J. Epstein

The Necessary Revolution: How individuals and organizations are working together to create a sustainable world by Peter Senge et al.

The Triple Bottom Line: How Today’s Best Run Companies are Achieving Economic, Social and Environmental Succes–And How You Can, Too by Andrew Savitz

The Sustainability Advantage: Seven Business Case Benefits of a Triple Bottom Line by Bob Willard

The Triple Bottom Line – How Today’s Best-Run Companies are Achieving Economic, Social, and Environmental Success by Andrew Savitz

The Sustainability Revolution – Portrait of a Paradigm Shift by Andres R. Edwards

Supercapitalism: The Transformation of Business, Democracy, and Everyday Life by Robert Reich

Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution by L. Hunter Lovins

Climate Capitalism by Hunter Lovins & Boyd Cohen

Reinventing Fire by Amory Lovins

Strategies for the Green Economy : Opportunities and Challenges in the New World of Business by Joel Makower - McGraw-Hill (October 5, 2008)

Strategy for Sustainability: A Business Manifesto by Adam Werbach - Harvard Business Press

Next Generation Business Strategies for the Base of the Pyramid: New Approaches for Building Mutual Value by Ted Landon

Building Social Business: The New Kind of Capitalism That Serves Humanity's Most Pressing Needs by Muhammad Yunus

Banker to the Poor by Muhammad Yunus

The Crisis of Global Capitalism by George Soros

Factor Four by Ernst von Weizsäcker, Amory B. Lovins and L. Hunter Lovins

Managing for Stakeholders: Survival, Reputation, and Success by R. Edward Freeman

The HIP Investor: Make Bigger Profits by Building a Better World by Paul Herman

Leading Change Toward Sustainability by Bob Doppelt

Investing in a Sustainable World: Why Green is the New Color of Money on
Wall Street by Matt Kiernan, Ph.D

Leading Change by John P. Kotter

Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins

Getting Green Done: Hard Truths from the Front Lines of the Sustainability Revolution by Auden Schendler

Now or Never – Why We Must Act Now to End Climate Change and Create a Sustainable Future by Tim Flannery

Ecological Economic: Principles and Applications by Herman E. Daly and Joshua Farley

The Clean Tech Revolution by Ron Parnick and Clint Wilder

Ethical Markets – Creating the Green Economy by Hazel Henderson

Plan B 4.0 – Rescuing a Planet Under Stress and a Civilization in Trouble by Lester R. Brown

The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of a Learning Organization, by Peter Senge

The Necessary Revolution – How Individuals and Organizations are Working Together to Create a Sustainable World by Peter Senge

Getting Green Done – Hard Truths from the Front Lines of the Sustainability Revolution by Auden Schendler

Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman by Yvon Chouinard

Permaculture: A Designers’ Manual by Bill Mollison and Reny Mia Slay

Design Is the Problem: The Future of Design Must be Sustainable by Nathan Shedroff

The Philosophy of Sustainable Design by Jason E Mclennan

Silent Spring by Rachel Carson

Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed by Jared Diamond

Dark Age Ahead by Jane Jacobs

Ecotopia by Ernest Callenbach

Stirring It Up: How to Make Money and Save the World by Gary Hirschberg

Values Driven Business: How You Change the World, Make Money, and Have Fun by Ben Cohen and Mal Warwick

The SmallMart Revolution: How Local Businesses are Beating the Global Competition by Michael Shuman

Greed to Green by David Gottfried

75 Green Businesses You Can Start to Make Money and Make a Difference by Glenn Croston, Ph.D.

Build a Green Small Business: Profitable Ways to Become an Ecopreneur by scott cooney

The Economics of Climate Change by Nicholas Stern

Value Shift: Why Companies Must Merge Social and Financial Imperatives to Achieve Superior Performance by Lynn Sharp Paine

The Moral Underground: How Ordinary Americans Subvert an Unfair Economy by Lisa Dodson

The Age of Empathy: Nature's Lessons for a Kinder Society by Frans De Waal

The Market for Virtue: The Potential And Limits of Corporate Social Responsibility by David Vogel

Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships by Daniel Goleman

What Matters Most by Jeff Hollender and Stephen Fenichell.

Good to Great by Jim Collins

The Soul in a Computer by Barbara Waugh

Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth by R. Buckminster Fuller

The Truth About Green Business by Gil Friend

The Sustainability Handbook – The Complete Management Guide to Achieving Social, Economic, and Environmental Responsibility by William Blackburn.

The Responsibility Revolution – How the Next Generation of Business Will Win by Jeffrey Hollender

Blue Covenant – The Global Water Crisis and the Coming Battle for the Right to Water, Maude Barlow

Citizen Engineer, A Handbook for Socially Responsible Engineering by Dave Douglas and Dave Papadopoulos,

Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman, by Yvon Chouinard

Hometown Money: How to Enrich Your Community with Local Currency by Paul Glover.

Climb the Green Ladder: Make Your Company and Career More Sustainable by Amy V. Fetzer and Shari Aaron

Designing Sustainable Packaging by Steve Serling

Green Building and Remodeling for Dummies! by Eric Corey Freed

Cannibals With Forks: 21st Century of Triple Bottom Line Business by John Elkington

The Compassionate Carnivore: Or, How to Keep Animals Happy, Save Old MacDonald’s Farm, Reduce Your Hoofprint, and Still Eat Meat by Catherine Frien

Diet for a New America by John Robbins

In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto by Michael Pollen

Inquiries into the Nature of Slow Money: Investing as if Food, Farms, and Fertility Mattered by Woody Tasch

Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan

Switch by Chip and Dan Heath,

SuperCorp by Rosabeth Kanter

Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirky,

Hot, Flat and Crowded by Thomas Friedman

A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold

Silent Spring by Rachel Carson

Unsafe At Any Speed by Ralph Nader

The Population Bomb by Paul L. Ehrlich

Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth by R. Buckminster Fuller

The Limits to Growth by Donella H. Meadows, Dennis L. Meadows, Jørgen Randers and William W. Behrens III

Small Is Beautiful by E.F. Schumacher

Gaia by James Lovelock

The Turning Point by Fritjof Capra

Our Common Future (‘The Brundtland Report’) by the World Commission on Environment and Development

The Dream of the Earth by Thomas Berry

A Fate Worse Than Debt by Susan George

Staying Alive by Vandana Shiva

Blueprint for a Green Economy by David Pearce, Anil Markandya and Edward B. Barbier

For the Common Good by Herman Daly and John B. Cobb Jr

Human Scale Development by Manfred Max-Neef

Changing Course by Stephan Schmidheiny and Business Council for Sustainable Development (BCSD)

Maverick by Ricardo Semler

When Corporations Rule the World by David C. Korten

Biomimicry by Janine M. Benyus

Cannibals with Forks by John Elkington

The Hungry Spirit by Charles Handy

False Dawn by John Gray

Development as Freedom by Amartya Sen

No Logo by Naomi Klein

The Skeptical Environmentalist by Bjørn Lomborg

Globalization and its Discontents by Joseph E. Stiglitz

The Corporation by Joel Bakan

Presence by Peter Senge, C. Otto Scharmer, Joseph Jaworski and Betty Sue Flowers

The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid by C.K. Prahalad

The River Runs Black by Elizabeth C. Economy

Capitalism as if the World Matters by Jonathon Porritt

Capitalism at the Crossroads by Stuart L. Hart

Collapse Jared Diamond

The End of Poverty Jeffrey D. Sachs

The Chaos Point by Ervin Laszlo

Heat by George by Monbiot

An Inconvenient Truth by Al Gore

When the Rivers Run Dry by Fred Pearce

The End of Money and the Future of Civilization by Thomas Greco

My Footprint by Jeff Garlin

Sustainable Event Management by Meegan Jones

The Blue Economy by Gunter Pauli - the 2010 report of the Club of Rome

Leading Change Toward Sustainability by Bob Doppelt (foreward by the aforementioned William McDonough)

Ishmael by Daniel Quinn

Delivering Tomorrow - Towards a Sustainable Future published by DHL

The Moneyless Man by Mark Boyle

Bicycle Diaries by David Byrne

GrassRoutes Northern California Wine Country: Green Road Trips by Serena Bartlett

Boiling Point by K.L. Dionne

Off the Grid: Inside the Movement for More Space, Less Government, and True Independence in Modern America by Nick Rosen

The Dirty Life: A Memoir of Farming, Food and Love by Kristin Kimball - Scribner

The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks and Giants of the Ocean by Susan Casey - Anchor

The Bucolic Plague: How Two Manhattanites Became Gentlemen Farmers: An Unconventional Memoir (P.S.) by Josh Kilmer-Purcell

Eco-Resorts: Planning and Design for the Tropics by Zbigniew Bromberek

© 2012, Richard Matthews. All rights reserved.
SHARE

Melili

  • Image
  • Image
  • Image
  • Image
  • Image
    Blogger Comment
    Facebook Comment

0 comments:

Post a Comment