Pivotal joins Transition Cambridge to support this Cambridge Literary Festival event.
Tickets available from Cambridge Live:
About the speakers
Brian Eno is an English musician, composer, record producer, singer, writer, and visual artist. He is best known for his pioneering work in rock, ambient, pop and electronic music. He has collaborated with artists such as David Bowie, Talking Heads, U2 and Coldplay.
Martin Goodman is the author of nine books of fiction and nonfiction. He holds the chair of Creative Writing at the University of Hull, where he is director of the Philip Larkin Centre for Poetry and Creative Writing.
James Thornton is an environmental lawyer and writer. He is the founding CEO of ClientEarth, a not-for-profit environmental-law organisation with offices in London, Brussels, and Warsaw. New Statesman named James as one of ten people who could change the world. He is a member of the bars of New York, California, and the Supreme Court of the United States, and a solicitor of England and Wales.
Since it opened its doors in 2007, ClientEarth, the only pan-European group of lawyers working in the public interest to protect the environment, has used advocacy, litigation and science to hold local, national and international governments to account.
Its successes have been significant, including helping to quash plans for a new generation of coal fired energy plants, forcing EU chemical and food safety regulators to be more transparent, launching a Sustainable Seafood Coalition, building legal capacity for timber producing communities in Africa, and succesfully taking the UK government to court over deadly air pollution.
Now, founder James Thornton, a top environmental lawyer whom New Stateman called "one of ten people who could change the world", has written a book telling the story of ClientEarth to the present - where most recently he has been advising the Chinese government on how to create the legal structures for an ecological civilisation.
He will be joined in this event by co-writer, Martin Goodman, and ClientEarth trustee, composer and producer, Brian Eno.
““ClientEarth is a rare thing: a hopeful book about the environment and a page-turner about the law”. ”
“This book is an inspiration for those of us trying to build a sustainable future.”