Bill McKibben
Bill McKibben, author, scholar and environmentalist, will deliver the 22nd annual Hesburgh Lecture in Ethics and Public Policy at 4 p.m. April 12 (Tuesday) in the McKenna Hall Auditorium at the University of Notre Dame.
McKibben’s lecture, “The Last Ditch Effort for a Working Climate: Report from the Front Lines,” will offer strategies and tactics for countering climate change in the context of the Paris climate accords, Pope Francis’ encyclical on the environment, and the hottest year ever measured on the planet, 2015. This lecture is free and open to the public.
McKibben is the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is a founder of 350.org, the first planet-wide, grassroots climate change movement. McKibben’s 1989 book “The End of Nature” is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, and has been translated into 24 languages.
“Bill McKibben is at the forefront of environmental thinking and activism,” said Ruth Abbey, interim director of the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. “We all will benefit immensely from hearing and learning from him on this vitally important topic.”
The Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, which is now an integral part of Notre Dame’s new Keough School of Global Affairs, established the Hesburgh lectures in 1995 in honor of the Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, C.S.C., the late president emeritus. Each year, a distinguished scholar, policymaker and/or peace advocate is invited to deliver a major lecture on an issue related to ethics and public policy in the context of peace and justice.
Past Hesburgh lecturers have included Ebrahim Rasool (2014), South Africa’s ambassador to the United States; Amartya Sen (2012), 1998 winner of the Nobel Prize in economics, Lamont University professor and professor of economics and philosophy at Harvard University; Shirin Ebadi (2009), 2003 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, lawyer and human rights advocate in Iran; and Congressman Lee Hamilton (2005), former vice-chair of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks and former chairman/ranking member of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.
Contact: Anne Riordan, Kroc Institute, 574-631-9370, riordan.14@nd.edu