Imagining Earth's Future

Kim Stanley Robinson seems to write two kinds of books. Both are hard sci-fi in the sense that they focus on either current technology or near-future technology extrapolated from current science. Both kinds of books are quick to locate the political elements of technology and science. While one sort of novel follows in the vein of his Mars trilogy – set in space and looking toward a sort of hopeful exploration (though often fraught with its own political difficulties) – the other kind of novel brings his readers back to Earth to take a hard look at the problems that we face here. The Ministry of the Future is one of the latter kind. While the title makes this sound like a time travel narrative, it is actually about a UN ministry that is established as a proxy for future generations as a way to keep current political entities from taking advantage of as-yet-unborn people. This in itself is an interesting idea because of the broad rhetoric used across the political spectrum in America about the importance of children, fetus, the future, and so on. In this novel, Robinson points out the fact that our systems loves to short the future while also counting on those yet to come to solve the ridiculous problems that we both create and shirk responsibility for.

This novel is a careful bricolage of narrative, ideas for problem solving, international intrigue, meditations on environmentalism and capitalism, and speculation on future technologies and bioengineering. The central narrative of the novel, detailing Mary Murphy's heading of the Ministry for the Future and the attempts she and her team make to bring the Earth back from the brink of destruction, makes up a small portion of the book. Robinson relies heavily on juxtaposition throughout to patch together scenes of striking contrast to highlight the manifold difficulties that we face. This is a necessary tactic because Robinson recognizes that the problems that we face are intricately interconnected.

For as bleak as much of the novel can be, Robinson does find a way to save the world. It takes invention of a new crypto-currency backed by the major economies of the world and based on carbon sequestration and the implementation of many other global-scale projects. But we have to make it through mass carnage and near collapse to get there. The disheartening revelation of the novel is that the wealthy and developed nations must experience the world as others do in order to take action.

I do not find this kind of Robinson's novels as entertaining to read as his space exploration novels, but they are still important to read. Robinson wants to think about a future that is based in the present day and fully cognizant of the problems that we face. He never imagines a future in which humankind is magically no longer like humankind. This can be disheartening, but it is a more useful way of looking at the future.