The Ministry for the Future

From Reboil

The Ministry for the Future is a 2020 science fiction novel by Kim Stanley Robinson. The novel imagines a possible 2020 fork in Earth's history down which human civilization mitigates the climate crisis caused by anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions.

Stats


Details

People

Badim
Ministry employee. (c27) Grew up in Nepal. Reveals to Mary that he founded the black wing of the Ministry to intimidate and kill Ministry obstacles.
Estevan
Ministry employee.
Frank May
(c1) A US citizen from Jacksonville.[cmt 1] Witnesses mass death in Uttar Pradesh, India, due to inhospitably high ambient temperatures. (c25) Kidnaps Mary Murphy, demanding her Ministry assassinate billionaires causing global warming. Flees. (c26) Frank uses the alias Jacob Salzman from a stolen passport.
Imeni
Ministry employee.
Mary Murphy
(c4) Head of the Ministry for the Future. (c25) Widow of Martin. Kidnapped by Frank May who demands her Ministry form a covert ops department to assassinate climate criminals. Allows Frank to escape but reports the kidnapping to police.
Syrine
Refugee wife of Frank.

Places

Antarctica
India
Lucknow
(c1) Captital of Utar Pradesh.
Uttar Pradesh
(c1) A place in India where Frank May works.
Zurich
(C4) headquarters for the Ministry for the Future.

Things

global warming
Children of Kali
An organization that combats climate change through assassinations.

Narrative

Chapters 1-20

Chapter summaries (c1-20)
Chapter Description Characters
1 A heat wave strikes India where Frank May works as a humanitarian aide worker. The heat wave eventually kills everyone in the vicinity except Frank. Frank
2 The sun talks about its nature. The Sun.
3 How the (fictional) Ministry for the Future was established under Article 16 Clause 4 and Article 18 Clause 1 of the Paris Agreement under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Author.
4 Mary Murphy, the Irish head of the Ministry, learns from her chief of staff, Badim Bahadur, that India breaks the Paris Agreement by seeding the atmosphere with sulfur dioxide to replicate the global temperature increase measured after the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo. Mary, Badim
5 Frank is found nearly dead of the Indian heatwave. He receives medical attention. Frank
6 India declares economic war to mitigate climate change.
7 Frank feels survivor's guilt at surviving the Indian heatwave. Frank
8 The temptations of fossil fuel, a description of the largest fossil fuel corporations, and a sympathetic description of their executives. Author
9 Mary and Badim discuss politcal and climatic effects of India's atmospheric seeding program. Mary has a swim and conversation with the Ministry legal head, Tatiana Voznesenskaya. They discuss the weakness of the Ministry and how motherhood could become a religion. Badim, Mary, Tatiana
10 A diatribe of an Indian pilot against doubters of India's geoëngineering atmospheric plan a pilot
11 An invitation to use science to create an ideology for interpreting reality for clarity of information and power. Author
12 The legacy of the anthropocene's extinctions. Author
13 Frank's PTSD over surviving the Indian heatwave and his encounter with the Kali and their request for him to advocate for climate policy change to communicate their threats to the world if the world does not change the climate. Frank, Children of Kali
14 A doctor is forced to smuggle himself and his family to western Europe due to civil unrest by local rebels killing in the streets. a doctor
15 Ministry meeting notes on collapse of global economy and ecology and attempts to quantify scope of problem. Badim, Mary, Tatiana, Imbeni Halle (infrastructure), Jurgen Atzgen (insurance), Bob Wharton, Adele Elia (glaciologist), Huo Kaming (ecologist), Estevan Escobar (oceans), Elena Quintero (agriculture), Indra Dalit (geoengineering), Dick Bosworth (economist), Janus Athena (artificial intelligence), Esmeri Zayed (refugees), Rebecca Tallhorse (Canadian indigenous) Badim, Mary, Tatiana, Imbeni, Jurgen, Bob, Adele, Dick, Huo, Estevan.
16 The failure of capitalism due to finite resources and their overallocation to billionaires. The plausibility of wealth redistribution ensuring adequate resource allocation, and thus security, to all individuals.
17 An interview about change and the agents of the world economy being a minority yet holding disproportionate power over everyone else.
18 Frank goes through therapy for PTSD learns eye movement techniques. He applies for a position and receives a job in Antarctica but suffers a panic attack and has to be medevac'd out. Frank
19 Slave fisherman are saved by vigilantes with an ideology to end fishing as a practice in general.
20 Failures of economic indices to account for human understanding and purpose. The United Nations's inequality adjusted human development index. The need to step back and ask what is all this index business really for.

Chapters 21-40

Chapter summaries (c21-40)
Chapter Description Characters
21 Some ultra wealthy partygoers attempt to intimidate a poor man from a public beach near their celebrity party venue. The man kills one intimidator and flees. Frank
22 An introvert glaciologist timid of politics shares a plan to combat rising sea levels by pumping water from beneath glaciers to slow further glacier melt.
23 Frank nearly shoots an oil executive with a stolen rifle, but lacks resolve. Frank
24 Perceptual illusions. Cognitive errors. Ideology as a necessary cognitive illusion. N/A
25 Mary goes out for drinks with her Ministry subordinates. Frank May kidnaps Mary and demands her Ministry form a covert ops section to assassinate climate criminals to fulfill her duty to protect the future people under her jurisdiction. Frank says the Children of Kali are killing climate criminals who the Ministry should be killing. Frank flees; Mary calls police. Mary, Frank
26 Frank's strategies for hiding from law enforcement in Zurich within a few kilometers of Mary's apartment. Frank
27 Mary chafes at police constantly guarding her after her kidnapping. Mary floats the idea of a black wing of the Ministry. Badim shocks Mary by telling her it already exists and he founded it. Mary demands details but Badim says operational security requires the Ministry head not know details. Mary insists and Badim agrees to share some information. Mary, Badim
28 The Hebrew story of the Tzadikim Nistarim, or “hidden righteous ones”: ordinary individuals among the population who, at key moments, effect great change for their people, then return to anonymity and never take credit for their momentous acts. Such stories are themselves the momentous acts.
29 Geoengineers establish a base in Antarctica to drill a water well to slow the Thwaite Glacier's melting into the sea by removing the water lubricating its slide along the bedrock. Mr. G.
30 How people subdivide history into periods. How a feeling of chaotic despair eventually stabilizes and is categorized as a period. How feelings of things simultaneously falling apart may simply reflect how living beings are constantly falling apart.
31 The fall of the BJP and Congress party in India and rise of a Coalition party that nationalizes all energy companies, decomissions coal-fired power stations and constructs solar power arrays.
32 Mary and Dick discuss how discount rates cause future generations to be negligibly valued. Dick highlights India using a seven-generation discount rate to justify economics of otherwise costly climate-friendly policies. Mary, Dick
33 A Children of Kali assassin's account of killing a weapons manufacturer while they slept in their fortified and monitored home. an assassin
34 Mary and Badim tour India to review their work to combat climate change. India will further violate the Paris Agreement with more sulfur dioxide geoëngineering. Badim notes eminent domain by government and assassinations of plutocrats by Children of Kali are defacto parts of India's integrated pest control. Badim, Chandra, Indra, Mary, Vikram
35 Refugees traveling westward from Austria are processed by Switzerland. Fear caused by a misunderstanding that they were being sent on a train eastward results in a riot and arson. Several travelers are killed. After an inquiry, the travelers are permitted to continue onward to France. refugees
36 A description of efforts to ameliorate the thawing of each winter's Arctic ice pack after the ice completely melted during a summer in 2036. A description of the runaway process of albedo loss and methane release. Author
37 A girl from Libya, her sister, and their mother become refugees in Switzerland following the riot in Chapter 35. She and her family learn English alongside other refugees from Jake[cmt 2]. Jake marries the mother and the daughters move in with Jake. The girl describes Jake as a person with high spin while her mother is very low spin with much charm. Eventually, Jake and the mother break up, forcing the mother and daughters to move again. refugee girl
38 Another talkshow interview between an inquisitive pessimistic host and a laconic pessimistic host about the impossibility to replace neoliberalism due to all non-violent mechanisms for political change being rigged by the rich against the poor. interviewer, interviewee
39
40 How efficiency is not a substitute for purpose and economics is a calculator for achieving objectives of their wielder. An invitation to reëvaluate economics for improving the biosphere. Author

Chapters 41-60

Chapter summaries (c41-60)
Chapter Description Characters
41
42 Ministry conversation. AI as method to implement command economy; market efficiency unable to price in extinctions and irreversible ocean warming. Conversation about carbon quantitative easing (CQE) in addition to traditional carbon tax as possible way to incentivize carbon sequestration by making sequestration how central bank money is created. Mary, others
43 Poetic prose on how code, block chain, etc. are tools. Author
44 A Russian billionaire's project to test pumping seawater onto the center of Antartica to freeze it and this counter sea level rise from the melting of the ice caps due to global warming. An academia's cynicism on the feasibility of the prospect. an academic
45 Mary visits San Francisco to meet with Central bankers. Goes on a tour of the hydrology of geoëgineering to refill aquifers to sustain the state during droughts with rainfall captured during rainy years.
46
47 Frank watches topless women at a beach. Frank regrets leaving Serena and her daughters. Frank attends a 2000-watt society meeting. Frank assists refugees anonymously and helps the needy at food kitchens. Swiss racists attack a food kitchen. Frank gives an account to police but is arrested after a face scan indicates a warrant out for his arrest. Frank
48 A member of a failed society in a concentration camp feels anger at the effective prison they find themselves in and their charitable infrastructure helpers. The prisoner resents foreign aid workers and religious clerics. They consider digging under a fence to escape. It is their 1859th day in the camp. a concentration camp prisoner
49 How the US Treasury's Harry Dexter White made the US Dollar the imperial coin of Earth via the World Bank instead of an International Clearing Union's bancor proposed by John Maynard Keynes. Author
50 Mary tours various central banks to pitch the carbon quantitative easing idea. She visits the Bank of England, the European Central Bank in Brussels, the Bundesbank on Berlin, and then the central bank of Russia. Badim informs Mary that her kidnapper has been caught. Mary visits Frank in jail and goes to help reduce his sentence. Mary, Badim, Frank
51 Author
52 A summary of how India politics changed to promote sustainable agriculture, better governance, and engineering. Examples from Sikkim, Kerala, Bangalore and other Indian states. an Indian
53 A photon describes their physical nature and role in heating the Earth as well as being emitted and absorbed by matter. A mention of their role in global warming via the greenhouse effect. a photon
54 Mary works with petrochemical companies and central banks to roll out a currency based on carbon sequestration. Mary and Janus-Athena discuss rolling out open source replacement to social media. Mary, Janus-Athena
55 An anarchist recounts a failed revolution in Paris. an anarchist
56 Mary polls non-economics departments of the Ministry. Legally, little hope exists to lower carbon emissions due to private industry lobbying power outmatching Ministry efforts. Mary ponders how to effect a grassroots revolution. Badim proposed promoting a new religion to leverage ancient habits of human condition. Mary, Badim
57 Dr. G reflects on how immobilizing and freezing ice in Antarctica to halt global warning is becoming less and less impossible. Dr. G imagines Antarctica will be a good place for unemployed oil field workers. An account of Dr. G's camp mates finding his corpse in a crevasse. Dr. G[cmt 3]
58 The history of the Mondragón coöperative in the Basque region of Spain described as a humane alternative to capitalism. a Spanish resident
59 A young Los Angeles woman is caught up in an atmospheric River event. She helps others stranded by the flood of the Los Angeles basin reach safety with her kayak. She is excited that Los Angeles, a city she hates, will have to be rebuilt. a Los Angeles kayaker
60 Mary takes a bath. Badim periodically notified Mary via cryptic messages of activities of the Ministry's dark wing; Mary suspects protests and strikes are his doing. Mary sees global sentiment warm to the Ministry's work after the Los Angeles flood. Mary meets with central banker if the world in China. China's diplomat, Madame Chan, boasts that China already agrees. Mary convinces all the central bankers to back a digital carbon coin issued in proof of carbon sequestration. The Ministry's Zurich office is bombed in the night. Mary goes into hiding at the behest of police. Mary, Badim, Madame Chan

Chapters 61-80

Chapter summaries (c61-80)
Chapter Description Characters
61 A review of negative emotional reactions to biosphere collapse. A mention of Edgar Allan Poe's The Masque of the Red Death (1842). A description of narcissism and associated Götterdämmerung Syndrome. author
62 Policewoman Schmidt escorts Mary to a safehouse in the Alps. They stay at a hotel. They hike to the safehouse hut. A rock slide in the night nearly demolishes the hut. The guards are spooked. They decide to relocate Mary. Sibilla Schmidt, Mary
63 Mary is marched up over a glacier through a pass in the Alps. She is picked up by helicopter and dropped off near a secret Swiss military base. Mary is exhausted. Mary is confronted by the seven Swiss Presidents who tell her Switzerland, the Ministry, and UN agencies are under attack. They say Swiss bank accounts were temporarily disabled due to a computer hack. The Presidents ask Mary if the Ministry provoked the attacks by performing the Davos hostage taking. Mary denies knowledge but argues the event was good overall. Mary says the Swiss have provoked the attacks by holding money for criminals. Mary strongly urges the Presidents to reörganize their banks to blockchain all their assets for transparency and adopt carbon coin to put their ill-gotten deposits to work sequestering carbon. Mary, Swiss Presidents
64 A review of the contemporary context of John Maynard Keynes's call for “the euthanasia of the rentier class” in his work The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money (1936). A call for an application of some definition of euthanasia on the rentier class in the face of the oncoming mass extinction event caused by global warming. author
65 Workers strike at a rare-earth element open-pit mine in Namibia. The strike ends when government drones incapacitate guards and liberate the workers, announcing the mine has been nationalized. Workers are provided busses and food and the options to leave or to stay and become worker-owners. Most choose to stay to retain their “sweat-equity”. a miner
66 The life history of a single carbon atom from their mother supernova, through being part of a dinosaur, becoming imprisoned as coal, burnt as fuel, dissolving into rain water, then finally imprisoned by carbon sequestration as magnesium carbonate. a carbon atom
67 A review of taxation. Progressive and regressive taxes in the 20th century United States. Blockchain ledger transparency as a means to eliminate tax dodging. A call for legislatures to reform tax laws. author
68 Mary is allowed to return to her apartment to collect some belongings. She is transported to a different residence in a secured walled compound. Mary continues to walk to work, accompanied by security. Mary visits Frank regularly. They speculate about who attacked Mary in the Alps. During a visit, Frank's former refugee wife and daughter visit to his surprise. Mary, Frank
69 The Sauds suffer a military coup, rendering Saudi Arabian simply Arabia. Arabia claims carbon coins for their unproduced petroleum reserves. A summary of a global gradual reduction in fossil fuel burning. The spread of everyone-versus-everyone warfare as portable hypersonic weapon technology is leaked by Russia; the same technology that destroyed the Ministry's headquarters in Zurich in chapter 60. A deadly heat wave in the US South and Arizona; Americans not directly affected mostly ignore the catastrophe. author?
70 COP meetings for the Paris Agreement continue despite worsening catastrophes. The Article 2 concept of “climate equity” in which wealthier nations should do more to fix the climate than poorer nations. Acceptance of future generations as a poor developing nation as justification for continued funding of the Ministry for the Future. author?
71 Ministry meeting notes. Attacks on Ministry may have promptes African nationalizations. Water pipelines successfully slowing Antarctica glaciers. Extinctions continuing. Mary wants farmers to get carbon coin. India preparing another Pinotubo. Finance market is shorting carbon coin. A global movement is rising with patriotism to the biosphere rather than any one nation-state. Janus-Athena says machine learning is computer-aided science. Mary, Badim, Janus-Athena, Ministry et.al
72 The implementation of wildlife corridors across North America such as from the Yukon to Yosemite and even some midwestern agricultural areas. A mob attacks wildlife corridor supporters and fails. Recommendation of ecologist Edward O. Wilson's Half-Earth idea. an ecologist
73 How Modern Monetary Theory was used in the late 2030s to replace conventional 20th century economics of capitalism to meet the climate crisis. Human and biosphere welfare as government's goal rather than inflation control, starting with full employment. Detractions against and acceptance of MMT as similar to communism. author
74 Frank meets with Mary. Mary denies Ministry support of terrorism. They discuss the emotional pressure of existing in a connected crowded world. Frank hikes and passes time with a feral goat. Frank, Mary, a goat
75 Students go on strike, refusing to pay their student loans. The banking system collapses. China reforms its government. Financial institutions are not bailed out without profit restrictions. YourLock provides micro banking. Carbon Coin provides income via grassroots carbon sequestration. Ministry governance experiments are deployed and accepted. author
76 How the US Navy is an organization competent to run many nuclear reactors. A comparison of the pay and personality types between Navy admirals and CEOs. Pay ratios between bottom and top of organization. How admirals are much more empathetic while psychopathy and dishonesty is selected for among CEOs who have astronomically high pay ratios to their rank and file employees. A call to reduce pay ratios to ten to one. a Navy sailor
77 A poetic anthropomorphization of History. author
78 A recounting of an Indian intellectual peacemaker academic's relatively privileged get rough childhood. They are summoned to confront Children of Kali. The academic argues for an end to their killings and declares themself Kali to stunned silence. an intellectual and peacemaker
79 Mary visits Frank. Frank urges Mary to visit the Alps as she urged him. Frank struggles to convey the importance of the new understanding visiting the Alps gave him. Frank urges Mary to use the Ministry to help refugees from being simply treated as criminals for seeking what local citizens are encouraged to do: take the initiative to seek economic opportunities. Frank, Mary
80 A farmer's wife and her stubborn husband discover carbon coins from preparing their land for agriculture is worth a large amount. a farmer's wife and a farmer

Chapters 81-100

Chapter summaries (c81-100)
Chapter Description Characters
81 A private conservation between Mary and a fellow Ministry member. How Russia seeks to improve their reputation. Siberia turning into swampland. America is unlikely to take the lead in repairing the climate. Mary, T
82 An interregnum starts as commerce stutters and the Internet fails. Socialism and democracy as solutions but under different names. author
83 In Russia, Tatiana meets with Svetlana who wants help migrating away. They discuss Russian politics which is swinging towards India-friendly relations and democracy, albeit under oligarch children. Tatiana, Svetlana
84 Mary works while aboard a sailing ship. Mary meets with global finance ministers in New York. Central bankers are pleased at the success of the carbon coin and related reforms. They ask Mary for further recommendations. Mary recommends taxing or ending high speed trading and dark money pools. Mary recommends providing basic necessities to people. Chinese finance minister Madame Chan is pleased with Mary and says China is following India's lead on agricultural reforms. Chan professes support for Mary and the Ministry. Mary, Madame Chan
85 Introductions of ecology activists from various parts of Earth introducing themselves for some unnamed conference. eco-activists
86 Mary and Frank hike alone in the Alps. They quietly watch wildlife. Frank collapses while they return to civilization. Mary, Frank
87 A town near Yellowstone closes up shop. Four hundred local residents mourne the end of their settlement. They all receive generous compensations that allows them to live in wealthy urban locations and receive good educations. A resident thinks how children moving away was a major contribution to the town's decline. a small town resident
88 A poem about herd animals, their nature, and similarity to people. herd animals
89 The Ministry celebrates a drop in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. Mary's bitter thoughts about the wealthy who continue to fight against the habitability of Earth. Mary
90 A conversation about how systems define civilization, not technology. talk show host and guest
91 Mary visits Frank who has been diagnosed with a brain tumor. Frank reflects on his own cognitive decline. Frank introduces Mary to Art, another coöp resident who helps care for Frank. Mary, Frank
92 A refugee is skeptical about global passports being offered to refugees to help them settle in a country of their choosing. The refugee reflects on how even refugee camps change over time as people live their lives and advance from one phase of life to the next within them, learning, marrying, divorcing. an arabic-speaking refugee
93 Glaciologists find glacier movement has slowed thanks to water pumping efforts. antarctic glaciologists
94 Mary visits Frank in a hospice. She encounters Frank's refugee family. Mary reports to Frank the conference talking about the victories for reclaiming climate stability. Mary, Frank, Frank's refugee family
95 a cryptic poem author
96 Mary visits Frank as he declined in hospice care. Frank dies. Mary mournes him and contemplates PTSD. Mary, Frank
97 Thoughts on a recovering Earth with a declining and stabilizing human population in balance with the biosphere. Author
98 Mary's last meeting and retirement party. Mary appoints Badim to run the Ministry. Mary and coworkers
99 A talk show interview on how, if there is to be success, it is composed of successive failures. The brittleness of oligarchy and the obfuscatory nature of political power and markets. Interviewer and guest
100 Mary travels by boat from Europe to San Francisco. Mary observes central bankers running the world deciding to prioritize the biosphere. Mary is particularly impressed with Madam Chan. Mary passes the torch to Chan. Mary, Madam Chan

Chapters 101-106

Chapter summaries (c101-106)
Chapter Description Characters
101 How Hong Kong protested over decades in order to secure rights for itself. How other Chinese provinces emulated Hong Kong's protests to also achieve similar ends. a Hong Kong resident
102 Mary goes with Art on a tour via airship from across the Arctic pole down to Antarctica. They see various sites of geoengineering. Mary asks Art to become his girlfriend. Art shyly agrees. Mary, Art
103 A linguist celebrates being alive in Hawaii. a linguist
104 Mary returns to the rhythm of civilian life. Mary attends a holiday party and speaks with Badim, her successor. Mary reveals she knew he had attacked the Ministry. Badim thanks Mary for trusting him but regrets having to hide his actions. Mary, Badim
105 A lifelong refugee from an Arabic country settles in Switzerland with family and friends. At age 71, they realize they no longer wish to return to Damascus, the country they were born in. Their family runs a restaurant. They reflect on the importance of language in establishing peace as well as the loss of local languages. a refugee
106 Mary and Art attend a celebration in Zurich. Mary, Art

Quotes

Chapter 25:

“Political science is a fake thing, if you ask me. Or at least it has a fake name. I mean, where’s the science in it?”

“Statistics, maybe?”

“No. They just want to sound solid. They’re history at best, economics at worst.”

Chapter 29:

Look, if you have to do something, you have to do it. Don’t keep talking about cost as if that’s a real thing. Money isn’t real. Work is real.

If at first you don’t succeed—

You’ll never get funded again.

History


See also


External links

References


Footnotes


Comments

  1. ↑ Baltakatei: 2024-12-17: Possibly Jacksonville, Florida?
  2. ↑ Baltakatei: 2024-12-26: Jake is actually Frank, as evidenced by his eye movements and PTSD panic attacks.
  3. ↑ Baltakatei: 2025-01-04: Probably the same narrator from chapters 29 and 44.
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