ABSTRACT
A few years ago this topic would have been an unlikely inclusion in a handbook on leadership and development. Leadership and development were seen to be so closely aligned to growth and expansion that issues of environmental care were considered to be a distraction. No more! In February 2007 the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change pronounced for the first time that the connection between global warming and industrial activity was ‘unequivocal’. A cursory glance at their website (https://www.ipcc.ch" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">https://www.ipcc.ch) and their fourth report should be sufficient to persuade the most sceptical that things are not going well for the environment and that things will have to change. The report was seen to be so influential that the US finally accepted the findings and despite the intense lobbying of the petroleum industry, President Bush endorsed this ‘inconvenient truth’. In the UK, the government formed the Committee on Climate Change (https://www.theccc.org.uk" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">https://www.theccc.org.uk) and their first report was more challenging than anyone anticipated – calling for a reduction in CO2 emissions of 80 per cent by 2050.
