Climate engineering in The Ministry for the Future and Termination Shock

[Geoengineering News]

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0950236X.2025.2551327#abstract

Authors: Matt Morgenstern

Published online: 31 August 2025

https://doi.org/10.1080/0950236X.2025.2551327

Abstract: This essay analyses representations of climate engineering in two novels: Kim Stanley Robinson’s The Ministry for the Future and Neal Stephenson’s Termination Shock. Also known as geoengineering, climate engineering is poised to utilise technological processes as solutions to climate change’s impacts. Climate engineering has attracted much state-corporate attention as a potential climate solution and has emerged as a site of struggle for environmental and climate justice efforts. As works of fiction, Robinson’s and Stephenson’s novels extrapolate representations of the near future, depicting the onset of the climate crisis, the merits of climate engineering programmes, and the labour infrastructure (or climate labour) required for their realisation. Through their emulation of different workers’ experiences, these novels shift how we understand the politics of characters and narration in climate fiction. Ultimately, Robinson’s and Stephenson’s novels suggest that the climate labour of climate engineering depends on those tasked with its maintenance and execution.

Source: Taylor & Francis