Online Book Reviews WINDFALL: THE BOOMING philosophy at Denmark’s Aarhus University. BUSINESS OF GLOBAL WARMING His master’s thesis was on “Greenlandic BY MCKENZIE FUNK Autonomy or Secession: Philosophical The Penguin Press, New York, NY, 2014. 310 pages, Considerations,” and in it he grappled with $27.95. the work of American philosopher Allen Buchanan. Reviewed by Christopher C. Faille According to Buchanan, secession is right when it is a remedy for serious wrong. At one point in this multifaceted book, Or, as certain secessionists put the point in McKenzie Funk treats us to a brief discus- 1776, prudence dictates “that Governments sion of the philosophy of secession. Under long established should not be changed for what circumstances should one part of a light and transient causes” but may rightly larger political entity—perhaps a part with be changed in response to “a long train of boundaries of its own (a province or region) abuses and usurpations.” and some degree of autonomy (a capital city For Minik, the problem with that line and a legislature)—secede from the whole? of thought is that the Danes have been And when is this wrong? a relatively benign colonial power. Every Sam Houston is the name that always Greenlander has had full citizenship, for comes to my mind first when I think of such example, since 1953. Further, Denmark junction of events in 2006 should have made questions, because Houston had the rare pays to allow Greenlanders such as Minik to that plain to everyone. experience of playing a prominent role on attend universities in the mother country, That year saw Greenland lose 100 giga- both sides of the question. He of course or elsewhere in Europe, and write masters’ tons of ice, and drought-crazed camels ram- worked to secure Texas’ secession from theses such as his. Minik doesn’t believe, paged through an Australian village. Also Mexico, but, many years later, he was a though, that he should be expected to point in 2006, fire consumed millions of acres in critical figure among the Unionists of Texas, to a long train of abuses and usurpations by Siberia; the Bay of Bengal took over most of resisting that state’s secession from the the Danes in order to justify secession. Ghoramara Island in India; the Solomon Sea United States. Minik told Funk, “Sometimes you have conquered most of the village of Malasiga Sometimes secession requires violence to view this as a marriage: adults, consent- in Papua New Guinea; and the people of in order to be effective, as in the first of ing people, divorcing of their own free will.” Shishmaref, a village in Alaska, decided to the two cases in Houston’s life. Sometimes The no-fault secession seems to have been evacuate their homes ahead of a Chukchi it is attempted violently and fails nonethe- fueled in part by the positive economic con- Sea inundation. less, as in the second. In yet other cases, sequences for Greenland of recent changes Further, in 2006 scientists reported that secession comes about peacefully. One in climate. The referendum in 2008 and the a 40-square-mile ice shelf had broken off of these was Greenland’s secession from agreement with Denmark in 2009 together Ellesmere Island in the Canadian territory Denmark in 2008-2009. Actually, “seces- meant that Greenland has taken over control of Nunavut, and that a European satellite sion” may be rather too strong a word there, of its own natural resources—and because showed a crack in the ice pack that led as Greenlanders continue to leave certain of climate change these have acquired much all the way from northern Russia to the foreign-policy functions to the Danes. Still, greater value and marketability than they North Pole. The crack was temporary, but the two countries are held together only had even quite recently. Thus, because of indicative nonetheless. Beyond that year, by very loose reins, and we may as well climate change, Greenlanders are persuad- “[s]keptics would continue loudly doubting describe the referendum that produced this ed they can go it alone as a country. Parts of the overwhelming scientific consensus, but situation, and the subsequent negotiations, the island that had long been inhospitable to they were a smoke screen,” Funk tells us. as a successful case of peaceful secession. oil drilling have become amenable, and sud- Because Funk considers that argument denly there is what Funk calls “an untapped over, the book isn’t about that. Nor is it A Minute with Minik Gulf of Mexico in the North Atlantic.” about a plan to head off global warming In Windfall, McKenzie Funk unequivo- at the level of intergovernmental coopera- cally calls the activists who produced this What We Know Since 2006 tion. Funk quotes Jeroen van der Veer, an result in Greenland secessionist, and he has Greenland’s secession is only one of analyst working for Shell Oil Company, discussed the politics of independence, as many stories that Funk tells in this book. who has written rather wistfully of the well as the related politics of melting ice and He isn’t especially interested in arguing possibility that, after the expiration of the climate change, with one of those activists, with people who don’t want to believe that Kyoto Protocol, which at the time he wrote Minik Kleist. climate change is real, and so won’t believe this analysis was set for 2012, “a meaning- Minik (as Funk calls him) studied political it. In his eyes, it is plainly a fact, and a con- ful international carbon-trading framework MAY/JUNE 2014 • THE FEDERAL LAWYER • 1 with robust verification and accreditation He concludes his discussion of the Spragg was not the work of a conspiracy at all, but [might emerge] from the patchwork of bags, typically, with a comic opera note. “In the work of a lone wolf, and an act upon regional and city-city schemes.” 1996 [Spragg] completed a successful drag which the Nazis then seized to consolidate But Funk doesn’t hold out much hope for across Puget Sound to Seattle, only to have their power. Hitler got lucky, according to such a result. We should observe here that a tugboat run into his docked prototype.” this reasoning, because van der Lubbe gave most parties to the protocol have agreed to Funk’s prose is sufficiently lively, and Funk him just what he needed. Hans Mommsen its extension until 2020. Canada—an arctic takes us so stylishly through a wide range of and A.J.P. Taylor are prominent among power that is reaping the same benefits fascinating subjects (human, political, and those historians who have taken this view. as Greenland from warming trends—has technological) as such an amiable guide, pulled out of this second round. So far as that we hardly notice the deep gloom of his Another View I can tell, Funk is right on this and van der bottom line. There has also always been another view: Veer’s speculation was wrong. Nonetheless, Windfall is a sign of a that the Nazis created their own opportu- Instead, what this book is chiefly about healthy shift in the way we talk about global nity, and that they enlisted or tricked van is the way in which people all over the warming, and the Spraggs of this world will der Lubbe into helping them. In Burning world—people who never cross the cogni- never be as gloomy as the Funks, though the Reichstag, Benjamin Carter Hett, pro- tive radar of newspaper editors or read- lots of prototypes get busted on the way to fessor of history at Hunter College, has ers—are adjusting to the fact of climate adaptation. now revived the case for the latter theory, change, “so if there’s a glimpse of the future freshening up some old arguments with in these pages, it’s only because we’re the Christopher Faille graduated from new evidence. He doesn’t profess to know ones making it.” Minik is making the future Western New England College School of how the Nazis enlisted or tricked van der in his manner, but so are the hundreds of Law in 1982 and became a member of Lubbe. He says that, because “[d]eath has entrepreneurs Funk has met who are each the Connecticut bar soon thereafter. He long since taken anyone who knew ... this convinced that there is profit to be made is at work on a book that will make the part of the mystery seems destined to stay from climate change. quants of Wall Street intelligible to sociol- with us.” ogy majors. Here’s an intriguing question: what was Towing Bags of Water van der Lubbe doing between 6 p.m. and 9 One of the important features of the near BURNING THE REICHSTAG: AN p.m. on Feb. 27? His confession said that future is that hydrological maps—our ideas INVESTIGATION INTO THE THIRD he had been waiting around since 2 p.m. of where fresh water may be found, and REICH’S ENDURING MYSTERY for the cover of darkness. But it gets dark where it is needed—will have to change. BY BENJAMIN CARTER HETT in late February in Berlin by 6 p.m. Why did Droughts will hit unaccustomed places, Oxford University Press, New York, NY, 2014. 413 the arsonist dawdle for another three hours and places that previously had droughts as pages, $29.95. before acting? fluctuating temporary conditions will now As Hett observes, “The evidence of become permanently dry. Reviewed by Christopher C. Faille the regular rounds of Reichstag employ- Terry Spragg is one of the entrepreneurs ees—the mailman, the porters, the lighting who hopes to benefit from this.