MEDIA KIT: Debunking pseudo-scholarship: Things a journalist should know about The Skeptical Environmentalist

WRI is urging journalists to exercise caution in reporting on or reviewing the new book, The Skeptical Environmentalist.

The book, which has been heavily publicized, makes extraordinary claims — that environmental quality is improving around the world, and that the environmental community is not telling the truth for its own cynical reasons. Those claims deserve scrutiny by careful and knowledgeable journalists.

Lomborg paints a caricature of the environmental agenda based on sometimes mistaken views widely held 30 years ago, but to which no serious environmental institution today subscribes. In making the case for a more rational and scientific debate on environmental issues, Lomborg commits the same sins for which he attacks environmentalists. He exaggerates, makes sweeping generalizations, presents false choices, is highly selective in his use of data and quotations and, frequently, is simply wrong.

News releases

• 2003 January 10. "WRI welcomes decision rebuking The Skeptical Environmentalist". The World Resources Institute (WRI) today commented on the decision by a committee of Danish scientists which ruled that Bjorn Lomborg’s book The Skeptical Environmentalist is scientifically dishonest.

Background information

• Letter from Jonathan Lash to the Society of Environmental Journalists. Urging journalists to exercise caution in reporting on Bjørn Lomborg's book, The Skeptical Environmentalist.