rachel carson, jane jacobs, jane goodall and alice waters . and you were taking a different approach and i thought maybe you could tell us how you came to do that. >> the book grew out of the conversation i was having with a friend and i realized that there were four women, each of whom intriguingly similar and adjacent ways had changed the way we thought about the world. carson, the environment. jacob levy, goodall, animals and alice waters, food and eating and what really interested me was that all of them, there were so many parallels in their stories, even though they didn't know each other, they were working in different fields, even in different generations so for instance, all were credentialedoutsiders. they were people who went into the field and literally got their hands literally and figuratively dirty and against all odds prevail . all were green before green had entered our vocabulary. three out of four wrote iconic books that the united social movements. and maybe most interesting, all came to power at a time when women had no vo

i think so much of our culture and ideas come from cities and the comes from just as one writer jane jacobs talked about the only place where you can see some stranger or other traveler by going to a city and so there's just so much going on ideas are generated and so cities are i think are a fulcrum of change like that but nevertheless central governments are still important very important in terms of addressing larger issues like income distribution and climate change you know what makes me concerned about this kind of discourse is that is the fact that they have long seen a gap but then politics and policies you know ideally politics is supposed to be a facilitator of policies but i think they're increasingly diverging especially in the western countries and my concern is that if we think this way of cities you know leading the way we will essentially leave all the major issues of life you know war and peace of life and that the politicians. do you have that sense and i wonder if you believe that politicians. care enough about the things that you supposedly care i think there's an awful

think so much of our culture and ideas come from cities and that comes from just as one writer jane jacobs talked about the only place where you can see the stranger of the or other traveler by going to a city and so there's just so much going on ideas are generated and so cities are i think are a fulcrum of change like that but nevertheless central governments are still important very important in terms of addressing larger issues like income distribution and climate change you know what makes me concerned about this kind of discourse is the fact that they have long seen a gap that's when politics and policies you know ideally politics is supposed to be a facilitator of policies but i think they're increasingly diverging especially in the western countries and my concern is that if we think this way of cities you know leading the way we will essentially leave all the major issues of life you know war and peace of life and that the politicians. do you have that sense and i wonder if you believe that politicians. care enough about the things that you supposedly care i think there's an awful