The oceans regulate the climate, provide us with food, and produce at least half the world's oxygen. And how do we repay them? By overharvesting their limited resources and polluting them with oil, plastics, and noise.

Chris Armstrong, Professor of Political Theory at the University of Southampton, says that if we are to save the seas, something has to change. In A Blue New Deal, published by Yale University Press, he argues that the institutions and laws that govern our oceans are too fragmented, too weak, and too amenable to vested interests to protect the marine environment from further destruction. On March 9, Professor Armstrong will virtually discuss how we ended up with the major challenges facing the ocean today—accelerating environmental problems and growing inequality in the ocean economy—and how we can do better.