Ecological Crises and Gandhian Solution: (Re) Locating Gandhi in the Contemporary Environmental Discourses

Abstract

As a result of the unfortunate ramification of the human activities over time, environmental degradation has emerged as a new force creating tension over resource depletion on the one hand, and, the necessity of new forms of cooperation, both local and global, such as decentralised micro-level mitigation methods, new rules and institutions to address common dangers of environmental catastrophe, etc. on the other. Hence, values, such as decentralisation, community based economics, post patriarchal principle, respect for diversity, local and global responsibility and future focus have come to be recognised institutionally as having potential to curb the rising environmental crises today. Gandhi was in pursuit of a framework of concepts and values and a method to arrive at them so that many a system could be built upon them for the immediate present, and for the many future stages of development in the unfolding or fulfilling human destiny. This fact about Gandhi explains his emergence as a possible answer to the global environmental crisis, with local, micro-level solutions. This paper attempts to evaluate the ideas of Mahatma Gandhi as having a bearing on the notions of environmental stewardship, ecological diversity, and ethics of sustainability; and relocates Gandhi to the centre-stage of contemporary environmental discourses.