Environmental Stewardship and Sustainable Development

Contents: Preface. 1. Introduction: environmental stewardship and sustainable development: an overview/R.B. Jain. I. The Conceptual Issues: 2. Environmental stewardship and sustainable development: the emerging conceptual issues/R.B. Jain and Kanchan Sharma. 3. Environmental stewardship: our spiritual heritage for sustainable development/O.P. Dwivedi. 4. Classical Indian perspective on sustainable development/S.R. Bhatt. 5. Environmental stewardship: the emerging western perspective/Renu Khator. 6. Environmental crisis: a challenge to modern civilisation for secularisation of environmental stewardship/K.D. Gangrade. II. The Governance and Environmental Stewardship: 7. Scale of governance and environmental stewardship/Rex Honey. 8. Constitutional dimensions of environmental stewardship: a comparative perspective/Thomas Fogarty. 9. Environmental stewardship and policy-making in the third world/Dhirendra Vajpeyi.

10. Environmental stewardship and sustainable development: a case for planning/R.K. Wishwakarma and Mukesh Kumar. 11. Grassroots people\'s response to environmental stewardship and sustainable development/Mohit Bhattacharya. 12. Environmental stewardship and sustainable development: policy and administration in India/Noorjahan Bava. 13. Environmental stewardship and sustainable development within the Arab world: with special reference to the United Arab emirates/Abdel-Rahman Bin Hadi. 14. Environmental stewardship for protecting cultural heritage/K.M. Shrimali. III. Environmental Stewardship: The Global Dimension: 15. Strategic roles of international aid agency networks in environmental stewardship and sustainable development/Andreas Obser. 16. The politics of global environmental regimes/L.P. Singh. IV. Summing Up: 17. Prithivisukta and environmental stewardship/O.P. Dwivedi and Neelam Trivedi. 18. In conclusion: environmental stewardship and sustainable development--the need for and earth charter/R.B. Jain. Index.

"This volume is the outcome of an international conference which was organised by the International Political Science Association\'s Research Committees 4 and 35 on public bureaucracies in developing societies and technology and development in association with Friedrich Ebert stiftung, New Delhi and the Department of Political Science, University of Delhi. Many internationally distinguished scholars have focused their attention on a number of issues that have arisen in the context of environmental stewardship and sustainable development. The major thrust of the book has been to discuss the various parameters of the individual and institutional stewardship for sustainable development. Both stewardship and sustainability require an understanding between individuals, between individuals and groups, between groups and communities and between communities and societies upto the global level. Environmental stewardship posits a relationship between human beings and the rest of the creation--not based on domination and exploitation--but on responsibility and accountability for use and preservation of natural resources in order to meet the needs of the present and future generations in a sustainable and equitable manner. In the background of this perspective, the essays in this volume discuss a number of interrelated questions regarding environmental stewardship and sustainable development viz, Is this concept in congruence with eco-ferminism and bio-diversity protection? Is it too human-centred, because it does not recognise the "reverse relationship" between nature and human? can it be made more eco-centric? does it not emphasise respect for indigenous knowledge and cultural diversity? What implementation strategies and institutional mechanisms can be developed in order to operationalise the concept into secular setting through governmental policies and programmes? What role can the political leadership and bureaucracy perform in promoting environment stewardship and sustainable development? How can international aid agencies and global institutions use the concept in their policies and programmes? Is it going to be a new paradigm of development? etc. Although the book does not attempt to make any definitive rigidly applicable answers to all these issues, the consensus amongst the scholars has been that apart from the citizen\'s right, duty and responsibility to secure enforcement of environmental laws, there is a need to evolve a charter of environment conduct to be observed universally by all institutions, organisations, authorities and individuals in order to achieve sustainable development through environmental stewardship." (jacket)