The Western Orientation of Environmentalism in the Islamic World Today

Abstract

Why is so much of official environmental action in the Islamic world Western-oriented? This article investigates this topic by first examining inherited resources in the Islamic tradition that could contribute to an environmentalism. It then proceeds to explain the peripheralization of these resources and the engagement of environmentalist methods of particularly modern and Western origin. A variety of factors are at play, including the large-scale indifference of religious scholars and politicians to the environment in the Islamic world; postcolonial attitudes of inferiority in the East that champion Western views and methodologies over local, traditional ones; the relative compatibility of Western environmentalist means with modernization; and the secularization of the acquisition of knowledge and its applications. In juxtaposition with concerns of romanticizing the traditional or the modern, the present article also examines the relevance of traditional Islamic methods of environmental action.