Sustainability, Natural Resources and Communities: Learning from Southern Voices

This essay offers a critical reflection on the evolution of the concept of ‘sustainability’, analysing its scope in the Anthropocene era. Through a comparative study of various Asian experiences, the paper examines the new frontiers of environmental law and community-based natural resource management practices, focusing on the Indian case (with the Kerala model), on some environmental participation processes in China and Vietnam, and on the emergence of new development indicators based on social well-being and environmental protection in Bhutan. The study highlights how these examples of sustainable and participatory governance, based on a Glocal approach involving communities, provide a response to the new sustainability challenges posed by current times and represent useful models also for moving away from the mainstream western idea of sustainability.