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Context

• As India continues to grapple with unrelenting heatwaves, it becomes pertinent to unpack two strands of environmental philosophy that reinvent the relationship between nature and humans as shallow and deep ecologism.

Two styles of ecologism

• The powerful and fashionable fight against pollution and resource depletion as shallow ecologism or environmentalism.
  • Exponents of this philosophy believe in continuing the present lifestyle, but with specific tweaks aimed at minimizing the damage to the environment.
  • It is also known as weak ecologism, as it includes the use of less polluting vehicles, etc., which serves to maintain the lifestyle of those dwelling in developed countries.
• Whereas, deep ecologism believes that humans should radically change their relationship with nature.
  • Deep ecologism aspires to sustain nature by making large-scale changes to our lifestyle. These may include limiting the commercial farming of meat to preserve forest areas and reduce the artificial fattening of animals or the reshaping of transport systems which involve the use of internal combustion engines.
  • Besides advocating these lifestyle changes, deep ecologism shifts the attention from pollution and conservation narratives to robust policy formulation and implementation.
  • Additionally, to recognise the complex richness of different lifeforms, deep ecologism calls for a re-evaluation of the ‘survival of the fittest
    • Deep ecologism thus prioritises a ‘live and let live’ attitude over an ‘either you or me’ approach.

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