Buddhist Environmental Ethics : A Contemplative Approach

Brings Tibetan Buddhist philosophy, contemplative practice, and contemporary environmental ethics together to present a novel way of approaching the pressing issues facing our more-than-human world.

In Buddhist Environmental Ethics, Colin H. Simonds presents a compelling case for using a contemplative register to approach some of our most pressing issues surrounding climate change, ecological collapse, and the exploitation of nonhuman animals. Simonds develops an emerging theory of Buddhist ethics—moral phenomenology—by engaging it with the Tibetan framework of view, meditation, action and providing a practical means by which individuals can ethically develop through contemplative practice. He then applies this theory and practical framework to the ethical and material problems facing the more-than-human world to show how a Tibetan Buddhist response to these issues offers a cogent, adaptable way to address environmental problems. In doing so, Buddhist Environmental Ethics forwards the first book-length constructive argument for an eco-Buddhist ethic in over a decade, articulates the first environmental ethic based on Tibetan Buddhist sources, and offers a timely framework for how we can experience the more-than-human world anew through contemplative practice.

Colin H. Simonds is Assistant Lecturer of Religion at the University of Alberta.