Chapter 4: Eurocentric Sustainability

After being in a relatively balanced state for over 11,000 years, planet Earth is moving out of the Holocene period due to human-induced global warming and environmental degradation, creating and exacerbating a wide range of environmental and socio-economic challenges (Hsiang et al., 2018; Steffen et al., 2015). Environmental exploitation, which began with the discovery of fossil fuels and catalysed the first industrial revolution 300 years ago, has long been driven by Western ideologies (Norde, 1997). These ideologies, rooted in Judeo-Christian traditions, view humans as separate from and superior to nature, with the right to dominate the Earth (Castro, 2004).

This fostered a mindset that values nature only for its utility rather than for its inherent worth, which has led to viewing unused and unconsumed resources as wasteful, resulting in unsustainable practices that have caused significant resource degradation and depletion (Leopold, 1949). This mindset also fuelled Europe’s quest for new lands, leading to the colonisation and exploitation of both nature and people. This observation is reflected in a 1580 diary passage by Italian missionary Matteo Ricci, who was living in China at the time: