ECOSYSTEMS AND RESOURCE CHOICES: Lessons from the Kerala Floods [Hardcover]

ABOUT THE BOOK The 2018 Kerala floods imparts an urgency to begin a broader conversation on India's resource choices, its drivers as well as determinants and its likely consequences for the day to day life of millions who are at the receiving end of flood fury. Managing flood rage presupposes linking the different domains of science. It cannot be understood in isolation from the crucial issues of growth and development, quality of politics, land use management, water supply, solid waste management and disaster prevention. This book helps to identify the missing links that are presently outside the mainstream discourse. Incorporating a human rights perspective in understanding and framing disaster response affirms the rights and dignity of vulnerable people and can provide opportunities to transform societies and deepen equality in the aftermath of disasters. The importance of common property and citizens' rights is already engrained in the basic framework of the governance of Kerala. However, the neo liberal practice that is in vogue has seriously eroded its strength in governance. Kerala had to streamline its governance policy framework in tune with the new market rules of globalization. Today it is well understood that the legacy of Kerala Model Development (KMD) has neither fructified into a self sustaining growth by itself, nor appropriated the potential of free market forces to stimulate a balanced multi-sectoral growth. The concept of development itself has transformed globally in the context of the environmental catastrophe the world has witnessed recently. Climate change, resource constraints and destruction, over use and over exploitation, bio-diversity loss, rising social inequalities and poverty questions the existing development models. Apart from raising the pertinent question of how to steer the course of development of the state, the book put forward solutions to secure sustainable development that can address the needs and aspirations of the people along with the responsibility of safeguarding our ecosystem.