Decolonizing Environmental Politics: Relationality and Cosmopraxis in the Sundarbans Region, Bangladesh

Abstract

The paper seeks to bridge the gap between environmental policy formulation and actual practices of the Sundarbans region in Bangladesh through a metatheoretical intervention within a decolonial framework. Ontologically, it foregrounds relationality and examines the implication of such ontological position. Epistemologically, the paper advocates standpoint epistemologies. With an effort to decolonize environmental governance, the paper specifically focusses on the epistemic erasures of traditional resource users in the Sundarbans. It engages with the ways in which specific communities engage with the mangrove forest ecosystem. Methodologically, the paper borrows the framework of Hybrid/Plural Climate Studies and Cosmopraxis. Cosmopraxis has the potential of countering epistemic erasures done by modernity and colonization of the lifeworld. Empirically, the paper examines the case of select communities in the Sundarbans, Bangladesh where their reciprocal and relational engagement with the nature goes beyond spirituality and shows an implicit presence of cosmopraxis.