Learning from Laotzi: Daoism and Sustainability

Abstract

Tao is the source of ten thousand things ... The ten thousand things carry yin and embrace yang. They achieve harmony by combining these forces ... The ten thousand things are born of being. Being is born of not being. (From verses 40, 42 and 62) Many scholars have observed that realisation of the concept of sustainability, as a process of human interaction with the natural world, will require a paradigmatic change in world view (Lee et al, 2000; Van der Ryn, 1996). This need for change is particularly true in so-called Western thought, which, historically, has had a mechanistic view of the interrelationships between people and their world, whether cultural or natural. This view has contributed to a problem-solving, expediency-based, and short-term- gain perspective that makes sustainability, in the holistic sense, impossible in the modern world. This paper examines an alternative philosophic system that can be used to look beyond traditional European/modern approaches and to allow the achievement of real sustainability. The Chinese philosophy of Daoism (Taoism) and the three principal areas in which it can be used to reframe contemporary perceptions of the natural and cultural world is the approach discussed here. Specifically, I discuss Daoism as a philosophy, as literature and as artistic inspiration, all in the context of environmental sustainability. Daoism emerged out of traditional Chinese animistic beliefs and geomantic practices about 2,300 years ago, when the teachings of one Laotzi (Lao-tzu) were recorded as the Daodejing (Tao Te Ching), or, as sometimes translated into English, The Way and Its Power (Clarke, 2000; Fenton et al, 1983; Palmer, 1991). Daoism, in its ritualistic, religious form, first became widely known in Euro-American thought in the nineteenth century. When, in the 1960s, numerous translations of the Daodejing and other Daoist texts became popularised by writers such as Alan Watts, the more direct philosophical underpinnings of Daoism came to be understood and appreciated (Clarke, 2000; Watts, 1975). In particular, Daoist nature references resonated with many in counterculture and environmental movements.