This companion volume focuses on the application and practical ramifications of Indian ethics. Here Indian dharma ethics is moved from its preeminent religious origins and classical metaethical proclivity to, what Kant would call, practical reason – or in Aristotle’s poignant terms, ēhikos and phronēis –and in more modern parlance normative ethics. Our study examines a wide range of social and normative challenges facing people in such diverse areas as women’s rights, infant ethics, politics, law, justice, bioethics and ecology. As a contemporary volume, it builds linkages between existing theories and emerging moral issues, problems and questions in today’s India in the global arena. The volume brings together contributions from some 40 philosophers and contemporary thinkers on practical ethics, exploring both the scope and boundaries or limits of ethics as applied to everyday and real-life concerns and socio-economic challenges facing India in the context of a troubled globalizing world. As such, this collection draws on multiple forms of writing and research, including narrative ethics, interviews, critical case studies and textual analyses.
The book will be of interest to scholars, researchers and students of Indian philosophy, Indian ethics, women and infant issues, social justice, environmental ethics, bioethics, animal ethics and cross-cultural responses to dominant Western moral thought. It will also be useful to researchers working on the intersection of Gandhi, sustainability, ecology, theology, feminism, comparative philosophy and dharma studies.
Edited by:
Purushottama Bilimoria (San Francisco State University USA),
Amy Rayner
Imprint: Routledge India
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions:
Height: 246mm,
Width: 174mm,
Weight: 1.224kg
ISBN: 9781032638461
ISBN 10: 103263846X
Pages: 546
Publication Date: 22 January 2024
Audience:
College/higher education
,
Primary
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active
List of Contributors xiv Preface xxiv Foreword xxviii Shyam RanganathanIntroduction 1 Purushottama Bilimoria and Amy Rayner Prologue: India in the World: The Historical Context for Intercultural Ethicality 24 Dipesh Chakrabarty PART I Health, Ethics and Public Welfare 35 1 Public Health, Care and Bioethics in Modern India 37 Purushottama Bilimoria2 COVID-19: Lessons in Ethics for Social Assets 54 Om Prakash Dwivedi 3 Biotechnology and Ethics in India 63 Jyoti Dineshrao Bhosale 4 Moral Responsibility and Pharmaceutical Companies 75 Gauri Seth (Verma) 5 Mental Illness and Mental Health Justice 86 Purushottama Bilimoria 6 Embryo Ethics: Traditional Hindu Perspective 99 Piyali Mitra 7 Abortion, Reproductive Rights and the Unborn: Between Tradition and Modernity 108 Purushottama Bilimoria, M. K. Sridhar and Arvind Sharma 8 Female Infanticide: Ethics of Death in the Shadow of Motherhood and Childbirth in India 121 Purushottama Bilimoria and Renuka Sharma 9 The Theatre of Surrogacy: Ethics of Surrogacy in India 135 Kelly Amal Dhru and Purushottama Bilimoria 10 Dying with Dignity: Sallekhanā vis-a- vis Euthanasia – Normative, Bioethical and Legal Ramifications 142 Purushottama Bilimoria PART II Ecology, Sustainability and Spirituality 159 11 Ethics of Genetic Modification: Commerce without Morality and Science without Humanity – A Gandhian Response 161 Gunjan Pradhan Sinha 12 Ethics, Science and Sustainability: A Gandhian Alternative 170 Bidisha Mallik 13 Climate Change and Development Ethics after Amartya Sen 184 Lindsay Dawson 14 WATER: Rites, Rights and Ecological Justice in India 197 Purushottama Bilimoria and M. K. Sridhar 15 Protection of the Indian Coastal Ecosystem through Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) Notifications: An Analysis 211 M. Sakthivel and Nagma Khan 16 Sustaining Dharma, Sustainable Ecology: Dharma as Rural Environmental Ethics 223 Pankaj Jain 17 On Understanding the Tribe Person’s Worldview 233 Sujata Miri 18 Yoga as Therapeutic Animal Ethics 239 Kenneth Valpey 19 Animal Justice and Moral Mendacity 252 Purushottama Bilimoria 20 You Are What You Eat: Animal and Dietary Ethics in the Early Indian Traditions 264 Nishant Upadhyay 21 Nature and Humans in the 21st Century: Some Reflections 277 Manoranjan Mohanty PART III Engaged Ethics and Ecofeminism 281 22 Dharma Morality as Virtue Ethics 283 Nicholas F. Gier 23 Engaged Jainism: Jaina Ethics in a Living Universe 292 Christopher Key Chapple 24 Buddhist Spirituality and Social Activism in the 20th–21st Centuries 302 Sallie B. King 25 Ecofeminism from a Buddhist Critical Perspective 313 Rita M. Gross 26 Caregiver vs. Citizen? Reflections on Ecofeminism from Kerala State, India 322 J. Devika 27 Humanizing the Feminine Earth: An Ecofeminist Perspective on the Corporeal Nature 335 Meera Baindur 28 Ecofeminism and Hindu Tantra 350 Rita Sherma PART IV Ethics and Politics: Contexts and Applications 361 29 Ethics and Politics in Tagore, Coetzee and Certain Scenes of Teaching 363 Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak 30 Towards an Ethics of Location 378 Morny Joy 31 The Question of Universalist Justice: Transnational Encounters in Feminism 387 Sara Ahmed 32 Activating the Imagination: Harmony, Justice, and Gender in Tagore’s Thought 394 Esha Niyogi De 33 Violence and Humanity: Or, Vulnerability as Political Subjectivity 402 Anupama Rao 34 From Victim to Survivor: Then and Now Interviews with Flavia Agnes 413 Flavia Agnes and Amy Rayner (Interviewer) 35 Marking Time: The Gendered Present and the Nuclear Future 424 Kumkum Sangari 36 The Gandhian Touch: Morals in Politics 435 Devaki Jain 37 Approaching Gandhian Metaethics: Some Methodological Issues 444 Samiksha Goyal 38 Globalization, Gandhi and Free Trade 454 Sanjay Lal PART V Women and the Limits of Traditional Ethics 461 39 Women and Ethics in Hindu Thought and Practice 463 Mandakranta Bose 40 Women and Values in Traditional India: A Feminist Probe 471 Anindita Niyogi Balslev 41 Normalization of Dowry 479 Praveena Kodoth 42 The Self-Employed Women’s Association (SEWA): Gandhian Ethics and Feminist Ethics in Action 489 Margaret A. McLaren 43 The Emergent Moral Agent: A Feminism-Buddhism Exchange 498 Vrinda Dalmiya 44 Gandhian Ethics and Feminist Perspectives: In a Somewhat Different Voice 508 Bindu Puri 45 Is Controlled Śakti to the Bharatanāṭyam Practitioner as Uncontrolled Śakti Is to the Devadāsī? 518 Sandra Sattler Index 527
Purushottama Bilimoria works in the areas of Indian and cross-cultural philosophy, continental philosophy, philosophy of religion, critical thinking and diaspora studies. He is a Distinguished Professor of Law and International Philosophy at O. P. Jindal Global University, and a Visiting Professor at Ashoka University, Delhi-NCR, India. A Principal Fellow at the University of Melbourne, he is also Permanent Fellow of the Oxford Center for Hindu Studies; he was named Lead Scientist (in 2021–2022) of the Purushottama Centre for Study of Indian Philosophy and Culture at Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia, in Moscow; Co-founder of Australasian Society for Asian and Comparative Philosophy and also serves as Co-Editor-in-Chief of Sophia and Associate Editor Journal of Dharma Studies. They have been a recipient of several awards: Distinguished Fulbright-Nehru Excellence in Teaching and Research Fellowship; Rockefeller Foundation, Templeton Foundation, Ford Foundation, Australia Research Council. His recent publications include Testimony in Indian Philosophy (revised, 2018); History of Indian Philosophy (with Amy Rayner, 2018); Religion and Sustainability (edited with Rita D. Sherma, 2021); Contemplative Studies and Hinduism (edited with Rita D. Sherma, 2021); Contemplative Studies and Jainism (co-edited with R. Sherma and C. Bohenac, 2023); The Routledge Companion to Indian Ethics: Women, Justice, Bioethics and Ecology (with Amy Rayner 2023); Engaging Philosophies of Religion; Thinking Across Boundaries (with Gereon Kopf, 2023); Postcolonial Philosophy of Religion (with Andrew Irvine, 2009, 2024); and under 200 articles in professional journals. A scholastic institution in its own right, he continues to teach and be a mentor at Cal State University (San Francisco and Long Beach, California) and periodically at the University of California, University of San Francisco, Ashoka University, and the University of Melbourne. Amy Rayner is a graduate of the University of Melbourne (philosophy). Amy has worked alongside Purushottama Bilimoria for 15 years, assisting with editing, research and writing. She was the editorial secretary of Sophia and is an editorial assistant for Sophia Studies in Cross-Cultural Philosophy of Traditions and Cultures. She served as Assistant Editor and Project Secretary for publications including Globalization, Transnationalism, Gender and Ecological Engagements (2015); Postcolonial Philosophy of Religion (2009); and Routledge’s acclaimed History of Indian Philosophy (2018). Her experience in Buddhism has ranged from an interest in philosophy and meditation to engagement with social change, education and well-being. She qualified as a Buddhist Chaplain and secular spiritual carer in Canberra, Australia, in 2011 and worked at a Buddhist school and orphanage for children living with HIV in Bihar, India. Inspired by the authors of this book, in 2022, Amy trained and now teaches secular ethics at her local primary school in regional Australia.
