This book explores two principal contradictions in environmental politics in India--between conservation and large-scale development projects, and between short-term electoral politics and long-term imperatives of environmental conservation. The Great Himalayan National Park (GHNP) in Himachal Pradesh, north-western India, is home to the western Tragopan--an endangered pheasant. It shares its habitat with the local population living on the park's fringes. This book demonstrates that both conservation and development are inter-related and inherently political.

With globalization fast becoming an irreversible process, it is necessary to pay increased attention to the implications for environmental sustainability. However, the so-called environmental Kuznets curve argument implies that rapid economic growth in many developing countries should be environmentally unsustainable. Environmental Sustainability addresses this dichotomy and articulates a notion of consumption sustainability that is both universal and pertains to the indefinite future.