Papers by Md Saidul Islam
Nature and Culture, 2015
Home to 60 percent of the world's population, Asia accounts for 85 percent of those killed an... more Home to 60 percent of the world's population, Asia accounts for 85 percent of those killed and affected globally by disaster events in 2011. Using an integrated sociological framework comprised of the pressure and release (PAR) model and the double-risk society hypothesis, and drawing on data obtained from the Emergency Events Database (EM-DAT), PreventionWeb, and the IPCC special report on extreme events, this article offers a sociological understanding of disaster development and recovery in Asia. The particular focus is on seven Asian countries, namely, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Rather than treating disasters entirely as “natural” events caused by “violent forces of nature”, we emphasize various ways in which social systems create disaster vulnerability. We argue that existing disaster mitigation and adaptation strategies in Asia that focus almost entirely on the natural and technological aspects of hazards have serious limitations, as the...
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Asian Culture and History, 2010
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Journal of Sustainable Development, 2009
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Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, 2011
... Siddique, a meritorious student of Dhaka University hailing from a poor farmer family had to ... more ... Siddique, a meritorious student of Dhaka University hailing from a poor farmer family had to give his life for the factional clashes of BCL in Sir AF Rahman Hall of the University; only a month ago, a Bangladesh Chhatra Maitree leader Rejanul Islam Chaudhury Sunny was killed ...
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Journal Article in Climate , 2021
Society is at an important intersection in dealing with the challenges of climate change, and thi... more Society is at an important intersection in dealing with the challenges of climate change, and this paper is presented at a critical juncture in light of growing recognition that the natural sciences are insufficient to deal with these challenges. Critical aspects of sociological perspectives related to climate change research are brought together in this review in the hope of fostering greater interdisciplinary collaboration between the natural and social sciences. We fervently argue for the need to inculcate interdisciplinary approaches that can provide innovative perspectives and solutions to the challenges we face from the impacts of climate change. As such, some critical sociological perspectives are addressed, with two objectives: (a) to provide a foundational opening for readers seeking an introductory perspective and potential core contributions of sociological insights on climate change; and (b) to explore opportunities and obstacles that may occur with increased interdisciplinary cooperation and collaboration. We lay out fundamental ideas by assembling a loosely connected body of sociological research, hoping to develop and advance the collaborative research agenda between sociology and other disciplines for the near future.
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Journal Article: Sustainability 2021, 13(1), 307, 2021
Over the last few decades, the global shrimp aquaculture industry has grown considerably and expe... more Over the last few decades, the global shrimp aquaculture industry has grown considerably and experienced important transformations in coastal regions in the Global South. However, despite being a major contributor to GDP and export earnings of the country, the shrimp industry in Bangladesh is not yet fully developed. This important sector is often plagued by numerous environmental challenges including frequent climate disasters. To address local climate perturbations, the shrimping industry undertakes a wide range of individual, communal, and institutional level resilience activities. Drawing on primary data collected through ethnography and qualitative interviews in three shrimping communities, this paper examines the nature, effects, and efficacy of resilience strategies adopted by various stakeholders in the shrimp industry in coastal Bangladesh. This research demonstrates that there is a clearly visible resilience gradient in the shrimp aquaculture industry in Bangladesh: individual shrimp farmers and households play a pivotal role in resilience enhancement, while other stakeholders including community, state, and civil society organizations have moderate-to-little involvement in aiding resilience in the sector. The study offers a series of recommendations for resilience to climate change.
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Journal article , 2020
Traditions and practices in food, resting, and hygiene or cleanliness are among the key factors d... more Traditions and practices in food, resting, and hygiene or cleanliness are among the key factors deeply associated with human immunity against fatal diseases and viruses. Al-Ṭibb Al-Nabawī (Prophetic medicine in Islam), similar to popular herbal and Ayurveda medicine, promotes a symbolic narration "prevention is better than cure." Drawing on this broader notion of Tibbin Nabawī, this paper addresses a critical question of how the "healthy lifestyle" prescribed in Islamic tradition provides a preventive measure against potentially fatal diseases and deadly viruses such as COVID-19. For this, the essay examines Islamic perspective on, among other things, ṭahārah (cleanliness), food habit and dieting, sleep and rest cycle, and pandemics. It argues that Islamic traditions on healthy lifestyle, which is largely consistent with the prescriptions of modern science, offer a unique physical and spiritual paradigm to fight toxic diseases of the human body and pandemics such as COVID-19.
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Journal Article , 2022
Recent years have witnessed a proliferation of environmental certification regimes in the global ... more Recent years have witnessed a proliferation of environmental certification regimes in the global agro-food system-a trend characterized as an example of the ecological modernization approach-which emerged largely because of the rise of consumer sovereignty and the neoliberal push for environmental and social "quality" in food production and processing. Based on a robust analysis of global aquaculture, the article argues that the environmental certification regimes privilege some actors, species, and cultures while marginalizing others. While the fundamental tenet of the ecological modernization approach is to shape capitalism by ecological principles, I argue instead that through environmental certification, ecology or nature itself is largely shaped, transformed and restructured to fit into and thereby serve neoliberal global governance and accumulation in a normalized manner. The example of certification regimes is therefore more like a "modernization of ecology" rather than ecological modernization.
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Sustainability 12(883):1-21, 2020
Climate change and food security issues are multi-faceted and transcend across national boundarie... more Climate change and food security issues are multi-faceted and transcend across national boundaries. Therefore, this paper begins with the premise that regional organizations are optimally positioned to address climate change and food security issues while actively engaging global partners to slow down or reverse current trajectories. However, the potential of regional organizations to play a central role in mitigating these vital concerns has not been realized. In this paper, we focus on three regional organizations-the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF), and the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) and set out to investigate the multifaceted obstacles that impede regional organizations' ability to effectively cope with these problems. We qualitatively review the efficacy of policies and examine the connections between politico-economic processes that affect the development, cooperation, and execution of regional policies. In doing so, we review regional policies using five key criteria: (i) planning, (ii) implementation, (iii) cooperation, (iv) legal obligation and (v) international contribution. Our findings suggest that regional organizations face fundamental problems in the implementation of extensive policies due to the lack of cooperation and legal obligation between member nation-states that stems from fundamental prioritization of national development agendas over regional cooperation.
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International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 16(672): 1-12 , 2019
Local contexts as well as levels of exposure play a substantial role in defining a community's pe... more Local contexts as well as levels of exposure play a substantial role in defining a community's perception of climate and environmental vulnerabilities. In order to assess a community's adaptation strategies, understanding of how different groups in that community comprehend climate change is crucial. Public risk perception is important as it can induce or confine political, economic, and social actions dealing with particular hazards. Climate change adaptation is a well-established policy discourse in Bangladesh that has made its people more or less aware of it. Similarly, shrimp-farming communities in southwestern Bangladesh understand environmental and climate change in their own ways. In order to understand how the shrimp-farming communities in coastal Bangladesh perceive current climate instabilities, we conducted a qualitative study in shrimp-farming villages in coastal Bangladesh where about 80% of commercial shrimp of the country is cultivated. We compared farmers' perceptions of local climate change with existing scientific knowledge and found remarkable similarities. Our assessment shows that at least two factors are critical for this outcome: coastal people's exposure to and experience of frequent climate extremes; and a radical approach to defining climate regimes in Bangladesh by various stakeholders and the media, depicting anthropogenic global warming as a certainty for the country. Thus, a convergence of scientific construct and sociocultural construct construes the level of awareness of the general public about climate change.
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Politics, Religion & Ideology 19(3):326-353. , 2018
Bangladesh is an overwhelmingly Muslim majority country in South Asia. Islam is quite predominant... more Bangladesh is an overwhelmingly Muslim majority country in South Asia. Islam is quite predominant in its political, social and cultural landscapes. While most classical and the contemporary sociologists predicted that religion would gradually fade in importance and cease to be significant with the advent of the industrial society, Bangladesh has instead witnessed a reemergence of the religious forces in its society. In order to address this theoretical exceptionalism and paradox, we have examined the role of both state and non-state or non-political actors in the Islamic revivalism in Bangladesh. Drawing on ‘Islamic revivalism’ as a theoretical construct and employing a triangulation of methods, we have critically investigated the contributions of five major independent regimes and key social, cultural and non-political organizations and groups to the Islamic revivalism in Bangladesh. We have found that Islamization in Bangladesh was actually initiated by the very first political regime in order to mobilize public supports and the subsequent regimes followed suit, albeit differently. None of the five independent political regimes in Bangladesh was however genuinely interested in establishing Islam and Islamic polity in society, but largely used Islam and Islamization to advance their political interests and legitimacy.
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Societies , 2019
Wildlife tourism is frequently touted as a solution to the problems of increased poaching, habita... more Wildlife tourism is frequently touted as a solution to the problems of increased poaching, habitat destruction, and species extinction. When wildlife is able to pay for its right to survive through attracting tourists, there is an incentive to conserve wildlife populations and the habitats that support them. However, numerous reports in recent years have drawn attention to the potential negative impacts of wildlife tourism attractions. This paper examines whether market environmentalism diminishes the potential of wildlife tourism to contribute to conservation and the welfare of individual animals. Market environmentalism commodifies the animals involved in wildlife tourism attractions and fuels an anthropocentric worldview where animals are resources to be used by humans for entertainment or economic gain, potentially presenting a threat to long-term conservation. Instead, we call for a decommodified experience of wildlife tourism based on more than just economic value.
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Aquaculture 493 (2018) 406–415, 2018
In the context of the exhaustion of marine fisheries, aquaculture increasingly plays a mounting r... more In the context of the exhaustion of marine fisheries, aquaculture increasingly plays a mounting role in the world economy and food security. However, it is confronted with and deeply affected by various threats and disruptions caused by global climate change. Bangladesh, a key site for global aquaculture production, contributes very little to global greenhouse gas emissions; however, it is one of the worst victims of climatic turmoil. While Bangladesh earns a large amount of foreign currency from the commercial shrimp providing livelihoods for millions, its goal of a sustainable aquaculture is recently hindered by its exposure to climate change vulnerability and extremes. Coastal Bangladesh, where shrimp is cultured, is frequently affected by extreme climatic disruptions like cyclones and storm surges that severely damage the entire coastal aquaculture. Drawing on primary and secondary data from Bangladesh shrimp industry, and using conceptual threads of climate vulnerability and resilience, this paper critically examines how and to what extent shrimp aquaculture in Bangladesh-located at the bottom of a buyer-driven commodity chain-becomes vulnerable and builds resilience to global climate change. Statement of relevance: • Aquaculture in the coastal Bangladesh is one of the worst victims of global climate change. • Shrimp aquaculture is frequently affected by cyclones and storm surges. • Worst victims are the small scale farmers and fry collectors located at the bottom of a buyer-driven commodity chain. • Most small bagda farming households in Bangladesh do not seem to be resilient in any meaningful sense.
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Social Sciences 7(37):1-18, 2018
Since 1990s, the political landscape in Bangladesh moved from democracy to an authoritarian klept... more Since 1990s, the political landscape in Bangladesh moved from democracy to an authoritarian kleptocracy, and experienced a new set of political and social narratives. This paper aims to contest some of these dominant/official narratives which have been discursively constructed and promoted by the secularist parties (including the ruling regime) and groups in Bangladesh over recent years. Examining the sociopolitical and historical facts and figures of the country, we have identified five major contested narratives related to (a) Bengali nationalism in East Pakistan, (b) foundational ideology of Bangladesh's war of liberation, (c) state-sponsored Islamization in Bangladesh, (d) pro-liberation and anti-liberation dichotomy, and (e) war crimes trial. Drawing on a robust content analysis of the credible secondary sources substantiated by qualitative interviews, we have examined these dominant narratives and found that they are not supported by historical evidence and popular mandate, yet have been constructed largely to support and legitimize the current authoritarian regime. The paper offers both counter-narratives and some pragmatic policy recommendations to elude increasing polarization and sociopolitical instability and foster a peaceful democratic society in Bangladesh.
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Religions 8 (104): 1-19 , 2017
Is authoritarianism intrinsic to Islam? Is Islam incompatible with democracy? These questions are... more Is authoritarianism intrinsic to Islam? Is Islam incompatible with democracy? These questions are frequently debated in the context of the study of the relationship between the Western and Islamic civilization. The debate has gained momentum since the last decade of the twentieth century, especially after the collapse of the former Soviet Union and the subsequent transition of socialist states in Eastern Europe and other authoritarian states in Asia and Latin America to democracy. The publication of The Clash of Civilizations by American scholar Samuel Huntington, in which he presented a controversial argument about a cultural divide and clash between the Islamic world and the West, pushed the debate even further. Apart from Muslim intellectuals, Western academics have spent a significant amount of time on these questions, with a multitude of articles and volumes examining the compatibility of Islam and democracy. In this paper, we will examine Islam's relationship with democracy from normative and philosophical viewpoints, examining how the established values and principles of Islam as reflected in the Qur'anic and prophetic traditions correspond to Western democratic norms and practices. In order to obtain a profound understanding of this subject, we have delved into, through content analysis, the thoughts of several early modernist Islamic scholars who have had tremendous impact on contemporary Islamic revivalist movements throughout the world, and interviewed a number of contemporary Islamic thinkers in Bangladesh.
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Sustainability
Our planet is undergoing radical environmental and social changes. Sustainability has now been pu... more Our planet is undergoing radical environmental and social changes. Sustainability has now been put into question by, for example, our consumption patterns, loss of biodiversity, depletion of resources, and exploitative power relations. With apparent ecological and social limits to globalization and development, current levels of consumption are known to be unsustainable, inequitable, and inaccessible to the majority of humans. Understanding and achieving sustainability is a crucial matter at a time when our planet is in peril-environmentally, economically, socially, and politically. Since its official inception in the 1970s, environmental sociology has provided a powerful lens to understanding the challenges, possibilities, and modes of sustainability. This editorial, accompanying the Special Issue on "sustainability through the Lens of Environmental Sociology", first highlights the evolution of environmental sociology as a distinct field of inquiry, focusing on how it addresses the environmental challenges of our time. It then adumbrates the rich theoretical traditions of environmental sociology, and finally examines sustainability through the lens of environmental sociology, referring to various case studies and empirical analyses.
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Environments 2017, 4, 38, 2017
The issue of climate change has been gaining widespread attention and concern as it has the abili... more The issue of climate change has been gaining widespread attention and concern as it has the ability to directly/indirectly affect our standard of living and quality of life. It has often been postulated that changes in climate would have a vast effect on food production systems and that food security might be threatened due to increasing climate change. However, it seems that research on climate change and food in/security has often been one-sided; with climate change being identified as the cause of food insecurity and not how the systems in place to ensure food security have exacerbated the issue of climate change. This paper thus seeks to give a more balanced view and thus understanding of the complex relationship between climate change and food security by critically examining both systems.
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International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 13(12), 1211: 1-16, 2016
In the last few decades, disaster risk reduction programs and climate initiatives across the glob... more In the last few decades, disaster risk reduction programs and climate initiatives across the globe have focused largely on the intimate connections between vulnerability, recovery, adaptation, and coping mechanisms. Recent focus, however, is increasingly paid to community resilience. Community, placed at the intersection between the household and national levels of social organization, is crucial in addressing economic, social, or environmental disturbances disrupting human security. Resilience measures a community's capability of bouncing back-restoring the original pre-disaster state, as well as bouncing forward-the capacity to cope with emerging post-disaster situations and changes. Both the 'bouncing back' and 'moving forward' properties of a community are shaped and reshaped by internal and external shocks such as climate threats, the community's resilience dimensions, and the intensity of economic, social, and other community capitals. This article reviews (1) the concept of resilience in relation to climate change and vulnerability; and (2) emerging perspectives on community-level impacts of climate change, resilience dimensions, and community capitals. It argues that overall resilience of a place-based community is located at the intersection of the community's resilience dimensions, community capitals, and the level of climate disruptions.
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Social Sciences 6, 133: 1-20, 2017
This article seeks to address the gap in representing micro-level civil society voices and contri... more This article seeks to address the gap in representing micro-level civil society voices and contribute to literature on state-society relations in Singapore's environmental movement. Given the present constraints of state-NGO communication and cooperation, the state and NGOs negotiate the restrictions by grooming youths as agents of change. Through in-depth interviews, it explores how environmentalism is represented differently through various discourses by the social actors; state, NGOs and youths. By using eco-governmentality as a framework and through discursive analysis, we argue that state-society cooperation in environmentalism is hindered by lack of clear and effective communication channels, as well as expertise and knowledge barriers. In addition, investing in youths has led to an altered dynamic of state-society relations and a greater variety in discourses on environmental advocacy. Owing to the youths' capability for spreading social awareness and ideas, this is an area that requires open discussion in order to achieve better state-civil society cooperation.
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Aquaculture 498 (2019): 428-434, 2019
This paper introduces a special issue of Aquaculture that brings together the largest collection ... more This paper introduces a special issue of Aquaculture that brings together the largest collection of research on aquaculture value chains compiled to date, comprising 19 individual papers and this introductory review. The introduction identifies five themes emerging from research on aquaculture value chains in the special issue, namely: multi-polarity, diversity and scale, dynamics of transformation, performance and equity, and technical and institutional innovation. Contrary to much research to date, the papers addressing these themes show how the expansion of aquaculture has resulted highly diverse configurations of production for consumption in the global South. Collectively, the papers highlight the need for greater attention to neglected value chain segments and categories of actor, modes of production, regulation, and innovation, and patterns of access to benefits. The papers synthesized also affirm the need for more rigorous and diverse future value chain research to illuminate the aquaculture sector's ongoing development, and contribute to the sustainable expansion as an increasingly important component of the global food system.
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Papers by Md Saidul Islam
The academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Science is one of the world’s most influential publications. Its articles are routinely cited, garnering it an impact factor of 31.027 in 2012. First published in 1880, it is one of only two scientific journals to cover the full range of scientific disciplines, publishing important original research, research reviews, science-related news, and opinions on science policy.
is in peril - both environmentally and socially. This edited collection will hopefully show some possible pathways for a sustainable earth. Along with global environmental politics with an aim of sustainable earth, we need to generate and inculcate new consciousness within the new social media generations about the environment and sustainability. We must develop a new understanding of the true purpose of our existence on this Earth, new models of behavior, and a new set of values for the planet.
In Confronting the Blue Revolution, Md Saidul Islam uses the shrimp farming industry in Bangladesh and across the global South to show the social and environmental impact of industrialized aquaculture. The book pushes us to reconsider our attitudes to consumption patterns in the developed world, neoliberal environmental governance, and the question of sustainability.
Md Saidul Islam is an assistant professor in the Division of Sociology at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
With apparent ecological and social limits to neoliberal globalization and development, the current levels of consumption are unsustainable, inequitable, and inaccessible to the majority of humans. Power has a great role to play in this global trajectory. Though power is one of most pervasive phenomena of human society, it is probably one of the least understood concepts.
The growth of transnational corporations, the dominance of world-wide financial and political institutions, and the extensive influence of media that are nearly monopolized by corporate interests are key factors shaping our global society today. In the growing concentration of power in few hands, what is apparent is a non-apparent nature of power. Understanding the interplay of power in the discourse of development is a crucial matter at a time when our planet is in peril — both environmentally and socially. This book addresses this current crucial need.