Daoist Ecological Ethics and Climate Adaptation: Rethinking Human Security and Community Resilience in Coastal Bangladesh

Abstract

Coastal southwestern Bangladesh — the districts of Bagerhat, Khulna, and Satkhira on the eastern fringe of the Sundarbans — is among the most climate-exposed inhabited deltas on earth, facing cyclonic storm surge, progressive salinization, and a shrinking dry-season freshwater supply, yet adaptation policy in the region remains techno-managerial. This study specifically asks whether Daoist ecological ethics — ziran, wu wei, yin-yang balance, and pu — can productively complement, rather than substitute for, quantitative climate-vulnerability assessment and inform a more balanced reading of human security. Using secondary district-level indicators from the Bangladesh Population and Housing Census, the Household Income and Expenditure Survey, the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey, and Bangladesh Meteorological Department records, we constructed a transparent, formula-based Livelihood Vulnerability Index (LVI-IPCC), then mapped five Daoist principles onto empirically observable proxies for interpretation. Satkhira recorded the highest composite vulnerability and lowest human security of the three districts (LVI-IPCC = 0.362; Overall Vulnerability Index = 0.681; Human Security Index = 0.319 of 1.00), driven by the highest groundwater salinity, lowest rainfall, and weakest adaptive capacity, despite holding the lowest monetary poverty rate (18.6%) of the three — a divergence read through the Daoist critique of monetary-only security metrics. Bagerhat and Khulna scored closely, both substantially lower on vulnerability. These findings indicate that infrastructure-first adaptation should be weighed against nature-based, tidal-process-consistent alternatives, and that monetary poverty indicators alone understate climate-linked human insecurity in this delta, with implications for adaptation investment priorities across southwest Bangladesh..