Environmental Democracy in Non-European Contexts: Assessing Its Necessity and Feasibility in Bangladesh for Achieving Environmental Sustainability

The primary goal of this paper is to demonstrate the positive correlation of Environmental Democracy (ED) and Environmental Sustainability (ES), and the necessity of ED in the Bangladesh legal framework for tackling environmental degradation. This article examines the legal framework of Bangladesh (a non-European/South Asian developing country) as a case study to explore the grounds and scope of operationalizing ED in the legal practice of developing countries outside Europe. This qualitative research comparatively studied the correlation between the compliance ratio of ED and the Environmental Sustainability Indicators (Environmental Performance Index and SDG Index), reflecting ES among the developed and developing countries from the European region. To test the feasibility of ED integration in Bangladesh, the legal system of Bangladesh has been thoroughly aligned with the three pillars of ED and critically appraised under the same pillars to highlight its limitations as a developing country. The research finds that despite the limitations, the country can integrate ED in its legal system to achieve better environmental sustainability through the recommended steps, such as signing the Aarhus Convention, following the Bali and Aarhus Implementation Guidelines, along with the exemplary performance of leading ED-compliant European states in the sustainability index.