2021/04/09

World energy consumption - Wikipedia

World energy consumption - Wikipedia

World energy consumption

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to navigationJump to search
Coal, oil, and natural gas remain the primary global energy sources even as renewables have begun rapidly increasing.[1]

World total primary energy consumption by fuel in 2019[2]

  Coal (27%)
  Natural Gas (24.2%)
  Hydro (renewables) (6.4%)
  Nuclear (4.3%)
  Oil (33.1%)
  Others (renewables) (5%)

World energy consumption is the total energy produced and used by humans. Typically measured per year, it involves all energy harnessed from every energy source applied towards activity across all industrial and technological sectors, in every country. It does not include energy from food. World energy consumption has implications for the socio-economic-political sphere.

Institutions such as the International Energy Agency (IEA), the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), and the European Environment Agency (EEA) record and publish energy data periodically. Improved data and understanding of world energy consumption may reveal systemic trends and patterns, which could help frame current energy issues and encourage movement towards collectively useful solutions.

Closely related to energy consumption is the concept of total primary energy supply (TPES), which – on a global level – is the sum of energy production minus storage changes. Since changes of energy storage over the year are minor, TPES values can be used as an estimator for energy consumption. However, TPES ignores conversion efficiency, overstating forms of energy with poor conversion efficiency (e.g. coal, gas and nuclear) and understating forms already accounted for in converted forms (e.g. photovoltaics or hydroelectricity). The IEA estimates that, in 2013, total primary energy supply (TPES) was 157.5 petawatt hours or 1.575×1017 Wh (157.5 thousand TWh; 5.67×1020 J; 13.54 billion toe) or about 18 TW-year.[3] From 2000 to 2012 coal was the source of energy with the total largest growth. The use of oil and natural gas also had considerable growth, followed by hydropower and renewable energy. Renewable energy grew at a rate faster than any other time in history during this period. The demand for nuclear energy decreased, in part due to nuclear disasters (Three Mile Island in 1979, Chernobyl in 1986, and Fukushima in 2011).[4][5] More recently, consumption of coal has declined relative to renewable energy. Coal dropped from about 29% of the global total primary energy consumption in 2015 to 27% in 2017, and non-hydro renewables were up to about 4% from 2%.[6]

In 2010, expenditures on energy totaled over US$6 trillion, or about 10% of the world gross domestic product (GDP). Europe spends close to one-quarter of the world's energy expenditures, North America close to 20%, and Japan 6%.[7]

Overview[edit]

Further information: Primary energy and List of countries by total primary energy consumption and production

Energy supply, consumption and electricity[edit]

Key figures (TWh)
YearPrimary energy
supply (TPES)1		Final energy
consumption1		Electricity
generation		Ref
1973
71,013
(Mtoe 6,106)
54,335
(Mtoe 4,672)
6,129[3]
1990102,569–11,821–
2000117,687–15,395–
2010
147,899
(Mtoe 12,717)
100,914
(Mtoe 8,677)
21,431[8]
2011
152,504
(Mtoe 13,113)
103,716
(Mtoe 8,918)
22,126[9]
2012
155,505
(Mtoe 13,371)
104,426
(Mtoe 8,979)
22,668[10]
2013
157,482
(Mtoe 13,541)
108,171
(Mtoe 9,301)
23,322[11]
2014
155,481
(Mtoe 13,369)
109,613
(Mtoe 9,425)
23,816[12]
2015
158,715
(Mtoe 13,647)
109,136
(Mtoe 9,384)
[13][14]
2017
162,494
(Mtoe 13,972)
113,009
(Mtoe 9,717)
25,606[15]
1 converted from Mtoe into TWh (1 Mtoe = 11.63 TWh)
and from Quad BTU into TWh (1 Quad BTU = 293.07 TWh)

World total primary energy supply (TPES), or "primary energy" differs from the world final energy consumption because much of the energy that is acquired by humans is lost as other forms of energy during the process of its refinement into usable forms of energy and its transport from its initial place of supply to consumers. For instance, when oil is extracted from the ground it must be refined into gasoline, so that it can be used in a car, and transported over long distances to gas stations where it can be used by consumers. World final energy consumption refers to the fraction of the world's primary energy that is used in its final form by humanity.

Also one needs to bear in mind that there are different qualities of energy. Heat, especially at a relatively low temperature, is low-quality energy, whereas electricity is high-quality energy. It takes around 3 kWh of heat to produce 1 kWh of electricity. But by the same token, a kilowatt-hour of this high-quality electricity can be used to pump several kilowatt-hours of heat into a building using a heat pump. And electricity can be used in many ways in which heat cannot. So the "loss" of energy incurred when generating electricity is not the same as a loss due to, say, resistance in power lines.

In 2014, world primary energy supply amounted to 155,481 terawatt-hour (TWh) or 13,541 million tonne of oil equivalent (Mtoe), while the world final energy consumption was 109,613 TWh or about 29.5% less than the total supply.[12] World final energy consumption includes products as lubricants, asphalt and petrochemicals which have chemical energy content but are not used as fuel. This non-energy use amounted to 9,723 TWh (836 Mtoe) in 2015.[13]

2018 World electricity generation (26,700 TWh) by source (IEA, 2019)[16]

  Coal (38%)
  Gas (23%)
  Hydro and other (19%)
  Nuclear (10%)
  Solar PV and wind (7%)
  Oil (3%)

The United States Energy Information Administration (EIA) regularly publishes a report on world consumption for most types of primary energy resources. For 2013, estimated world energy consumption was 5.67 × 1020 joules, or 157,481 TWh. According to the IEA the total world energy consumption in past years was 143,851 TWh in 2008, 133,602 TWh in 2005, 117,687 TWh in 2000, and 102,569 TWh in 1990.[3] In 2012 approximately 22% of world energy was consumed in North America, 5% was consumed in South and Central America, 23% was consumed in Europe and Eurasia, 3% was consumed in Africa, and 40% was consumed in the Asia Pacific region.[4]

Electricity generation[edit]

The total amount of electricity consumed worldwide was 19,504 TWh in 2013, 16,503 TWh in 2008, 15,105 TWh in 2005, and 12,116 TWh in 2000. By the end of 2014, the total installed electricity generating capacity worldwide was nearly 6.14 TW (million MW) which only includes generation connected to local electricity grids.[17] In addition, there is an unknown amount of heat and electricity consumed off-grid by isolated villages and industries. In 2014, the share of world energy consumption for electricity generation by source was coal at 41%, natural gas at 22%, nuclear at 11%, hydro at 16%, other sources (solar, wind, geothermal, biomass, etc.) at 6% and oil at 4%. Coal and natural gas were the most used energy fuels for generating electricity. The world's electricity consumption was 18,608 TWh in 2012.[citation needed] This figure is about 18% smaller than the generated electricity, due to grid losses, storage losses, and self-consumption from power plants (gross generation). Cogeneration (CHP) power stations use some of the heat that is otherwise wasted for use in buildings or industrial processes.

In 2016 the total world energy came from 80% fossil fuels, 10% biofuels, 5% nuclear, and 5% renewable (hydro, wind, solar, geothermal). Only 18% of that total world energy was in the form of electricity.[18] Most of the other 82% was used for heat and transportation.

Recently there has been a large increase in international agreements and national Energy Action Plans, such as the EU 2009 Renewable Energy Directive, to increase the use of renewable energy due to the growing concerns about pollution from energy sources that come from fossil fuels such as oil, coal, and natural gas.[19][20] One such initiative was the United Nations Development Programme's World Energy Assessment in 2000 that highlighted many challenges humanity would have to overcome in order to shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy sources.[19] From 2000 to 2012 renewable energy grew at a rate higher than any other point in history, with a consumption increase of 176.5 million tonnes of oil. During this period, oil, coal, and natural gas continued to grow and had increases that were much higher than the increase in renewable energy. The following figures illustrate the growth in consumption of fossil fuels such as oil, coal, and natural gas as well as renewable sources of energy during this period.[4]

Trends[edit]

World primary energy consumption in quadrillion Btu[21]
Energy intensity of different economies: The graph shows the ratio between energy usage and GDP for selected countries. GDP is based on 2004 purchasing power parity and 2000 dollars adjusted for inflation.[22]
GDP and energy consumption in Japan, 1958–2000: The data shows the correlation between GDP and energy use; however, it also shows that this link can be broken. After the oil shocks of 1973 and 1979 the energy use stagnated while Japan's GDP continued to grow, after 1985, under the influence of the then much cheaper oil, energy use resumed its historical relation to GDP.[23]

The energy consumption growth in the G20 slowed down to 2% in 2011, after the strong increase of 2010. The economic crisis is largely responsible for this slow growth. For several years now, the world energy demand is characterized by the bullish Chinese and Indian markets, while developed countries struggle with stagnant economies, high oil prices, resulting in stable or decreasing energy consumption.[24]

According to IEA data from 1990 to 2008, the average energy use per person increased 10% while the world population increased 27%. Regional energy use also grew from 1990 to 2008: the Middle East increased by 170%, China by 146%, India by 91%, Africa by 70%, Latin America by 66%, the United States by 20%, the European Union by 7%, and world overall grew by 39%.

In 2008, total worldwide primary energy consumption was 132,000 terawatt-hours (TWh) or 474 exajoules (EJ).[25] In 2012, primary energy demand increased to 158,000 TWh (567 EJ).[26]

The production and usage of electronic devices, data traffic, and storage is growing 9% per year and is expected to use 3.3% of the world's electricity supply in 2020 (vs. 1.9% in 2013). In 2017 data centers consumed 19% of the global digital energy consumption. Internet traffic is expanding 25% per year, meaning the number of data centers is expanding very quickly, increasing energy consumption dramatically.[27]

Energy consumption in the G20 increased by more than 5% in 2010 after a slight decline in 2009. In 2009, world energy consumption decreased for the first time in 30 years by 1.1%, or about 130 million tonnes of oil equivalent (Mtoe), as a result of the financial and economic crisis, which reduced world GDP by 0.6% in 2009.[28]

This evolution is the result of two contrasting trends: Energy consumption growth remained vigorous in several developing countries, specifically in Asia (+4%). Conversely, in OECD, consumption was severely cut by 4.7% in 2009 and was thus almost down to its 2000 levels. In North America, Europe and the CIS, consumption shrank by 4.5%, 5%, and 8.5% respectively due to the slowdown in economic activity. China became the world's largest energy consumer (18% of the total) since its consumption surged by 8% during 2009 (up from 4% in 2008). Oil remained the largest energy source (33%) despite the fact that its share has been decreasing over time. Coal posted a growing role in the world's energy consumption: in 2009, it accounted for 27% of the total.

Most energy is used in the country of origin, since it is cheaper to transport final products than raw materials. In 2008, the share export of the total energy production by fuel was: oil 50% (1,952/3,941 Mt), gas 25% (800/3,149 bcm) and hard coal 14% (793/5,845 Mt).[29]

Most of the world's high energy resources are from the conversion of the sun's rays to other energy forms after being incident upon the planet. Some of that energy has been preserved as fossil energy, some is directly or indirectly usable; for example, via solar PV/thermal, wind, hydro- or wave power. The total solar irradiance is measured by satellite to be roughly 1361 watts per square meter (see solar constant), though it fluctuates by about 6.9% during the year due to the Earth's varying distance from the sun. This value, after multiplication by the cross-sectional area intercepted by the Earth, is the total rate of solar energy received by the planet; about half, 89,000  TW, reaches the Earth's surface.[30]

The estimates of remaining non-renewable worldwide energy resources vary, with the remaining fossil fuels totaling an estimated 0.4  yottajoule (YJ) or 4 × 1023 joules, and the available nuclear fuel such as uranium exceeding 2.5 YJ. Fossil fuels range from 0.6 to 3  YJ if estimates of reserves of methane clathrates are accurate and become technically extractable. The total power flux from the sun intercepting the Earth is 5.5  YJ per year, though not all of this is available for human consumption. The IEA estimates for the world to meet global energy demand for the two decades from 2015 to 2035 it will require investment of $48 trillion and "credible policy frameworks."[31]

According to IEA (2012), the goal of limiting warming to 2 °C is becoming more difficult and costly with each year that passes. If action is not taken before 2017, CO2 emissions would be locked-in by energy infrastructure existing in 2017. Fossil fuels are dominant in the global energy mix, supported by $523 billion subsidies in 2011, up almost 30% on 2010 and six times more than subsidies to renewables.[32]

Regional energy use (kWh/capita & TWh) and growth 1990–2008 (%)[33][34]
kWh/capitaPopulation (million)Energy use (1,000 TWh)
Region19902008Growth19902008Growth19902008Growth
United States89,02187,216−2%25030522%22.326.620%
European Union40,24040,8211%4734995%19.020.47%
Middle East19,42234,77479%13219951%2.66.9170%
China8,83918,608111%1,1411,33317%10.124.8146%
Latin America11,28114,42128%35546230%4.06.766%
Africa7,0947,79210%63498455%4.57.770%
India4,4196,28042%8501,14034%3.87.291%
Others*25,21723,871nd1,4301,76623%36.142.217%
World19,42221,28310%5,2656,68827%102.3142.339%
Source: IEA/OECD, Population OECD/World Bank
  • Energy use = kWh/capita * billion capita (population) = 1 TWh
  • Others: Mathematically calculated, includes e.g. countries in Asia and Australia. The use of energy varies between the "other countries": E.g. in Australia, Japan, or Canada, more energy is used per capita than in Bangladesh or Burma.

Emissions[edit]

Global warming emissions resulting from energy production are an environmental problem. Efforts to resolve this include the Kyoto Protocol (1997) and the Paris Agreement (2015), international governmental agreements aiming to reduce harmful climate impacts, which a number of nations have signed. Limiting global temperature increase to 2 degrees Celsius, thought to be a risk by the SEI, is now doubtful.

To limit global temperature to a hypothetical 2 degrees Celsius rise would demand a 75% decline in carbon emissions in industrial countries by 2050, if the population is 10 billion in 2050.[35] Across 40 years, this averages to a 2% decrease every year. In 2011, the emissions of energy production continued rising regardless of the consensus of the basic problem. Hypothetically, according to Robert Engelman (Worldwatch Institute), in order to prevent collapse, human civilization would have to stop increasing emissions within a decade regardless of the economy or population (2009).[36]

Greenhouse gases are not the only emissions of energy production and consumption. Large amounts of pollutants such as sulphurous oxides (SOx), nitrous oxides (NOx), and particulate matter (PM) are produced from the combustion of fossil fuels and biomass; the World Health Organization estimates that 7 million premature deaths are caused each year by air pollution.[37] Biomass combustion is a major contributor.[37][38][39] In addition to producing air pollution like fossil fuel combustion, most biomass has high CO2 emissions.[40]

By source[edit]

Total primary energy supply of 13,972 Mtoe by source in 2017 (IEA, 2019)[15]

  Oil (32.0%)
  Coal/peat/shale (27.1%)
  Natural gas (22.2%)
  Biofuels and waste (9.5%)
  Hydro electricity (2.5%)
  Others (renewables) (1.8%)
  Nuclear (4.9%)

Fossil fuels[edit]

Main article: Fossil fuel

The twentieth century saw a rapid twenty-fold increase in the use of fossil fuels. Between 1980 and 2006, the worldwide annual growth rate was 2%.[25] According to the US Energy Information Administration's 2006 estimate, the estimated 471.8 EJ total consumption in 2004, was divided as given in the table above, with fossil fuels supplying 86% of the world's energy:

Coal[edit]

Main articles: Coal and List of countries by coal production

In 2000, China accounted for 28% of world coal consumption, other Asia consumed 19%, North America 25% and the EU 14%. The single greatest coal-consuming country is China. Its share of the world coal production was 28% in 2000 and rose to 48% in 2009. In contrast to China's ~70% increase in coal consumption, world coal use increased 48% from 2000 to 2009. In practice, the majority of this growth occurred in China and the rest in other Asia.[41] China's energy consumption is mostly driven by the industry sector, the majority of which comes from coal consumption.[42]

Coal is the largest source of carbon dioxide emissions in the world. According to James Hansen the single most important action needed to tackle the climate crisis is to reduce CO2 emissions from coal.[43] Indonesia and Australia exported together 57.1% of the world coal export in 2011. China, Japan, South Korea, India and Taiwan had 65% share of all the world coal import in 2011.[44]

Top 10 coal exporters (Mt)[45]
RankNation20102011Share
% 2011		2012
1Indonesia16230929.7%383
2Australia29828527.4%302
3Russia89999.5%103
4US57858.2%106
5Colombia68767.3%82
6South Africa68706.7%72
7Kazakhstan33343.3%32
8Canada24242.3%25
9Vietnam21232.2%18
10Mongolia17222.1%22
xOthers19141.3%
Total (Mt)8561,0411,168
Top ten97.8%98.7%

Oil[edit]

Main articles: Petroleum, List of countries by oil production, and List of countries by oil consumption

Coal fueled the industrial revolution in the 18th and 19th century. With the advent of the automobile, aeroplanes and the spreading use of electricity, oil became the dominant fuel during the twentieth century. The growth of oil as the largest fossil fuel was further enabled by steadily dropping prices from 1920 until 1973. After the oil shocks of 1973 and 1979, during which the price of oil increased from 5 to 45 US dollars per barrel, there was a shift away from oil.[46] Coal, natural gas, and nuclear became the fuels of choice for electricity generation and conservation measures increased energy efficiency. In the U.S. the average car more than doubled the number of miles per gallon. Japan, which bore the brunt of the oil shocks, made spectacular improvements and now[when?] has the highest energy efficiency in the world.[47] From 1965 to 2008, the use of fossil fuels has continued to grow and their share of the energy supply has increased. From 2003 to 2008, coal was the fastest growing fossil fuel.[48]

It is estimated that between 100 and 135 billion tonnes of oil has been consumed between 1850 and the present.[49][when?]

Natural Gas[edit]

Main articles: Natural Gas, List of countries by natural gas production, and List of countries by natural gas consumption

In 2009, the world use of natural gas grew 31% compared to 2000. 66% of this growth was outside EU, North America, Latin America, and Russia. Others include the Middle East, Asia, and Africa. The gas supply increased also in the previous regions: 8.6% in the EU and 16% in the North America 2000–2009.[50]

Regional gas supply (TWh) and share 2010 (%)[51][50]
Land2000200820092010%
North America7,6217,7798,8398,92527%
Asia excl. China2,7444,0744,3484,79914%
China2708251,0151,1413%
EU4,5745,1074,9675,15516%
Africa6129741,4551,0993%
Russia3,7094,2594,2094,33513%
Latin America1,0081,357958ndnd
Others3,7745,7456,0477,78523%
Total24,31230,13431,83733,240100%
Source: IEA, in 2009, 2010 BP

Renewable energy[edit]

Main articles: Renewable energy, List of renewable energy topics by country and territory, and Renewable energy commercialization
Strong public support for renewables worldwide in 2011[52]

Renewable energy is generally defined as energy that comes from resources that are not significantly depleted by their use, such as sunlight, wind, rain, tides, waves and geothermal heat.[53] Renewable energy is gradually replacing conventional fuels in four distinct areas: electricity generation, hot water/space heating, motor fuels, and rural (off-grid) energy services.[54]

Based on REN21's 2019 report, renewables contributed 18.1 percent to the world's energy consumption and 26 percent to its electricity generation in 2017 and 2018, respectively. This energy consumption is divided as 7.5% coming from traditional biomass, 4.2% as heat energy (non-biomass), 1% biofuels for transport, 3.6% hydro electricity and 2% electricity from wind, solar, biomass, geothermal, and ocean power. Worldwide investments in renewable technologies amounted to more than US$289 billion in 2018, with countries like China and the United States heavily investing in wind, hydro, solar and biofuels.[55] Renewable energy resources exist over wide geographical areas, in contrast to other energy sources, which are concentrated in a limited number of countries. Rapid deployment of renewable energy and energy efficiency is resulting in significant energy security, climate change mitigation, and economic benefits.[56] In international public opinion surveys there is strong support for promoting renewable sources such as solar power and wind power.[57] At the national level, at least 30 nations around the world already have renewable energy contributing more than 20 percent of energy supply. National renewable energy markets are projected to continue to grow strongly in the coming decade and beyond.[58]

The following table shows increasing nameplate capacity, and has capacity factors that range from 11% for solar, to 40% for hydropower.[59]

Selected renewable energy global indicators20082009201020112012201320142015201620172018
Investment in new renewable capacity (annual) (109 USD)[60]182178237279256232270285241279289
Renewables power capacity (existing) (GWe)1,1401,2301,3201,3601,4701,5781,7121,8492,0172,1952,378
Hydropower capacity (existing) (GWe)8859159459709901,0181,0551,0641,0961,1141,132
Wind power capacity (existing) (GWe)121159198238283319370433487539591
Solar PV capacity (grid-connected) (GWe)16234070100138177227303402505
Solar hot water capacity (existing) (GWth)130160185232255373406435456472480
Ethanol production (annual) (109 litres)677686868387949898106112
Biodiesel production (annual) (109 litres)1217.818.521.422.52629.730303134
Countries with policy targets
for renewable energy use		798998118138144164173176179169
Source: The Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st Century (REN21)–Global Status Report[61][62][63][64][65][66][67][68][69]
Renewable energy 2000-2013 (TWh)[70]
200020102013
North-America1,9732,2372,443
EU1,2042,0932,428
Russia245239271
China2,6133,3743,847
Asia (-China)4,1474,9965,361
Africa2,9663,9304,304
Latin America1 5022,1272,242
Other567670738
Total renewable15,23719,71121,685
Total energy116,958148,736157,485
Share13.0%13.3%13.8%
Total nonrenewable101,721129,025135,800

From 2000 to 2013 the total renewable energy use has increased by 6,450 TWh and total energy use by 40,500 TWh.

Hydro[edit]

Main articles: Hydroelectricity and Hydropower

Hydroelectricity is the term referring to electricity generated by hydropower; the production of electrical power through the use of the kinetic energy of falling or flowing water. In 2015 hydropower generated 16.6% of the world's total electricity and 70% of renewable electricity.[71] In 2019 it made up 6.5% of total energy use.[72] Hydropower is produced in 150 countries, with the Asia-Pacific region generating 32 percent of global hydropower in 2010. China is the largest hydroelectricity producer, with 2,600 PJ (721 TWh) of production in 2010, representing around 17% of domestic electricity use. There are now three hydroelectricity plants larger than 10 GW: the Three Gorges Dam in China, Itaipu Dam in Brazil, and Guri Dam in Venezuela.[73] Nine of the worlds top 10 renewable electricity producers are primarily hydroelectric, one is wind.

Wind[edit]

Main articles: Wind power and Wind power by country

Wind power is growing at the rate of 11% annually, with a worldwide installed capacity of 539,123 megawatts (MW) at the end of 2017,[74] and is widely used in Europe, Asia, and the United States.[75][76] Several countries have achieved relatively high levels of wind power penetration: wind power produced the equivalent of 47% of Denmark's total electricity consumption in 2019,[77] 18% in Portugal,[78] 16% in Spain,[78] 14% in Ireland[79] and 9% in Germany in 2010.[78][80] As of 2011, 83 countries around the world are using wind power on a commercial basis.[80] In 2019 wind made up 2.2% of total energy use.[72]

Solar[edit]

Main articles: Solar energy, Solar power, and Solar power by country

Solar energy, radiant light and heat from the sun, has been harnessed by humans since ancient times using a range of ever-evolving technologies. Solar energy technologies include solar heating, solar photovoltaics, concentrated solar power and solar architecture, which can make considerable contributions to solving some of the most urgent problems the world now faces. The International Energy Agency projected that solar power could provide "a third of the global final energy demand after 2060, while CO2 emissions would be reduced to very low levels."[81] Solar technologies are broadly characterized as either passive solar or active solar depending on the way they capture, convert, and distribute solar energy. Active solar techniques include the use of photovoltaic systems and solar thermal collectors to harness the energy. Passive solar techniques include orienting a building to the Sun, selecting materials with favorable thermal mass or light dispersing properties, and designing spaces that naturally circulate air. In 2012 it make up 0.18% of energy use which increase to 1.1% in 2019.[72]

Geothermal[edit]

Main articles: Geothermal energy and Geothermal power

Geothermal energy is used commercially in over 70 countries.[82] In 2004, 200 petajoules (56 TWh) of electricity was generated from geothermal resources, and an additional 270 petajoules (75 TWh) of geothermal energy was used directly, mostly for space heating. In 2007, the world had a global capacity for 10 GW of electricity generation and an additional 28 GW of direct heating, including extraction by geothermal heat pumps.[83][84] Heat pumps are small and widely distributed, so estimates of their total capacity are uncertain and range up to 100 GW.[82] It was estimated that geothermal heat pumps had, in 2015, a total capacity of about 50 GW producing about 455 petajoules (126 TWh) per year.[85]

Bio energy[edit]

Main articles: Biomass, Biogas, and Biofuel

Until the beginning of the nineteenth-century biomass was the predominant fuel, today it has only a small share of the overall energy supply. Electricity produced from biomass sources was estimated at 44  GW for 2005. Biomass electricity generation increased by over 100% in Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, Poland, and Spain. A further 220  GW was used for heating (in 2004), bringing the total energy consumed from biomass to around 264  GW. The use of biomass fires for cooking is excluded.[83] World production of bioethanol increased by 8% in 2005 to reach 33 gigalitres (8.7×109 US gal), with most of the increase in the United States, bringing it level to the levels of consumption in Brazil.[83] Biodiesel increased by 85% to 3.9 gigalitres (1.0×109 US gal), making it the fastest-growing renewable energy source in 2005. Over 50% is produced in Germany.[83]

Marine energy[edit]

Main article: Marine energy

Marine energy, also known as ocean energy and marine and hydrokinetic energy (MHK) includes tidal and wave power and is a relatively new sector of renewable energy, with most projects still in the pilot phase, but the theoretical potential is equivalent to 4–18 Mtoe. MHK development in U.S. and international waters includes projects using devices such as wave energy converters in open coastal areas with significant waves, tidal turbines placed in coastal and estuarine areas, in-stream turbines in fast-moving rivers, ocean current turbines in areas of strong marine currents, and ocean thermal energy converters in deep tropical waters.[86]

Nuclear power[edit]

Main article: Nuclear Power

As of 1 July 2016, the world had 444 operable grid-electric nuclear fission power reactors with 62 others under construction.[87]

Annual generation of nuclear power has been on a slight downward trend since 2007, decreasing 1.8% in 2009 to 2558 TWh, and another 1.6% in 2011 to 2518 TWh, despite increases in production from most countries worldwide, because those increases were more than offset by decreases in Germany and Japan. Nuclear power met 11.7% of the world's electricity demand in 2011. Source: IEA/OECD.[9]

While all the commercial reactors today use nuclear fission energy, there are plans to use nuclear fusion energy for future power plants. Several international nuclear fusion reactor experiments exist or are being constructed, including ITER.

By country[edit]

Main article: List of renewable energy topics by country
See also: Energy by country, Worldwide energy supply, and List of countries by energy consumption per capita

World total final consumption of 9,717 Mtoe by region in 2017 (IEA, 2019)[15]

  OECD (38.2%)
  Middle East (5.1%)
  Non-OECD Eurasia (7.5%)
  China (20.6%)
  Rest of Asia (13.5%)
  Non-OECD Americas (4.8%)
  Africa (6.1%)
  International aviation and marine bunkers (4.2%)
World energy consumption per capita, 1950–2004

Energy consumption is loosely correlated with gross national product and climate, but there is a large difference even between the most highly developed countries, such as Japan and Germany with an energy consumption rate of 6 kW per person and the United States with an energy consumption rate of 11.4 kW per person. In developing countries, particularly those that are sub-tropical or tropical such as India, the per person energy use rate is closer to 0.7 kW. Bangladesh has the lowest consumption rate with 0.2 kW per person.

The US consumes 25% of the world's energy with a share of global GDP at 22% and a share of the world population at 4.6%.[88] The most significant growth of energy consumption is currently taking place in China, which has been growing at 5.5% per year over the last 25 years. Its population of 1.3 billion people (19.6% of the world population[88]) is consuming energy at a rate of 1.6 kW per person.

One measurement of efficiency is energy intensity. This is a measure of the amount of energy it takes a country to produce a dollar of gross domestic product.

The World Bank: Kilograms of oil equivalent (2011)
The World Bank: PPP $ per kg of oil equivalent (2011)

Oil[edit]

Main article: Petroleum

Saudi Arabia, Russia and the United States accounted for 34% of oil production in 2011. Saudi Arabia, Russia and Nigeria accounted for 36% of oil export in 2011.

Top 10 oil producers (Mt)[45]
RankNation20052008200920102011Share %
2011		2012
1Saudi Arabia51950945247151712.9%544
2Russia47048549450251012.7%520
3United States3073003203363468.6%387
4Iran2052142062272155.4%186
5China1831901942002035.1%206
6Canada1431551521591694.2%182
7UAEnd1361201291493.7%163
8Venezuela1621371261491483.7%162
9Mexico1881591461441443.6%nd
10Nigeria133ndnd1301393.5%nd
xKuwaitnd145124ndndnd152
xIraqndnd114140ndnd148
xNorway139ndndndndndnd
Total3,9233,9413,8433,9734,011100%
Top ten62%62%61%62%63%
Top 10 oil exporters (Mt)[89]
RankNation2011Share %
2011		2012
1Saudi Arabia33317.0%
2Russia24612.5%
3Nigeria1296.6%
4Iran1266.4%
5UAE1055.4%
6Iraq944.8%
7Venezuela874.4%
8Angola844.3%
9Norway784.0%
10Mexico713.6%
xOthers60931.0%
Total (Mt)1,962

Coal[edit]

Main articles: List of countries by coal production and Coal

Coal was 27% of world energy consumption in 2019 but is being displaced by natural gas and renewables.[90]

Natural gas[edit]

Main article: Natural gas
Top 10 natural gas producers (bcm)[89]
RankNation20052008200920102011Share %
2011
1Russia62765758963767720.0%
2US51758359461365119.2%
3Canada1871751591601604.7%
4Qatarnd79891211514.5%
5Iran841211441451494.4%
6Norway901031061071063.1%
7Chinand7690971033.0%
8Saudi Arabia70ndnd82922.7%
9Indonesia77777688922.7%
10Netherlands79857989812.4%
xAlgeria938281ndndnd
xUK93ndndndndnd
Total2,8723,1493,1013,282100%3,388
Top ten67%65%65%65%67%
bcm = billion cubic meters
Top 10 natural gas importers (bcm)[89]
RankNation20052008200920102011Share %
2011
1Japan8195939911613.9%
2Italy73776975708.4%
3Germany91798383688.2%
4US121847674556.6%
5South Korea29363343475.6%
6Ukraine62533837445.3%
7Turkey27363537435.2%
8France47444546414.9%
9UKnd262937374.4%
10Spain33393436344.1%
xNetherlands23ndndndndnd
Total838783749820834100%
Top ten70%73%71%69%67%
Import of production29%25%24%25%25%
bcm = billion cubic meters

Wind power[edit]

Top 10 countries
by nameplate windpower capacity
(2011 year-end)[91]
CountryWindpower capacity 2011
(MW) ǂprovisional		% world totalWindpower capacity 2019
(MW)		% world total
China62,733ǂ26.3236,40236.3
United States46,91919.7105,46616.2
Germany29,06012.261,4069.4
Spain21,6749.1n/an/a
India16,0846.737,5065.7
France6,800ǂ2.816,6452.6
Italy6,7472.8n/an/a
United Kingdom6,5402.723,3403.6
Canada5,2652.213,4132.1
Portugal4,0831.7n/an/a
(rest of world)32,44613.8156,37524.1
World total238,351 MW100%650,557 MW100%
Top 10 countries
by windpower electricity production
(2010 totals)[92]
CountryWindpower production
(TWh)		% world total
United States95.227.6
China55.515.9
Spain43.712.7
Germany36.510.6
India20.66.0
United Kingdom10.23.0
France9.72.8
Portugal9.12.6
Italy8.42.5
Canada8.02.3
(rest of world)48.514.1
World total344.8 TWh100%

By sector[edit]

World total final consumption of 119.8 PWh by sector in 2012[93]

  Residential (13%)
  Commercial (7%)
  Industrial (54%)
  Transportation (26%)
World energy use by sector, 2012[93]
Sector1015BtuPetawatt-hours%
Residential53.015.513
Commercial29.38.67
Industrial222.365.154
Transportation104.230.526
Total*408.9119.8100
Source: US DOE. PWh from 0.293 times Btu column.
Numbers are the end use of energy
Percentages rounded

The table to the right shows the amounts of energy consumed worldwide in 2012 by four sectors, according to the Energy Information Administration of the US Department of Energy:

  • Residential (heating, lighting, and appliances)
  • Commercial (lighting, heating and cooling of commercial buildings, and provision of water and sewer services)
  • Industrial users (agriculture, mining, manufacturing, and construction)
  • Transportation (passenger, freight, and pipeline)

Of the total 120 PWh (120×1015 Wh) consumed, 19.4 were in the form of electricity, but this electricity required 61.7 PWh to produce. Thus the total energy consumption was around 160 PWh (ca 550×1015 Btu).[93] The efficiency of a typical existing power plant is around 38%.[94] The new generation of gas-fired plants reaches a substantially higher efficiency of 55%. Coal is the most common fuel for the world's electricity plants.[95]

Another report gives different values for the sectors, apparently due to different definitions. According to this, total world energy use per sector in 2008 was industry 28%, transport 27% and residential and service 36%. Division was about the same in the year 2000.[96]

World energy use per sector[96]
Year2000200820002008
SectorTWh%*
Industry21,73327,2732728
Transport22,56326,7422827
Residential and service30,55535,3193736
Non-energy use7,1198,68899
Total*81,97098,022100100
Source: IEA 2010, Total is calculated from the given sectors
Numbers are the end use of energy
Total world energy supply (2008) 143,851 TWh
Percentages rounded

European Union[edit]

The European Environmental Agency (EEA) measures final energy consumption (does not include energy used in production and lost in transportation) and finds that the transport sector is responsible for 32% of final energy consumption, households 26%, industry 26%, services 14% and agriculture 3% in 2012.[97] The use of energy is responsible for the majority of greenhouse gas emissions (79%), with the energy sector representing 31 p.p., transport 19 p.p., industry 13 p.p., households 9 p.p.and others 7 p.p.[98]

While efficient energy use and resource efficiency are growing as public policy issues, more than 70% of coal plants in the European Union are more than 20 years old and operate at an efficiency level of between 32 and 40%.[99] Technological developments in the 1990s have allowed efficiencies in the range of 40–45% at newer plants.[99] However, according to an impact assessment by the European Commission, this is still below the best available technological (BAT) efficiency levels of 46–49%.[99] With gas-fired power plants the average efficiency is 52% compared to 58–59% with best available technology (BAT), and gas and oil boiler plants operate at average 36% efficiency (BAT delivers 47%).[99] According to that same impact assessment by the European Commission, raising the efficiency of all new plants and the majority of existing plants, through the setting of authorisation and permit conditions, to an average generation efficiency of 52% in 2020 would lead to a reduction in annual consumption of 15 km3 (3.6 cu mi) of natural gas and 25 Mt (25,000,000 long tons; 28,000,000 short tons) of coal.[99]

See also[edit]

Lists

References[edit]

  1. ^ Friedlingstein et al. 2019.
  2. ^ "Statistical Review of World Energy (2020)" (PDF). Retrieved 17 February 2021.
  3. ^ Jump up to:a b c "Key world energy statistics" (PDF). IEA. 2015. Retrieved 6 April 2017.
  4. ^ Jump up to:a b c BP: Statistical Review of World Energy, Workbook (xlsx), London, 2016
  5. ^ World Energy Assessment (WEA). UNDP, United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, World Energy Council, New York
  6. ^ "Statistical Review of World Energy (June 2018)" (PDF). Retrieved 27 September 2019.
  7. ^ "World Energy Expenditures | Enerdata". www.enerdata.net. Retrieved 8 November 2020.
  8. ^ "2012 Key World Energy Statistics" (PDF). www.iea.org. IEA. 2012. pp. 6, 24, 28. Archived (PDF) from the original on 3 July 2015.
  9. ^ Jump up to:a b "2013 Key World Energy Statistics" (PDF). www.iea.org. IEA. 2013. pp. 6, 24, 26, 28. Archived from the original (PDF)on 6 July 2019. Retrieved 1 July 2015.
  10. ^ "2014 Key World Energy Statistics" (PDF). www.iea.org. IEA. 2014. pp. 6, 38. Archived (PDF) from the original on 5 April 2015.
  11. ^ "Key World Energy Statistics" (PDF). 28 May 2017. pp. 27, 37.
  12. ^ Jump up to:a b "Key World Energy Statistics" (PDF). IEA. 28 May 2017. p. 38.
  13. ^ Jump up to:a b "Key World Energy Statistics" (PDF). IEA. September 2017. p. 7 (TPES), 36 (TFC, total final consumption). Retrieved 5 September 2018.
  14. ^ "International Energy Outlook 2017" (PDF). EIA. 14 September 2017. p. 10.
  15. ^ Jump up to:a b c "Key World Energy Statistics 2019". International Energy Agency. 26 September 2019. pp. 6, 36. Retrieved 7 December 2019.
  16. ^ IEA Website
  17. ^ "Electricity - Installed generating capacity, 2014". Archived from the original on 29 April 2017. Retrieved 6 April 2017.
  18. ^ "Shell – World Energy Model – A View To 2100" (PDF). Shell International BV. 2017. Retrieved 28 October 2019.
  19. ^ Jump up to:a b Cite error: The named reference UNDP was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  20. ^ Nakićenović, Nebojša; Grübler, Arnulf; McDonald, Alan (1998). Global energy: perspectives. Cambridge, NY: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521642000.
  21. ^ "International Energy Statistics". Energy Information Administration. Retrieved 5 June 2013.
  22. ^ "World Energy Intensity: Total Primary Energy Consumption per Dollar of Gross Domestic Product using Purchasing Power Parities, 1980–2004". Energy Information Administration, U.S. Department of Energy. 23 August 2006. Archived from the original (XLS) on 6 February 2007. Retrieved 3 April 2007.
  23. ^ "Historical Statistics of Japan". Japan Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications. Retrieved 3 April 2007.
  24. ^ "Sluggish growth of World energy demand in 2011".
  25. ^ Jump up to:a b "Consumption by fuel, 1965–2008". Statistical Review of World Energy 2009. BP. 8 June 2009. Archived from the original (XLS) on 26 July 2013. Retrieved 24 October 2009.
  26. ^ International Energy Statistics 2015
  27. ^ "The myth of the green cloud". European Investment Bank. Retrieved 17 September 2020.
  28. ^ "World Energy Statistics – Energy Supply & Demand". Enerdata.
  29. ^ IEA Key energy statistics 2010 and IEA Key energy statistics 2009 Archived 31 March 2010 at the Wayback Machine oil p. 11, gas p. 13, hard coal (excluding brown coal) p. 15 and electricity p. 27
  30. ^ Schreiber, William (May–June 2007). "Solving the Energy Problem". MIT Faculty Newsletter. Retrieved 10 September2016.
  31. ^ "IEA estimates $48tn investments till 2035 to meet global energy demands". Bloomberg News. Retrieved 4 June 2014.
  32. ^ "IEA World Energy Outlook 2012 Executive Summary"(PDF). Retrieved 27 September 2019.
  33. ^ Table 55, Regional energy use, 1990 and 2008 (p. 48), in "Energy in Sweden – facts and figures 2010" (PDF). Swedish Energy Agency. Archived from the original (PDF) on 14 October 2013. (see also Energy in Sweden 2011), data from IEA Energy Balances of Non-OECD countries 2010.
  34. ^ "IEA Key energy statistics 2010" (PDF). IEA. 2010. p. 48. Archived from the original (PDF) on 1 March 2012.
  35. ^ Energiläget 2050 by prof. Cristian Azar and Kristian Lindgren Chalmers Göteborg (in Swedish)
  36. ^ State of the world 2009, Worldwatch Institute
  37. ^ Jump up to:a b "7 million premature deaths annually linked to air pollution". WHO.
  38. ^ "Ambient (outdoor) air quality and health". WHO.
  39. ^ "Household air pollution and health". WHO.
  40. ^ http://www.pfpi.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/PFPI-biomass-carbon-accounting-overview_April.pdf
  41. ^ Table 52 Global supply of coal, 1990–2009 (pp. 44-45), in "Energy in Sweden — facts and figures 2010" (PDF). Swedish Energy Agency. Archived from the original (PDF) on 14 October 2013. (see also Energy in Sweden 2011), data from IEA Energy Balances of Non-OECD countries 2010.
  42. ^ Ma, Damien. "China's Coming Decade of Natural Gas". Asia's Uncertain LNG Future, NBR Special Report. November 2013. Retrieved 8 August 2014.
  43. ^ The True Cost of Coal 27 November 2008 pp. 66–69
  44. ^ Key statistics 2012 IEA
  45. ^ Jump up to:a b IEA Key World Energy Statistics 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009 Archived 7 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine, 2006 Archived 12 October 2009 at the Wayback Machine IEA October, crude oil p. 11, coal p. 13, gas p. 15
  46. ^ Yergin, p. 792
  47. ^ "Key World Energy Statistics" (PDF). International Energy Agency. 2006. Archived from the original (PDF) on 12 October 2009. Retrieved 3 April 2007. pp. 48–57
  48. ^ Yergin, p. ?
  49. ^ How Much Oil Have We Used?, Science Daily, 8 May 2009. Retrieved March 2014.
  50. ^ Jump up to:a b Table 50 Global supply of gas 1990–2009 (p. 44), in "Energy in Sweden — facts and figures 2010" (PDF). Swedish Energy Agency. Archived from the original (PDF) on 14 October 2013. (see also Energy in Sweden 2011), data from IEA Energy Balances of Non-OECD countries 2010.
  51. ^ Energiläget 2011 Archived 1 April 2012 at the Wayback Machine
  52. ^ Ipsos 2011, p. 3
  53. ^ "The myth of renewable energy". Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. 22 November 2011. Retrieved 3 October 2013.
  54. ^ REN21 (2010). Renewables 2010 Global Status Report p. 15.
  55. ^ REN21 (2019). "Renewables 2019: Global Status Report"(PDF).
  56. ^ International Energy Agency (2012). "Energy Technology Perspectives 2012" (PDF).
  57. ^ "Global Trends in Sustainable Energy Investment 2007: Analysis of Trends and Issues in the Financing of Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency in OECD and Developing Countries" (PDF). www.unep.org. United Nations Environment Programme. 2007. p. 3. Archived (PDF) from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 13 October 2014.
  58. ^ REN21 (2013). "Renewables global futures report 2013"(PDF).[permanent dead link]
  59. ^ "Electricity generation: very different capacity factors!". 21 September 2015.
  60. ^ http://www.ren21.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/GSR2015_Figure25.jpg
  61. ^ "Renewables 2011: Global Status Report" (PDF).
  62. ^ "Renewables 2012: Global Status Report" (PDF).
  63. ^ "Renewables 2013: Global Status Report" (PDF).
  64. ^ "Renewables 2014: Global Status Report" (PDF).
  65. ^ "Renewables 2015: Global Status Report" (PDF).
  66. ^ "Renewables 2016: Global Status Report" (PDF).
  67. ^ "Renewables 2017: Global Status Report" (PDF).
  68. ^ "Renewables 2018: Global Status Report" (PDF).
  69. ^ "Renewables 2019: Global Status Report" (PDF).
  70. ^ Energiläget i siffror 2016 Energimyndigheten Sweden (See Renewable energy 12.3 Total energy 12.1)
  71. ^ http://www.ren21.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/GSR_2016_Full_Report_REN21.pdf
  72. ^ Jump up to:a b c Ritchie, Hannah; Roser, Max (28 March 2014). "Energy". Our World in Data.
  73. ^ "Use and Capacity of Global Hydropower Increases". Worldwatch Institute. January 2012. Archived from the originalon 24 September 2014. Retrieved 17 February 2012.
  74. ^ Global Wind Energy Council. "GWEC Global Statistics".
  75. ^ Global wind energy markets continue to boom – 2006 another record year Archived 7 April 2011 at the Wayback Machine (PDF).
  76. ^ Beattie, David (18 March 2011). "Wind Power: China Picks Up Pace". Renewable Energy World.
  77. ^ "Denmark sources record 47% of power from wind in 2019". Reuters. 2 January 2020. Retrieved 14 January 2020.
  78. ^ Jump up to:a b c "World Wind Energy Report 2010" (PDF). Report. World Wind Energy Association. February 2011. Archived from the original (PDF) on 4 September 2011. Retrieved 30 April2011.
  79. ^ "Renewables". eirgrid.com. Archived from the original on 10 August 2011. Retrieved 22 November 2010.
  80. ^ Jump up to:a b REN21 (2011). "Renewables 2011: Global Status Report"(PDF). p. 11.
  81. ^ http://www.iea.org/Textbase/npsum/solar2011SUM.pdf
  82. ^ Jump up to:a b "The Future of Geothermal Energy" (PDF). MIT. Archived from the original (PDF) on 10 March 2011. Retrieved 7 February 2007.
  83. ^ Jump up to:a b c d "Renewables, Global Status Report 2006" (PDF). Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st century. 2006. Archived from the original (PDF) on 18 July 2011. Retrieved 3 April 2007.
  84. ^ Fridleifsson, Ingvar B.; Bertani, Ruggero; Huenges, Ernst; Lund, John W.; Ragnarsson, Arni; Rybach, Ladislaus (11 February 2008). O. Hohmeyer and T. Trittin (ed.). "The possible role and contribution of geothermal energy to the mitigation of climate change" (PDF). Luebeck, Germany: 59–80. Archived from the original (PDF) on 22 July 2011. Retrieved 6 April 2009.
  85. ^ Lund, John W.; Boyd, Tonya L. (March 2016). "Direct utilization of geothermal energy 2015 worldwide review". Geothermics. 60: 66–93. doi:10.1016/j.geothermics.2015.11.004.
  86. ^ "Tethys | Environmental Effects of Wind and Marine Renewable Energy". tethys.pnnl.gov. Retrieved 27 September2019.
  87. ^ World Nuclear Association, (1 July 2016) [1], www.world-nuclear.org
  88. ^ Jump up to:a b "World Population Prospects". United Nations. Archived from the original on 21 March 2007. Retrieved 7 February2011.
  89. ^ Jump up to:a b c IEA Key World Energy Statistics 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009 Archived 7 October 2013 at the Wayback Machine, 2006 Archived 12 October 2009 at the Wayback Machine IEA October, crude oil p. 11, coal p. 13 gas p. 15
  90. ^ "Coal | Energy economics | Home". bp global. Retrieved 19 July 2020.
  91. ^ "GWEC Global Wind Statistics 2011" (PDF). Global Wind Energy Commission. Retrieved 15 March 2012.
  92. ^ "Worldwide Electricity Production From Renewable Energy Sources: Stats and Figures Series: Thirteenth Inventory – Edition 2011" (PDF). 2.2 Electricity Production From Wind Sources: Main Wind Power Producing Countries – 2010 (text & table): Observ'ER. Retrieved 29 March 2012.
  93. ^ Jump up to:a b c Table F1 of "International Energy Outlook 2016"(PDF). Washington, DC: United States Department of Energy. Archived from the original on 27 July 2017.
  94. ^ "Energy efficiency measures and technological improvements". e8.org. Archived from the original on 4 February 2007. Retrieved 21 January 2007. Article by group of ten leading electricity companies
  95. ^ "Coal Facts 2006 Edition" (PDF). World Coal Institute. September 2006. Archived from the original (PDF) on 17 May 2016. Retrieved 8 April 2007.
  96. ^ Jump up to:a b Table 56, Total world energy use per sector 1990–2008 (pp. 48–49), in "Energy in Sweden – facts and figures 2010"(PDF). Swedish Energy Agency. Archived from the original(PDF) on 14 October 2013. (see also Energy in Sweden 2011), data from IEA Energy Balances of Non-OECD countries 2010.
  97. ^ European Environmental Agency. "Final energy consumption by sector and fuel (CSI 027/ENER 016) – Assessment". January 2015. Retrieved 21 June 2015.
  98. ^ Eva Hoos European Commission 2011. A new Directive on Energy Efficiency. Retrieved 11 October 2011.
  99. ^ Jump up to:a b c d e European Commission 2011. Impact Assessment Accompanying the document Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on energy efficiency and amending and subsequently repealing Directives 2004/8/EC and 2006/32/EC. p. 106. Retrieved 11 October 2011.

External links[edit]

Posted by at

Disengaged Buddhism Jan 2019 Amod Jayant LeleAmod Jayant Lele

(2) (PDF) Disengaged Buddhism


Disengaged Buddhism

January 2019
Journal of Buddhist ethics 26:240-89
Follow journal


Amod Jayant Lele

Research Interest


0.7
Citations
0
Recommendations
0 new
0
Reads

3 new
99
See details






Overview


Related research
If intention is karma: A new approach to the Buddha's socio-political teachings
Article
Full-text available

January 2012
Download
View more

Abstract
Contemporary engaged Buddhist scholars typically claim either that Buddhism always endorsed social activism, or that its non-endorsement of such activism represented an unwitting lack of progress. This article examines several classical South Asian Buddhist texts that explicitly reject social and political activism. These texts argue for this rejection on the grounds that the most important sources of suffering are not something that activism can fix, and that political involvement interferes with the tranquility required for liberation. The article then examines the history of engaged Buddhism in order to identify why this rejection of activism has not yet been taken sufficiently seriously.

-------------

See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/337367324

Disengaged Buddhism
Article  in  Journal of Buddhist ethics · January 2019
 
author: Amod Jayant Lele
Boston University

5 PUBLICATIONS   7 CITATIONS   
SEE PROFILE
All content following this page was uploaded by Amod Jayant Lele on 19 November 2019.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.
Journal of Buddhist Ethics 
ISSN 1076-9005 
http://blogs.dickinson.edu/buddhistethics/ 
Volume 26, 2019 
 
 
 
 ==========================

Disengaged Buddhism 
 
Amod Lele 
Boston University 
 
Copyright Notice: Digital copies of this work may be made and distributed provided no change is made and no alteration is made to the content. Reproduction in any other format, with the exception of a single copy for private study, requires the written permission of the author. All enquiries to: vforte@albright.edu. 
====
 
Disengaged Buddhism 
 
Amod Lele   
 
Abstract 

Contemporary engaged Buddhist scholars typically claim either that Buddhism always endorsed social activism, or that its non-endorsement of such activism represented an unwitting lack of progress. This article examines several classical South Asian Buddhist texts that explicitly reject social and political activism. These texts argue for this rejection on the grounds that the most important sources of suffering are not something that activism can fix, and that political involvement interferes with the tranquility required for liberation. The article then examines the history of engaged Buddhism in order to identify why this rejection of activism has not yet been taken sufficiently seriously. 
----

 
Introduction  

In a chapter entitled “All Buddhism Is Engaged,” Patricia Hunt-Perry and Lyn Fine quote Thich Nhat Hanh as follows: “‘Buddhism is already engaged Buddhism. If it is not, it is not Buddhism.’”  (Hunt-Perry and Fine 36) What does this quote actually mean? Hunt-Perry and Fine do not spell it out. It could be a simple tautology: by “engaged Buddhism” we simply mean “Buddhism,” such that a forest monk who refuses all contact with society counts as an engaged Buddhist. Such an approach would be entirely unhelpful; for, in that case, there would be no need to speak of “engaged Buddhism” rather than simply of Buddhism, and to do so would merely confuse the issue. 
 More commonly, “engaged Buddhism” is used as a shorthand for socially engaged Buddhism, a Buddhism that embraces social and political activism. Hunt-Perry and Fine themselves use the term this way. If “engaged Buddhism” is indeed understood in this way, then the quote could mean one of two things. It could be a factual claim that everyone practising Buddhism has, in fact, been socially engaged, or it could be a normative definition that says self-identified Buddhists who are not socially engaged are not truly Buddhist.  
 The factual claim that everyone practising Buddhism has been socially engaged is false. For in fact many revered Buddhist thinkers have not merely refrained from social engagement, they have actively discouraged it. As a consequence, the normative definition is far more exclusionary than Hunt-Perry and Fine would likely want it to be.  
 I refer to the Buddhism of these thinkers as disengaged Buddhism.  Disengaged Buddhists, in this sense, reject involvement with social and political issues as unfruitful and even harmful. I intend no negative connotation to the term “disengaged.”  In colloquial conversation, when a friend is involved in conflict surrounding other acquaintances that has negative emotional effects, we might give that friend the helpful advice that “You need to disengage from that situation”—advice that, we will see, has an analogue among the positions of the disengaged Buddhists. 
 This article does not argue that a Buddhist disengaged view is correct. Rather, I argue that disengaged Buddhism is a coherent, thoughtful position to be found across a variety of at least classical Indian Buddhist texts; as such, it deserves more constructive ethical attention than it has so far received. Western engaged Buddhist scholars, in particular, have typically given the claims of disengaged Buddhism insufficient attention in two different ways: either they act as if it never existed, or they treat it as an unwitting lack, a vacuum to be filled. They have generally not taken it as a thoughtful position worthy of response and debate.  
 This article is a response to those Western scholars, because they occupy a very prominent place in the scholarly field of Buddhist ethics, especially constructive or normative Buddhist ethics. It is not in response to Asian or other engaged Buddhist activists, who are outside this article’s purview. The aim of this article is not to critique what engaged Buddhists do (that would be a very different article), but how they think and write, especially about the Buddhist past. I am critiquing the scholarship and advocacy, rather than the practice, of engaged Buddhism. 
 This article is in sympathy with James Deitrick’s claim that, to date at least, American “socially engaged Buddhist social ethics is derived less from Buddhist sources than from the American religious culture in which it has grown” (i). It aims to go beyond Deitrick by examining those Buddhist sources and the positions they take in opposition to contemporary Western engaged Buddhist thought. I will present several texts from classical South Asia (roughly the eighth century CE and before) that directly discourage involvement in politics or other forms of activism, and I will explain the reasoning that underlies this discouragement. I have intentionally selected a broad range of texts from across the period in question—mainstream  and Mahāyāna, narrative and philosophical—to highlight how widespread disengaged ideals were across this context.  
 I stick to this classical South Asian context to avoid losing focus, though disengaged Buddhist ideals extend beyond this context.7 I am not claiming that every Buddhist text from this period is disengaged in the sense I use here. Steven Collins acutely notes two “modes of dhamma” in the Pāli literature, one of which accommodates both politics and violence, and one of which resists them both (Nirvana 419-423). I am deliberately focusing on texts in the latter mode in order to highlight an aspect of classical South Asian Buddhism that has been unjustly neglected in contemporary Buddhist ethical reflection. Still, I hope that the wide variety of texts in this article shows that even if the disengaged tendency is not universal in classical Indian Buddhism, it is nevertheless widespread—widespread enough that a normative definition of Buddhism as socially engaged would bar a wide variety of revered thinkers and texts as not truly Buddhist. 
 I will begin the article by articulating the ways in which engaged Buddhist scholars have so far approached historical Buddhist texts, noting that those approaches take two different forms, though neither form has so far done justice to the positions the texts articulate. Next, I will introduce the classical texts at issue and explain the methodological reasons why the claims of these texts matter. I will then show how these texts reject the idea that social engagement is a duty, and then explain their reasoning. Briefly, they claim that the significant sources of suffer-
                                                                                                                                         
are affiliated with Mahāyāna traditions, most in classical South Asia were not so affiliated.  
7 For example, recently Thanissaro Bhikkhu has constructively made some of the sorts of arguments I describe here as disengaged, with reference to some of the texts cited here. Later in the article we will also see Judith Simmer-Brown speaking of contemporary Buddhist teachers who advocate disengaged Buddhism. 
ing are not the sort that social engagement can address, and that political participation is typically harmful to well-being.  Finally, I will look at the history of engaged Buddhism to explore why disengaged Buddhism has so far been generally ignored.  
 
Engaged Buddhist Scholarship and the Buddhist Past 

The movement of engaged Buddhism is well-studied, in part because it includes many religion scholars among its members. They have offered a variety of definitions of engaged Buddhism, though not necessarily precise ones. One of them, Christopher Queen, identifies engaged Buddhism in terms of “energetic engagement with social and political issues and crises” (ix). Another term for this “engagement” is activism. Thomas Tweed identifies activism as “the concern to uplift individuals, reform societies, and participate energetically in the political and economic spheres” (xxiv). 
 Sallie King similarly says engaged Buddhism consists of Buddhists who “engage with the problems of their society—inclusive of political, social, economic, racial, gender, environmental, and other problems—on the basis of their Buddhist worldview, values, and spirituality” (“Problems” 166). Not explicitly included on this list are psychological or spiritual problems of craving, anger, and ignorance. A call for papers for a 2000 conference on engaged Buddhism (published in JBE vol. 7) made that exclusion explicit, stating that engaged Buddhism is 
[c]haracterized by a reorientation of Buddhist soteriology and ethics to identify and address sources of human suffering outside of the cravings and ignorance of the sufferer—such as social, political, and economic injustice, warfare, and violence, and environmental degradation. (qtd. in Jenkins 2000) 
 The political element of engaged Buddhism is particularly important. We may note first that all three definitions just quoted include the term “political.” I have not yet seen an engaged Buddhist article that defines “political,” but they seem to be in line with the definition proposed by the political scientist Matthew Moore in his examination of Buddhist political theory, as having to do with government:  
I understand government to be the processes and institutions either authorized to make or effectively capable of making binding decisions for a geographically bounded population, including the power to enforce those decisions coercively. Politics, more broadly, is the set of practices and institutions that are concerned with the operation, staffing, maintenance, and possible modification of government, including the extreme of wanting to abolish government altogether or at least radically change it. (8990) 
 Thomas Freeman Yarnall’s examples of social engagement— ”voting, lobbying, peaceful protest, civil disobedience, and so forth” (1)— are all political in this sense, of practices involved with government. Likewise, in looking for a historical exemplar or precursor of engaged Buddhism, many scholars turn to the figure of Aśoka/Asoka, the thirdcentury (BCE) emperor who united most of the Indian subcontinent under his rule. Joanna Macy, for example, proclaims:  
One of the great heroes of Buddhist tradition is King Asoka, who in his devotion to Dharma built hospitals and public wells and tree-lined roads for the ‘welfare of all beings.’ Historians recognize his efforts in the third century B.C.E. as the first public social service program in recorded history. (173)  
 The reasons that engaged Buddhist ethics urges activism vary, but they typically involve a conviction that ethical action requires the sort of systemic change that government can provide. As Main and Lai describe it, socially engaged reasoning recognizes action as moral only when it changes the nature of the social relations and situations that cause the other to experience pain, privation, and exclusion. From early in the twentieth century, this has meant systematic solutions and broad reform to properly address social problems. (24) 
It is conceptually crucial to distinguish social and political engagement, in this sense of activism, from other different phenomena which are sometimes confused with it. First, as Queen (14-17) rightly notes, engagement is not at all the same thing as altruism, kindness, or compassion.  Karuṇā and maitrī are praised throughout the Indian Buddhist world, and they are particularly important for Mahāyāna Buddhists. Mahāyāna Buddhists like Śāntideva take altruistic action as an essential part of the good life. But for several important Mahāyāna Buddhists, neither karuṇā nor maitrī nor altruism implies social or political activism at all. We will see, indeed, that Śāntideva and Candrakīrti explicitly reject political engagement while nevertheless singing the praises of compassion and altruism. For them altruism and political engagement are entirely different from each other. 
 Nor is engagement identical with “living in the world,” with a life within saṃsāra that rejects the detachment of the forest monk. Contra Thich Nhat Hanh,10 living with one’s family as a Buddhist is not sufficient to make one an engaged Buddhist, if the term “engaged Buddhism” is to mean anything of significance at all. Classical texts on a householder’s conduct, like the Sigālovāda Sutta, do not indicate that a householder should address issues “inclusive of political, social, economic, racial, gender, environmental, and other problems.” They do not advocate political activism or systemic change, and so should not count as engaged Buddhism. Likewise, the altruism of Śāntideva and Candrakīrti requires them to engage with other people in society, but that engagement may well take the form of recommending those others reject political involvement. 
 Engaged Buddhist scholars often claim that engagement with social and political problems (“outside of the cravings and ignorance of the 
                                                                                                                                         
ing the kind of political activism for systemic change pursued by engaged Buddhists. As we will see, in many respects they oppose it. 
10 In a 1989 lecture at First Unitarian Church in Houston, Texas, Nhat Hanh said “Engaged Buddhism is just Buddhism. If you practice Buddhism in your family, in society, it is engaged Buddhism” (White). Like the earlier “Buddhism is already engaged” quotation, this quotation is often quoted without the original source, although in this case I was able to track it down.  
sufferer”) is a duty, an obligation. Kenneth Kraft closes the Engaged Buddhism in the West collection with these words:  
How best to respond to the plight of the world? The twenty authors of this book concur unanimously on the first part of the answer:  We must be engaged. (506) 
 Those last four words get their own paragraph, to emphasize the idea that social engagement is a duty, a necessity, something we must do. Engaged Buddhist writers often believe that something is wrong or lacking with people or traditions who are not engaged in the ways specified.  
 The major point of disagreement among Western engaged Buddhist scholars is about the extent to which the Buddhist past fits that description, of lacking a proper degree of engagement. It is a matter of some controversy among engaged Buddhist scholars whether engaged Buddhism, in fact, amounts to a reorientation of Buddhist ethics, as the 2000 call for papers had proclaimed, or whether it was always present. 
 Yarnall helpfully distinguishes between two major orientations on this latter question. He refers to these as “traditionist” and “modernist.” I agree with his assessment that these terms are not ideal, but they do serve present purposes, so I adopt them rather than attempting to coin further neologisms. 
 “Modernist” writers, in Yarnall’s sense, emphasize the discontinuity of engaged Buddhism with the Asian Buddhist past. They assert that Buddhists in the past were not socially active, but they rarely treat that disengaged past as an intellectual opponent worthy of response and refutation. More commonly, they speak of that past as if it were an unwitting lack, a primitive stage that Buddhists would have progressed beyond if they’d just thought about it enough. Gary Snyder argues that “Historically, Buddhist philosophers have failed to analyze out the degree to which ignorance and suffering are caused or encouraged by social factors, considering fear-and-desire to be given facts of the human condition” (Snyder 82). Sallie King says that a concern for individual spiritual growth “has tended, especially in some sects like Zen, to retard the development of an attitude that more energetically embraces social activism as a good thing” (King, “Social Engagement” 167). George Tanabe similarly identifies traditional Buddhist philosophy’s refusal to engage with political concerns as a sign of premodern Buddhism’s lack of advancement:  
Whereas Buddhists throughout the ages have been involved with society, their development of a social and political philosophy has not been as advanced as their teachings on inner spirituality. Engaged Buddhism arises from and responds to this vacuum . . . (Editor’s preface to King, Benevolence, ix; emphases added to all quotes) 
 By contrast “traditionists,” like Yarnall, often see modernist ideas of “advancement” beyond a “vacuum” as disrespectful to the existing Asian Buddhist past. However, not only do the traditionists give disengaged Buddhism no intellectual consideration, they deny that it was widespread or even that it existed. So Yarnall says his traditionist “group of scholars maintains that Buddhists have never accepted a dualistic split between ‘spiritual’ and ‘social’ domains. To engage in the spiritual life necessarily includes (though it cannot be reduced to) social engagement” (4; emphasis added). 
 Traditionist scholars often cite textual evidence from classical Indian Buddhism to support their position. Stephen Jenkins argues that in traditional texts, “in order to create the conditions necessary for benefiting people spiritually, one must first attend to their material needs.” He claims that in the Cakkavatti-Sīhanāda Sutta, “Material well-being is a prerequisite for moral development, and its absence leads to social disaster.” Likewise, Joanna Macy invokes Bodhicaryāvatāra chapter VIII’s famous arguments for altruism in order to claim that Śāntideva “saw service to others as the path leading to enlightenment . . .” (Macy 173) 
 I dispute both the traditionist and modernist engaged interpretations of classical Indian Buddhism. Against the traditionists, rejections of social and political activity were widespread among Indian Buddhist thinkers, including in some texts that the traditionists take as examples of engagement. The modernists are an interpretive step up from most traditionists in that they recognize how often premodern Buddhism was disengaged; what they rarely acknowledge is the thoughtful reasoning underlying that disengagement.  
 
Method in Buddhist Ethics 

Engaged Buddhist scholarship occupies both descriptive and normative ground, and I take this to be a good thing. However, such Buddhist normative ethics needs to respond to classical Buddhist claims it disagrees with, such as disengaged Buddhist claims.  
 Kenneth Kraft notes that there is a potential ambiguity in the term “engaged Buddhist studies:” although it can mean simply the study of engaged Buddhism without any commitment to it, it nevertheless also “suggests approaches that incorporate personal religious beliefs, political commitments, or other forms of involvement” (79). It is easy to see that engaged Buddhist scholarship in practice takes such normative approaches frequently. Kraft’s own “we must be engaged” is an obvious example. Sallie King, likewise, often claims in her works that they are written “from the perspective of engaged Buddhism” (“Social Engagement” 179n3; “Response” 638). Even the works of King’s that do not explicitly proclaim a normative perspective nevertheless implicitly take it up, such as when she proclaims that “it is easy to take expressions of contempt and acts of violence as criteria for discerning what is not a valid expression of the Dharma” and uses explicitly normative language of “at best” and “at worst” to describe various forms of Buddhist political expression (Socially 25-26). Franz-Johannes Litsch introduces a description of German engaged Buddhism by proclaiming: “To practice engaged Buddhism is to unlock the deepest potential of persons, to serve others, and to become enlightened” (423). Brian Victoria (“Skeleton” 72) proclaims that “I personally am a strong supporter of this movement” (i.e. engaged Buddhism). Acknowledging his status as a fully ordained Zen priest (Zen xiii), he then declares it a “glaring deficiency” of his second edition that it “fails to address the question of how Japanese institutional Buddhism, most especially Zen, can be restored to its rightful place as an authentic expression of the Buddha Dharma” (Zen 232). These examples of engaged Buddhist scholars’ normative commitments could easily be extended. 
 Importantly, Kraft says of this ambiguity in “engaged Buddhist studies” that “perhaps it is a welcome one” (79). I agree with Kraft on this point. When done well, normative engaged Buddhist scholarship can help to fill the unfortunate “void” identified by José Cabezón (27) “in the triangle between a) purely descriptive philology, b) uncritical traditionalism and c) uncritical popular literature.”  
 Such a void is created when Buddhist or other theological or constructive concerns are considered to have no place in scholarship. David Chappell (371), for example, recommends that his conclusions’ “validity and usefulness now need to be measured by trying to apply them as a guide for various ethical decisions. But perhaps this is a task for Buddhists rather than scholars”—as if somehow one could not be both. When one assumes that scholarship is not Buddhist and Buddhism is not scholarly, one limits and deprives both of them.  
 Chappell makes no argument for this separation of Buddhism from scholarship; in my experience, such a separation is typically more assumed than argued. There have been some scholars of religion who have argued for it, most notably Donald Wiebe. Wiebe argues that university scholarship must be “scientific,” which in his view requires a commitment to “description, analysis and explanation” alone, not hermeneutic interpretation or the dissemination of social or cultural values. (95) But such a criterion would rule out not only the entire discipline of philosophy, but the normative dimensions of political theory and of fields like gender studies, literature, and art. Wiebe frequently attacks “humanists” (112-113, 281, 286), so he seems to accept this implication; but it seems unlikely to me that Chappell and most others who would make such claims in Buddhist ethics are willing to do so.  
 Nor should they. The separation of “scholars” from “Buddhists” leaves no room for scholars to do Buddhist ethics, only to study other people’s Buddhist ethical beliefs. If Buddhist ethical scholarship were to be limited in that way, it would be analogous to limiting biologists to the study of other people’s beliefs about biology without their ever making any biological claims of their own. The scholarly field of Buddhist ethics needs to include normative ethical work. Yet typically scholars have been too timid to include it; thus, even when Damien Keown expresses the genuine need for Buddhist ethics to move “beyond simple descriptive ethics,” he still moves only to a descriptive meta-ethics, explicitly avoiding normative ethics (3, 6). Keown’s approach is striking since the study of ethics, from Aristotle’s coining of the term onward, has been an overwhelmingly normative discipline—as one would expect, since, for most people studying ethics over the centuries, normatively identifying how human beings should live has been the point.  
 It is, then, an enormous virtue of the field of engaged Buddhist studies that it has often avoided such an impoverished, merely descriptive, view of Buddhist ethics: engaged Buddhist studies has aimed to articulate what is good and bad for us Buddhists to do, not merely what others have said about the topic; and it has done so within a scholarly context.  
 What engaged Buddhist ethics has not yet had is sufficient rigor in defending its constructive ethical claims—a task central to making any claims that one makes as a scholar. A key difference between biology and Buddhist ethics is that, in the latter, descriptive historical and sociological claims are directly relevant to constructive and normative claims. Most engaged Buddhist scholars make normative inferences from some 
Buddhist texts; they agree that the question of whether the texts or the Buddha said something is relevant to whether it is true or should be adopted. But once one agrees with that premise, then one must take seriously the claims of those other Buddhist texts that disagree. Many engaged Buddhists would take texts addressed in this article as canonical; indeed, some of them, such as the Cakkavatti-Sīhanāda Sutta and Śāntideva’s Bodhicaryāvatāra, are among the very texts that engaged Buddhist scholars typically quote. Therefore, it is critical for engaged Buddhist scholars to confront the disengaged arguments made in those texts, as to date they have not. As Cabezón notes, the norms of scholarly humanistic discourse require “breadth of analysis,” which  implies that no source will be dismissed in an ad hoc manner. I take such a commitment to imply a willingness to grapple with what, from a contemporary perspective, 
might be considered the most problematic and anachronistic portions of the tradition. (35) 
 Brian Victoria’s Zen at War and the recent works of Stephen Jenkins (“On the Auspiciousness,” “Making Merit”) have been exemplary in this regard. Victoria and Jenkins have shown how wide swaths of Buddhist tradition have argued for violence and war in the name of the dharma. They have done an excellent job of bringing engaged Buddhists face-to-face with parts of the tradition (including revered texts and thinkers) that argue for a politics contrary to contemporary engaged Buddhist scholars’ ideals. Considerably less “grappling” has so far occurred with those elements of Buddhist tradition that contradict contemporary engaged Buddhists in urging their audiences not to participate in politics at all.  
 In the sections to follow, I will show the claims of these disengaged Buddhists using an intentionally wide variety of classical Indian Buddhist texts. The earliest texts at issue here come from the Pāli Canon (Tipiṭaka), a collection dating from the first Buddhist millennium and still held sacred by contemporary Theravāda Buddhists. The Pāli texts cited here include several suttas (discourses of the Buddha) and the Mūgapakkha Jātaka, one of the Ten Great Jātakas (the stories of the Buddha’s ten last births before his final birth as Gotama Buddha).  
 I also include Aśvaghoṣa’s Buddhacarita (Acts of the Buddha, abbreviated BC), a famous Sanskrit courtly poem (kāvya) from approximately the first century CE, which recounts the Buddha’s life story and is considered authoritative in China as well as India (Li). To demonstrate that the disengaged Buddhist approach is found in Mahāyāna as well as mainstream (“Hīnayāna”) sources, I also refer to the seventh- and eighth-century Mahāyāna Madhyamaka philosophers Śāntideva and Candrakīrti. On the latter I refer specifically to Śāntideva’s two major works, the Bodhicaryāvatāra (BCA) and Śikṣāsamuccaya (ŚS), and to Candrakīrti’s Catuḥśatakaṭīkā (CŚṬ), a commentary on the Catuḥśataka (CŚ) verses by the earlier Madhyamaka philosopher Āryadeva. These Madhyamaka works were all composed in Sanskrit, though the CŚ/CŚṬ is now only extant in Tibetan.  
Is Engagement a Duty? 
Against Yarnall’s claim that “the spiritual path necessarily includes . . . social engagement” or Kraft’s claim that “we must be engaged,” several classical Indian texts explicitly reject involvement with social and political issues. Let us first consider first the figure of the cakravartin (in Sanskrit, cakkavatti in Pāli), the ideal “wheel-turning” ruler. When a cakravartin is the head of state, many classical texts claim, his society is uplifted tremendously for the better. The Lakkhana Sutta proclaims that his polity will be “a land open, uninfested by brigands, free from jungle, powerful, prosperous, happy and free from perils” (DN III.146). He even has the power to “end all strife” (DN III.173). The act of becoming a cakravartin enables one to create a world where social systems are perfected, idyllic. 
 Becoming a cakravartin is something that every buddha is capable of doing—and yet every buddha decides not to do it. The Pāli texts repeatedly proclaim that a great person (mahāpurisa) has only two options: to be a cakravartin, or to be a buddha.  Several texts praise the buddhas for declining the former option and selecting the latter. They have the option of not merely improving, but effectively perfecting, society—and they decline it.  
  The Mahāpadāna Sutta (DN II.16-30) tells the story of Vipassī, a prince of an age long before ours. A prophecy informed Vipassī’s father, the king, that only two options were open to his son: to become either a cakravartin or a buddha. The king was excited that his son could make the kingdom flourish and afraid that the son would leave him to be a monk, so he built luxurious palaces full of sensual pleasures to keep Vipassī around, hooked on the delights kingship had to offer. But soon enough the prince left the palace to see the outside world, and saw what later tradition would immortalize as the “Four Sights.” That is, he saw an old man, a sick man, and a dead man, and realized that all these fates awaited him in the end, even as a king. On his fourth trip out, he saw a monk. He immediately recognized the monk’s path as a better one, a way beyond the clinging that characterizes the ruler’s life, and he explicitly chose that life as one better than political rulership. 
 Later sources tell a similar story about Siddhārtha or Gotama Buddha, the buddha of our age. Aśvaghoṣa makes it the central drama in his story of the Buddha’s life. First Siddhārtha’s father, the king, tells him that his dharma, his duty, is to remain in the family and be a king (BC V.32); then the family priest (purohita) tells him to abandon his idea of monkhood for the sake of dharma (dharmārtham) (BC IX.15). But the Buddha-to-be rejects their claims in both cases, specifically responding by saying “a kingdom thus provides neither dharma nor joy” (BC IX.42). We might think that the king’s main reason for telling his son to be a king was his familial love rather than a desire to make the kingdom prosper, but later in the text the Buddha-to-be encounters a different king (Śreṇya, the king of Rājagṛha ) who offers his own kingdom if the hero will not accept his father’s. He pleads for Siddhārtha to become king because he will create great prosperity: “association with the virtuous makes the virtuous prosper” (BC X.26). But Siddhārtha turns Śreṇya down too.  
 The Rajja Sutta  (SN I.116-117) goes yet further. Here, even to rule according to dharma (dhammena) is presented to the Buddha as a temptation from Māra, the evil tempter figure. As the Buddha comes closer to awakening, he wonders: “Is it possible to exercise rulership righteously [dhammena]: without killing and without instigating others to kill, without confiscating and without instigating others to confiscate, without sorrowing and without causing sorrow?” Māra replies that he can and should indeed rule righteously. But the Buddha, of course, refuses this temptation, and proceeds instead on the monastic path.  
 Classical Buddhists texts do not merely claim that buddhahood is such a lofty goal that it exceeds the goods a cakravartin could provide, or that only a monk should reject the path of the ruler. In the Gilāna Sutta (SN IV.302-304), the highly regarded householder disciple Citta is sick and about to die, and the gods ask him to vow that he will become a cakravartin. But he turns them down, saying: “That too is impermanent; that too is unstable; one must abandon that too and pass on.” Citta is not a bodhisattva or aspiring to be a buddha; he is simply aiming at arhatship, the lower kind of awakening possible for a normal person. But even that is a greater goal than being a ruler who will bring general prosperity and flourishing to his society.  
 Nor is it merely rulership per se that the texts reject. The Tiracchāna Kathā Sutta rejects even talking about social problems and institutions: “Do not engage in the various kinds of pointless talk: that is, talk about kings, thieves, and ministers of state; talk about armies, dangers and wars . . . talk about relations, vehicles, villages, towns, cities, and countries . . . .” (SN V.419) 
 So far, I have cited only mainstream (non-Mahāyāna) texts. One might imagine that the thoroughgoing altruism of the Mahāyāna would demand political engagement for the benefit of the world. But Śāntideva, one of the greatest Mahāyāna ethical thinkers, lists learning about law and politics (daṇḍanīti śāstra) among the kinds of learning that are fruitless, against liberation, and leading to delusion, which should therefore be avoided by bodhisattvas (ŚS 192). When he offers advice to kings, the advice is that they give their kingdoms away (ŚS 27). Nor does the alleviation of poverty take high priority in his work, as he asks: “If the perfection of generosity consists in making the universe free from poverty, how can previous Protectors [buddhas] have acquired it, when the world is still poor, even today?” (BCA V.9). Candrakīrti, too, quotes and comments approvingly on a verse that a “sensible person does not acquire a kingdom” (CŚ IV.13).  
 It should be clear, then, that a wide range of classical Indian Buddhist texts look with suspicion on, or even actively reject, engagement with social and political problems. The next three sections will explain their reasons for doing so.  
 
Arguments Against Engagement: Where Does Suffering Come From? 
Why do many Indian Buddhist texts reject engagement? First, they reject the idea that social problems such as war or poverty are significant causes of suffering (dukkha), when that suffering is properly understood. The Second Noble Truth states that the origin of suffering is craving; disengaged texts typically agree that the causes of suffering are primarily or entirely within the sufferer’s mind. To the extent that these texts identify causes of suffering beyond the sufferer’s mind, they are inevitabilities of life from which no amount of privilege will allow escape, such as old age, illness, and death. For that reason, they claim, attention to social problems is a distraction at best. So, the Tiracchāna Kathā Sutta explains why one should abstain from talk of society and its problems: “Because, monks, this talk is unbeneficial, irrelevant to the fundamentals of the holy life, and does not lead to revulsion, to dispassion, to cessation, to peace, to direct knowledge, to enlightenment, to Nibbāna” (SN V.420). 
 For Aśvaghoṣa, when Siddhārtha’s father begs him not to become a monk, he says that he will agree on four conditions: “My life shall never be subject to death, disease shall not steal this good health of mine, old age shall never overtake my youth, no mishap shall rob this fortune of mine.” Of course, the king cannot make such a guarantee, and he allows his son to leave. Becoming a ruler will not help Siddhārtha fix the real problems of life (BC V.32-35).  
 In the Rajja Sutta, Māra notes the Buddha is so powerful he could create great prosperity, sufficient to turn the Himalayas to gold. But the Buddha refuses, noting that any wealth always leaves one wanting more: “If there were a mountain made of gold, Made entirely of solid gold, Not double this would suffice for one . . .” (SN I.116-117). 
 Śāntideva, as is well known, takes the well-being of others as his first priority. That he is an altruistic thinker, concerned with others’ well-being, is not in dispute. And yet, as we saw clearly in the previous section, he still explicitly rejects social and political engagement. Why? Because that social engagement does not actually remedy the real causes of suffering. For him as for the non-Mahāyāna thinkers, the real causes of suffering are mental: “all fears and immeasurable sufferings arise from the mind alone” (BCA V.6). Furthermore, the things of this world are unworthy of our attention because they are metaphysically empty. (See Lele “Metaphysical” 273-277.) They will not get us out of suffering; they may even trap us there further. (See Lele, “Revaluation” 98-100 and 124-28 for a detailed discussion of Śāntideva’s reasoning.)  
 For Śāntideva, as a consequence of all these points, the way one can best benefit others is to help them learn to follow the bodhisattva path, not to alleviate any social problems they might be facing. Jenkins disputes this interpretation of Śāntideva, noting correctly that on occasion Śāntideva does say the bodhisattva gives to the poor (ŚS 274, for example). But as I have argued elsewhere (Lele, “The Compassionate”), for Śāntideva the primary purpose of the bodhisattva’s compassionate giftgiving is to make the recipient better disposed to receive the teaching.  The bodhisattva gives to the rich as well as the poor; the recipient, rich or poor, receives no real material benefit from the gift.  
 It is a common mistake in discussions of Mahāyāna to miss this point: they assume that Śāntideva’s concern for others must necessarily imply social or political engagement, even though (as we saw in the previous section) he explicitly rejects it on multiple occasions. So, while King is correct to note that Śāntideva’s meditations on self and other are designed to lead us to compassionate action, she is wrong to equate compassionate action with social action (“Social Engagement,” 164). And while Macy is correct, strictly speaking, to say that Śāntideva “saw service to others as the path leading to enlightenment,” she is not correct to identify that service with social service, or to segue as she does into the Sri Lankan reformer A. T. Ariyaratne and his movement to build “repaired roads, de-silted irrigation canals, nutrition programs, and schools” (Macy 174-175). For Śāntideva, such an approach does not provide the benefits that people really need. To Macy he might reply: “Our duty to others is to save them from the suffering their own cravings inflict on themselves. It helps to give them material goods, but not because possessing the goods helps prevent their suffering; instead because the goods allow them to listen to the message that wealth and poverty are not what really matters.”  
 
The Cakkavatti-Sīhanāda Sutta: Detachment from the Passage of Time 

The Cakkavatti-Sīhanāda Sutta (Discourse on the Lion’s Roar of the Cakravartin) makes for a particularly helpful case study in disengaged Buddhism because engaged Buddhist scholars often take it as a key text advocating the reform and uplift of society. A reading of the discourse in context, however, shows that it actually advocates social disengagement. This sutta begins with the Buddha exhorting monks as follows:  
Monks, be islands unto yourselves, be a refuge unto yourselves with no other refuge. Let the Dhamma be your island, let the Dhamma be your refuge, with no other refuge . . . . Keep to your own preserves, monks, to your ancestral haunts. If you do so, then Māra will find no lodgement, no foothold. It is just by the building-up of wholesome states that this merit increases. (DN III.58)  
 The Buddha adds that one can put this advice into practice by mindfully contemplating body, mind, feelings and dhammas. He then tells a story that extends from the past into the future, which takes up the bulk of the text. 
 The story goes as follows. Once upon a time, the Buddha says, a cakravartin ruled a flourishing kingdom where people lived for eighty thousand years. His descendant mostly ruled well but neglected to give to the needy, so the kingdom became poorer, and criminal violence ensued. Once the decline began, the sutta continues, people began to take worse and worse actions, and as they did so, lives got worse and lifespans continued to decrease further (typically by about half each time), until “the children of those whose life-span had been two and a half centuries lived for only a hundred years” (DN III.59-71). 
 At this point the story’s past tense gives way to the future: “Monks, a time will come when the children of these people will have a life-span of ten years.” This future time is dystopian in multiple ways: families will be torn apart by hatred, even murder; even food with tasty flavours will disappear. But one desperate group of people will come together and say “It is only because we became addicted to evil ways that we suffered this loss of our kindred, so let us now do good! What good things can we do? Let us abstain from the taking of life—that will be a good practice” (DN III.73). This abstinence will start to give them a more beautiful appearance; lifespans will soon increase back to twenty years. So the group will learn to refrain from other sorts of bad actions. As a result, lifespans will continue to move back upward until they again reach eighty thousand years and a new cakravartin will arise, as will the future buddha Metteyya (Maitreya).  
 From that point the text returns to the original frame, exhorting the monks to “be islands unto yourselves, be a refuge unto yourselves, with no other refuge,” to enter states of meditative concentration (jhāna), and to take the dhamma as their refuge (DN III.73-79). 
 Some readers have perceived a tension between the embedded past-future narrative and the solitary exhortations that frame it at the beginning and end. Mavis Fenn, for example, claims that “the effect of the frame tale on the embedded story is to undermine the strong sociopolitical thrust of the embedded story” (104). Richard Gombrich goes considerably further, proclaiming that  
the myth is set in an inappropriate frame. Most of the Buddha’s sermons are presented as preached in answer to a question or in some other appropriate context; but this one has a beginning and an ending in which the Buddha is talking to monks about something totally different. Either the whole text is apocryphal or at least it has been tampered with. (85-86) 
 It is noteworthy that Gombrich says nothing about what is actually in the beginning and ending—namely the exhortations to be islands unto themselves and take the dharma as their refuge—nor why he takes them to be “totally different.” Perhaps he is agreeing with Fenn and Jenkins that the embedded story has a “strong socio-political thrust” (as the frame story does not). But does it?  
 Steven Collins provides a reading of the Cakkavatti-Sīhanāda that does far more justice to the text’s features. Collins notes that there are several phrasings that occur in both the frame story and the embedded story, suggesting the same author was at work in both. We cannot know for sure whether the Cakkavatti is a composite text or not, but even if it were a composite text, there was a redactor who tried to give it unity, and it is that redactor’s version that we have. So, we have textual reason to attempt to read the story as a consistent work (Nirvana 491-492). For his part, Gombrich recognizes “The Theravādin tradition itself, however, does not doubt that the text is authentic . . .” (85-86). 
 Collins argues that the purpose of the whole Cakkavatti is “to induce in its audiences—or at least to make possible as a reaction from some among them—a sense of detachment from, or at least a (briefly) noninvolved perspective on the passage of time.” The embedded story gives “narrative form” to a “sense of the futility of temporal goods . . .” (Nirvana 481). That is, the embedded story—taken as a whole, rather than taking the passage about poverty and crime in isolation—serves to show that good and bad social systems will come and go, and they will get worse before they get better. So the narrative provides a reason why the text’s audience should build personal virtue and embrace the dharma, rather than placing its hope in those social systems or any idea of progress therein.  Read in this way, the message of the frame and embedded stories is entirely consistent—but to the extent that either can be seen as having a “strong socio-political thrust,” that thrust turns out to be a disengagement from society and politics. 
 Earlier I noted Stephen Jenkins’s claim that the embedded story shows “Material well-being is a prerequisite for moral development, and its absence leads to social disaster.” He argues this because it is the king’s failure to provide for the poor that causes theft and creates the downward cycle. But the later sections of the embedded story themselves show that material well-being is not a prerequisite for moral development: beings come together and improve themselves by learning to refrain from bad actions amid fantastically bad material conditions. Rather, that moral improvement is what ultimately makes the material conditions better. The frame story prepares the audience to be able to improve morally even in such a dire situation. To do so, the text says, audience members can and should disengage from society: keep to their own preserves, be islands unto themselves. Then they will no longer be dependent on social conditions for their well-being.  
 When placed in the context of this sutta, the aforementioned prophecy that a buddha can choose to be a cakravartin, but does not do so, is particularly striking. If the Buddha of our era had decided to become a cakravartin instead of a buddha, he could have stopped the downward spiral and taken us to a better era. But he did not do so. Finding the path to liberation was so important that it was worth allowing the disastrous future where lifespans are a mere ten years. 
 
Arguments Against Engagement: The Harshness of Politics 

Let us turn now to politics and government, an area that, as we saw, plays a major role in engaged Buddhists’ engagement. Many classical Indian Buddhist texts reject the activity of governing because they view it as inimical to advancement on the Buddhist path because of the kinds of acts and mental states that governing requires. This is not to say the texts are anarchistic. Governing is a necessary evil—but it is no less evil for being necessary. One will be better off, progress further on the path, if one can avoid engaging in the processes of government.  
 The Aggañña Sutta’s brief section on the kingly (khattiya, equivalent to kṣatriya) caste has become renowned for expressing a “social contract” theory of government. (See Collins, “Discourse” 387-389.) That is, once people first begin to steal and do other bad things, other people decide together that if someone takes on the job of punishing these wrongdoers, they will reward him with a portion of rice, and the sutta presents this as the origin of government.  What is less frequently noted is that the text explicitly proclaims that accusation, punishment, and banishment are bad (pāpaka, akusala), just as the original thefts are (DN III.93). Their role in maintaining society does not stop them from creating bad karma and interfering with one’s progress to nirvana.  
 Likewise, in the Mūgapakkha Jātaka, the Bodhisatta (buddha-tobe)  is born as a prince whose father rules according to dharma (dhammena). Yet even so, when the Bodhisatta sees his father punishing criminals, he thinks: “Ah! my father through his being a king, is becoming guilty of a grievous action which brings men to hell” (Ja VI.3, emphasis added). So, the prince pretends to be deaf and mute in order to get out of the burden of rulership—so concerned to avoid it that he resorts to deception. 
 Aśvaghoṣa’s Buddhacarita makes this point as well. The family priest (purohita) tells Siddhārtha that he will fulfill dharma better as a king than a renouncer (BC IX.15-17). Siddhārtha responds that kingship is dangerous and interferes with liberation because of the harshness or fierceness (taikṣṇya) that it requires: 
As for the scripture that householder kings have attained release, that cannot be! The dharma of release [mokṣadharma], where calm prevails, and the dharma of kings [rājadharma], where force prevails—how far apart are they!19 If a king delights in calm, his realm [rājya] falls apart, if his mind is on his realm, his calm is destroyed; for calmness and fierceness [taikṣṇya] are incompatible, like the union of fire and water, heat and cold. (BC IX.48-50) 
 Notice here the dramatic contrast to the claim of Yarnall’s traditionists, noted earlier, that “Buddhists have never accepted a dualistic split between ‘spiritual’ and ‘social’ domains.” In the Buddhacarita, a major Buddhist author not only makes an explicit distinction between the domains of mokṣa and of rājya, he claims that the mental states they involve are incompatible. Perhaps there were some classical Buddhists who did not accept such a split, but Aśvaghoṣa was not among them. So, likewise, the idea of engagement as a duty is explicitly rejected: the kings tell the buddha-to-be that dharma requires his political involvement, and he says no. Indeed, the higher Buddhist dharma of liberation requires the exact opposite.  
 These are mainstream (non-Mahāyāna) thinkers. One might think that since governing produces a more functional society, the more altruistic Mahāyāna thinkers might see governing as a necessary selfsacrifice, such that the ruler should sacrifice his own well-being for the sake of a better society. But this is not the case.  
 We saw earlier how Candrakīrti says a sensible person does not become a king. For Candrakīrti, the most important reason for this decision is the harshness in which a king must engage to maintain order: “he cannot reign without oppressing the people” (commentary on CŚ IV.24). For him, that punishment is a necessary evil does not make it any less of an evil. Introducing CŚ IV.10, he entertains the objection that “If the king punishes evil people in order to protect his people, he accumulates no bad karma [sdig pa]  because he benefits the good people.” The objector wants to make the utilitarian claim that the net benefit of punishment makes it a karmically good act. But to this objection Candrakīrti says no:  
The king believes that punishment is his job and that there is nothing nonvirtuous about it. In this way, reasons that are satisfying are created. But the bad karma of these actions is not destroyed. It is just the same for the king. Since the king mostly engages in karmically bad actions, he will experience the maturation of that bad karma in bad rebirths.  
 
Western Engaged Buddhist Presuppositions 

The disengaged Buddhist texts we have considered—the Mūgapakkha 
Jātaka, the works of Aśvaghoṣa, Śāntideva and Candrakīrti, and various Pāli suttas—are at odds with claims of both “traditionist” and “modernist” engaged Buddhists. Against the traditionists, we have seen that South Asian Buddhists not only made an explicit separation between liberation and socio-political domains but thought that the two were in direct opposition to each other. Against modernists we have seen that, far from constituting a “failure” or a lack of development, these Buddhists had plausible, considered reasons to oppose social and political engagement. The texts in question are hardly obscure; the Ten Great Jātakas and the works of Śāntideva are among the most beloved works in contemporary Theravāda and Tibetan traditions respectively. The widespread nature of disengaged Buddhism in classical South Asia should have been easy to see.  
 Yet somehow many Western engaged Buddhist scholars have, indeed, failed to see it. This failure is despite the fact that some Western scholars have observed Buddhist anti-political tendencies for a long time. While Max Weber’s (206) depiction of Buddhism as a “specifically unpolitical and anti-political status religion” was in important respects exaggerated, it captures the ideas we have encountered here far better than many engaged Buddhist scholars have.  
 Sometimes disengaged Buddhism is not even unseen so much as intentionally ignored. Consider Judith Simmer-Brown’s description of the group that would become the Buddhist Peace Fellowship. The implications of this passage are striking enough to merit a close reading. 
Simmer-Brown says this group  was concerned that Buddhist practice centers and groups had become entirely removed from the social and political issues of the day: some teachers and organizations were even actively discouraging political involvement. The Maui group envisioned an organization which would attract a wide range of Buddhists, fomenting political discussion and action. Something had to be done, and specifically something political needed to be done by Buddhists. “Anyone, feeling compassion, seeing no boundary between self and others, would feel compelled to do something,” observed Nelson Foster, reflecting on the occasion. (69) 
 In this passage, Simmer-Brown describes the teachers’ discouragement of political involvement with “even,” strongly suggesting that she finds this discouragement surprising, unexpected, or extreme. Does Simmer-Brown then react as one would expect a scholar would react to a surprising or unexpected development, by probing further and exploring the reasons for it? No. Simmer-Brown does not deem the teachers’ objections relevant enough to be worthy of any recognition, regard, or consideration beyond this half-sentence. Nothing further is said about them, not even their names.  
 Instead, Simmer-Brown proceeds with the story of what the group did in apparent defiance of its teachers, by saying something had to be done. This “had to” is a claim of normative necessity, like Kraft’s “We must be engaged.” As I’ve argued above, it is a good thing that engaged Buddhist scholars make normative claims. However, they also need to justify them, and Simmer-Brown does nothing of the sort. The teachers, after all, were explicitly saying that something did not “have to” be done. If they were right, the claim that “Something had to be done”—a premise that underlies the laudatory tone of Simmer-Brown’s overall story—would therefore be wrong, and vice versa. So, from this passage I can only infer that she thinks it obvious that these teachers were wrong, and that she believes her audience will share this sentiment. She thinks, that is, that her audience will take it as obvious that this group “had to” disregard the advice of its own teachers, so much so that there is no need to discuss their reasons in a story constituted by the actions the group took in defiance of those teachers. The teachers’ voices are deemed irrelevant; only the defiance matters. Indeed, since those teachers apparently did not “feel compelled to do something,” Nelson Foster’s claim, approvingly quoted by Simmer-Brown, has the further eye-opening implication that the group’s own teachers were not feeling compassion. Yet even after implying this startling accusation against the group’s teachers, with no evidence provided for it, SimmerBrown still does not deem it relevant to give the teachers a voice or a chance to defend themselves against it.  
 This sort of neglect of disengaged Buddhism—an assumption that political disengagement is obviously bad—itself calls for explanation. A significant part of the problem is that engaged Buddhists have often been blind to their movement’s own history. Consider this additional claim of Foster’s:  
I find no evidence that the emerging [engaged] culture of the American Zen sangha has been forced upon it as a protective adaptation to yet another foreign environment. Rather, the new forms seem to have taken root spontaneously, from within, as teachers and students found them helpful to express realization. After all, the values that have cropped up in the American sangha are hardly those that prevail in the population of the United States. (52) 
 This last sentence is deeply misleading. American engaged Buddhists’ values may be at odds with those that prevail in Alabama or rural Michigan, but they are not easily distinguished from the values of their non-Buddhist fellows in Berkeley and Vermont and Boulder. Indeed, some of the characteristics Foster attributes to engaged Buddhists are stereotypically so, like “recycling, gardening, and organic farming” (52). Such values appear far closer to those of their non-Buddhist neighbors than they do to the values in the classical Buddhist texts we have considered.  
 Foster’s earlier sentences are more misleading still. Far from having “taken root spontaneously,” the values of American engaged Buddhism are fully contiguous with the early reception of Buddhism in the United States. In documenting that early reception, Thomas Tweed has noted the remarkable degree of normative agreement between American Buddhist apologists and their (typically Christian) critics on one key point. That is: “Whether there is a personal creator or a substantial self . . . there still must be optimism and activism” (155, emphasis in original). Notice the exact parallel with Kenneth Kraft’s contemporary claim that “we must be engaged.”  
 Americans and Englishmen of the late nineteenth century shared a great suspicion of Buddhism for its perceived lack of social engagement. Charles Henry Appleton Dall, a Unitarian missionary to India, proclaimed that Buddhism is to be judged by its contributions to society: “What Buddhism has accomplished in the world, that it is.” Dall found it lacking because of its emphasis on renunciation, which left it unable to generate the requisite “energy”  for worldly accomplishment, such that “the properly Buddhist nations of the world are all asleep” (quoted in 
Tweed 144). Henry Melville King, on the executive committee of the American Baptist Missionary Union, claimed that Buddhism promotes a way of life in which the individual is “wholly idle, and to all besides himself absolutely useless” (quoted in Tweed 145). And in the Atlantic in 1894, the mainline Protestant writer William Davies wrote:  
If we make a comparison of Buddhism and Christianity, however great a similarity may appear in some of the elements of its teaching, its distinct inferiority in scope, purpose, and adaptability will become apparent. The religion of the Buddha could never be brought to combine with the advancement and progressive amelioration of society. It works by abandonment, leaving the world every way as it finds it. It lacks the helpful and actively loving spirit of Christianity. (quoted in Tweed 145) 
 Such views took on a particular poignancy in a colonial context, when Buddhists’ Western political rulers took their subjects’ social disengagement as grounds for discouraging Buddhism in favor of an alien tradition. George Bond (124) notes that British officials and Christian missionaries took Buddhism’s “other-worldly” nature “as an argument for promoting Christianity and Christian schools. Since Christianity was identified with Western culture and knowledge, the British praised it as progressive and condemned Buddhism as backward.”  
 It was this context that formed the background for the newfound activism of Anagarika Dharmapala, the Sinhalese reformer in whom Queen (20) says we “first recognize the spirit and substance of the religious activism we call ‘socially engaged Buddhism,’” and whose message, as Bond notes, “profoundly influenced later Buddhist reformers” like A. T. Ariyaratne, the Gandhian sarvodaya social reformer often taken as an inspiration by Western engaged Buddhists. Dharmapala “stressed ‘the constructive optimism’ and fundamental ‘activism’ of authentic Buddhism. ‘Buddhism’, he claimed, ‘teaches an energetic life, to be active in doing good work all the time’” (Tweed 148). Bond agrees that in “advocating a Buddhism of activity and service, Dharmapala was undoubtedly responding to the Western and Christian criticism of Buddhism as too other-worldly”; Dharmapala agreed with his colonial rulers in referring to Sri Lankan monks as “‘indolent’” (124). 
 Dharmapala made these criticisms as what Yarnall would call a traditionist, writing Buddhist activism back into the past. He claimed his “‘indolent’” contemporaries had “‘lost the spirit of heroism and altruism of their ancient examples’” (quoted in Bond 124). H. L. Seneviratne (3132) claims that Dharmapala agreed with the criticisms “that Buddhism is other-worldly and provides no basis for a progressive society, that Buddhism is selfish, and that the Sinhalas are lazy”—but also believed that these criticisms were true “only of the modern-day Sinhalas, not the true Sinhalas of old.”  
 Views like those of Dall, King, Davies and the British rulers of Sri Lanka remain alive and well in the modern West. And they continue to form the present background to contemporary engaged Buddhism, just as they did to the incipient engaged Buddhism of Dharmapala. Stephen Batchelor notes:  
Most Buddhist practitioners have been asked at one time or another—”Why do you go off on these retreats? Isn’t it selfish? Why don’t you go out and do something useful in the world?” Engaged Buddhism is, in a way, counter to that objection. (quoted in Bell 414) 
 Such questions echo the critiques of previous generations of Western anti-Buddhist critics, and engaged Buddhism is a product of that context. Batchelor responds as follows:  
The question is what motivates a person to adopt engaged Buddhism? Is it because they feel they have to somehow justify themselves in the light of Western criticism of Buddhism? Or is it a spontaneous and genuine outflow of their Buddhist practice? (quoted in Bell 414) 
 I submit that the emphasis on “spontaneity,” here as in Foster, is misplaced, at least insofar as it implies a personal attitude independent of historical context. Engaged Buddhism in the West is the product of a long Western history of assuming that activism is a good thing and even an obligation. Western engaged Buddhist scholars, of both “traditionist” and “modernist” varieties, share more in common with the early Western anti-Buddhist critics described above than they might like to think. For clarity, we may phrase those critics’ argument as a deductive categorical syllogism:  
1. Not to engage in social activism is to be deficient. 
2. The tradition of premodern Buddhism generally does not engage in social activism. 
3. Therefore, the tradition of premodern Buddhism is generally deficient. 
This syllogism is valid: if premises 1 and 2 are true, then conclusion 3 must be as well. Naturally, Buddhists will aim to avoid the implication that Buddhism as such is inferior. Traditionists attempt to avoid that implication by rejecting premise 2, in ways that (as we have seen above) typically do interpretive injustice to a significant portion of premodern Indian Buddhist tradition. Modernists reluctantly accept the whole syllogism, instead aiming to build a newer, modern Buddhism about which premise 2 ceases to be true.  
 But the traditionists and the modernists share something not only with each other, but also with Dall, King, Davies and the colonial rulers of Sri Lanka. That is, they all share an endorsement (even if only implicit) of premise 1: there must be something wrong with a tradition that is not activist. To refrain from activism and political involvement would be “selfish” or “indolent,” not “useful.” We must be engaged.  
 It is that premise, so widely shared among pro-Buddhist and antiBuddhist Westerners alike, that the disengaged Buddhists reject. But the premise is taken so much for granted among Westerners that they often refuse to take its rejection seriously, choosing instead to ignore or silence its rejectors. This refusal has existed for a long time; Tweed “found no evidence that any midcentury American who encountered the challenge of Buddhist negation seriously considered abandoning Victorian presuppositions,” including the presupposition that activism is necessary (Tweed 13).  
 Viewed in this light, Yarnall’s militant criticism of “modernist” engaged representations of traditional Buddhism takes on a very different cast. Because modernists treat engaged Buddhism as a new improvement on an Asian failure or vacuum—the approach we have seen in Tanabe and Snyder—Yarnall accuses them of “a subtle form of neocolonial, neo-Orientalist bias” (Yarnall 6). But Yarnall’s grounds for this criticism turn out to apply to his own “traditionist” work at least as much as to theirs.  
 Adapting criticisms of Carl Jung made by Donald Lopez and Luis Gómez, Yarnall claims the modernists create a “neo-colonial economy” because they “judge the raw materials of Buddhism to be valuable, but unusable and even dangerous (or irrelevant) to the modern Westerner in their unrefined form” (Yarnall 33). As his preferred alternative, Yarnall approvingly quotes David Seyfort Ruegg on the need for an analysis that “will not superimpose from the outside extraneous modes of thinking and interpretive grids in a way that sometimes proves to be scarcely distinguishable from a more or less subtle form of neo-colonialism” (Yarnall 76-77). 
 But elsewhere in his piece, to “superimpose from the outside extraneous modes of thinking and interpretive grids” is exactly the agenda that Yarnall calls for. To wit, “Interested scholars (both traditionists as well as open-minded modernists) should now revisit the history of premodern Buddhist Asia with the express purpose of discovering examples of engagement as defined (more or less) by Queen and/or other modernists” (Yarnall 71, emphasis added). That is, he takes a mode of thinking defined in the terms of modernists extraneous to premodern Buddhist Asia, and urges that scholars superimpose that very extraneous mode of thinking on the history of premodern Buddhist Asia when they revisit it. Moreover, he makes both this call and this accusation of neo-colonialism with no more than one passing parenthetical reference to any premodern text.  We should, it would seem, read our own modern Western preferences for social activism and engagement onto premodern Buddhist texts from the outside, irrespective of anything those texts actually happen to say. We can’t allow those texts to advocate political disengagement, because then they would be unusable, and even dangerous or irrelevant. Our extraneous mode of thinking and interpretive grid tells us so.  
 Yarnall, then, apparently misses the irony that he advocates exactly that mode of analysis which he himself has labelled “scarcely distinguishable from a more or less subtle form of neo-colonialism.” I want to emphasize here that I do not myself think that Yarnall’s project, or that of any other engaged Buddhist, is in any way a form of neocolonialism, subtle or otherwise. I take neo-colonialism to be a serious accusation, and one uncalled for by the evidence at hand. As Gadamer reminds us, we all come to inquiry with a set of preexisting presuppositions of some sort or another; that Western engaged Buddhist scholars’ endorsement of activism is Western in origin by no means makes it wrong. One can be justified in one’s views while acknowledging their historical roots; a view does not need to be a “spontaneous” historical anomaly for it to be justified.   
 Rather, I dwell on Yarnall’s accusation of neo-colonialism only because it makes so visible the lack of self-scrutiny among too many engaged Buddhists to date (a lack that an insistence on spontaneity tends to worsen). Yarnall’s article never once considers as a possibility the idea, so widespread in premodern Indian Buddhist texts yet so rarely expressed in the West, that social or political engagement might be a bad thing. Instead he follows the longstanding tradition, with its deep roots in the West, of assuming activism is a good and taking that good for granted; as a result, he assumes that to describe premodern Buddhism as disengaged must be to criticize it. In that lack of introspection his article is typical of the present Western engaged Buddhist literature—and because of it, he inadvertently accuses himself of neo-colonialism! 
 
Responses to Disengaged Buddhism 

It is rare for Western engaged Buddhist scholars to acknowledge that disengaged Buddhists have reasons and arguments for disengagement. But the arguments of disengaged Buddhists have not gone entirely unnoticed by Western engaged Buddhist writers. Hsiao-Lan Hu and Sallie King, in particular, pay them some attention, but not enough. For they do not address the arguments made in the historical sections of this article, as made either by the thinkers I have quoted or by anyone else.  
 Hu’s This-Worldly Buddhism is one of the more systematic expressions to date of an engaged Buddhist ethic. Hu shows admirable clarity about engaging in normative ethics—acknowledging that “I am joining those who engage in critical and constructive Buddhist thinking” (Hu 5). She justifies her points with detailed references to the Pāli suttas, especially the Saṃyutta and Majjhima Nikāyas. Yet the disengaged Rajja, Gilāna, and Tiracchāna Kathā Suttas, which are all in the Saṃyutta, get no mention in the book. The Cakkavatti Sīhanāda appears only for the brief portion of the story where the king’s inattention to poverty causes decline, and not for any of the story’s wider advocacy of disengagement. She cites the Aggañña approvingly on greed creating a need for punishment (Hu 112), but does not mention the way the text treats punishment as bad.  
 Hu improves on most engaged Buddhist scholars by referring briefly to the arguments of Buddhists who have “not provided much direct critique of existing social structure . . .” But the particular arguments she mentions only justify those social structures in terms of past karma (Hu 120). She does not reply to the kinds of Buddhist arguments discussed in the previous sections, that the causes of suffering are mental or that politics interferes with tranquility.  
Neither does King. Possibly alone among Western engaged Bud-
dhist ethicists, she does refer directly, by name, to texts that appear to advocate disengagement, and cites their arguments, referring specifically to the Fire Sermon (Ādittapariyāya Sutta) and Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta. She looks at these texts in order to examine “what is controversial about engaged Buddhism,” and notes that “many Buddhists have taken teachings like this to mean that samsara is inherently flawed, that the correct response toward it is to feel revulsion and to flee it if at all possible” (Socially 40-45). 
King’s response notes other texts, like the Mettā and Sigālovada 
Suttas, that do advocate living in the world of saṃsāra, and reads the Fire Sermon to note that its critique is really directed at the “three poisons” of craving, hatred, and delusion: 
If these three poisons are indeed the root of the problem, then the problem is in our minds, not in the world. We can free ourselves of duḥkha by practicing Buddhism in such a way that we rid ourselves of this craving, hatred, and delusion. This has nothing whatsoever to do with leaving the world and everything to do with transforming ourselves, here and now. (Socially 43; emphasis in original) 
 King interprets this text correctly in this passage. Yet everything King says in this passage is compatible with the disengaged arguments made in previous sections of this article. If “the problem is in our minds, not in the world,” that is itself a reason why it is folly to seek the kinds of worldly goods that social activism can secure, rather than the more important goods of mental cultivation. It is also why one must avoid participation in the political action that is likely to increase the hatred (dveṣa or dosa) in our minds. Or so the texts claim, anyway, and to these points King has offered no refutation.  
 An alternate response to disengaged Buddhists comes from Matthew Moore, who does not identify with engaged Buddhism and demonstrates considerably more awareness of disengaged Buddhist views, which he cites extensively under the rubric of “limited citizenship” (Moore 87-111). He notes further how this “limited citizenship” approach contrasts with a Western tradition from Plato onward that assumes the good life must be political: “It is virtually always true that the cure proposed for anomie, alienation, sectarian conflict, disempowerment, and other political ills is . . . more politics!” (Moore 136). But Moore’s normative response, too, is unsatisfactory, when he identifes this contrast as an irreconcilable conflict between value preferences. The pro-politics party argues that the virtues that can be cultivated only through politics are more important than the 
virtues that can be cultivated only by eschewing politics in favor of some other important pursuit like meditation, while the limited-citizenship party argues the opposite. Absent a noncontroversial rank ordering of the relevant moral values, there is no principled way to choose between the competing options, and neither choice can be shown to be universally morally preferable. (109-10) 
 Moore, then, presents engagement and disengagement as a choice between options, entirely up to the chooser. What is important to note about this approach is that it expresses a strong disagreement with the disengaged texts discussed above—and also, for that matter, with more politically engaged thinkers like Plato. The disengaged thinkers do indeed believe that the disengaged path is universally morally preferable, and they make arguments to show why this is the case; more political thinkers do the opposite. Both engaged and disengaged thinkers believe they have provided a principled way to choose between the options, partially on the basis of a rank ordering of values. The ordering is controversial, of course, but so is the theory of evolution; the presence of controversy does not imply that both sides or both options are equally valuable.  
 There is no substitute for weighing the arguments on both sides and coming to a resolution—a task that is yet to be undertaken. Is it the case that the goods activism can provide are inherently unsatisfactory and therefore unworthy of our seeking, for ourselves and for others? If so, then social activism is indeed a worthless pastime, just as the disengaged Budhists say it is, and the engaged Buddhists are sadly deluded, for they are leading themselves and others away from liberation. Is it the case that political participation necessarily makes it impossible to attain the tranquility that has been held throughout the ages as a central Buddhist goal?  If so, then Buddhists should not be politically engaged, and perhaps nobody should. I am not endorsing either of these disengaged conclusions; I am arguing that Buddhists should take them, and the arguments that lead to them, with the utmost seriousness, and that to date they have not.  
 
Conclusion 

Against traditionist engaged Buddhist scholars, we have seen that social and political disengagement has a long Buddhist history, one that extends to some of the texts the traditionists take as their sources. Against modernist scholars, we have seen that a thoughtful logic and reasoning underlies that disengagement: social and political problems are not the primary causes of suffering, so one is best served by detaching oneself from the passage of time, and participation in government fills one with harshness of mind. One may certainly disagree with the reasoning behind a disengaged Buddhist position, but that position is not a “vacuum” or a “failure.”  
 It is not my aim to rule out either traditionist or modernist engaged Buddhism as viable intellectual positions, but rather to argue that they must think differently than they typically have. Modernists must engage intellectually—no pun intended—with premodern disengaged Buddhism, in the details of its arguments, and articulate what it is they reject about its premises and why. If the traditionist project is to continue, traditionists must acknowledge the large number of premodern works that are disengaged; they must not only identify engaged works that they find as a counter-current, but explain how they interpret the disengaged works in light of the engaged ones.  
It should, I hope, be clear by now that it is not the case that all 
Buddhism is socially engaged. If one still wished to claim with HuntPerry and Fine that what is not already engaged is not Buddhism, it would need to be as a normative claim—and that normative claim would exclude Aśvaghoṣa, Śāntideva, the author of the Cakkavatti-Sīhanāda Sutta, and many others as not true Buddhists. That claim is radical and drastic, and one that I doubt Hunt-Perry and Fine, or others who quote them approvingly, would actually want to make.  
 If it is to remain an intellectually defensible project, I submit, engaged Buddhism must take the value of activism as a conclusion to be defended, not as a premise to be assumed. Engaged Buddhists must recognize the ways in which the likes of Aśvaghoṣa and Śāntideva oppose politics and social activism, and explain why they reject these thinkers’ positions. It should no longer be considered acceptable either to pretend disengaged Buddhist views did not exist or to dismiss them as a “failure” or “undeveloped.” Rather, we must respect them and take them on as partners in dialogue. 
 
----

Abbreviations (primary works cited) 

BC Buddhacarita of Aśvaghoṣa. Edition and translation: Olivelle. 
BCA Bodhicaryāvatāra of Śāntideva. Edition: Vaidya. Translation: Crosby and Skilton. 
CŚ(Ṭ) Catuḥśataka of Āryadeva with Ṭīkā commentary of Candrakīrti. Edition: Peking Tanjur P 5266, v. 98, ya, ff. 33b-273b. Translation: Lang. 
DN Dīgha Nikāya. Pali Text Society edition. Translation: Walshe. 
Ja Jātaka. Pali Text Society edition. Translation: Cowell. 
SN Saṃyutta Nikāya. Pali Text Society edition. Translation: Bodhi. 
ŚS Śikṣāsamuccaya of Śāntideva. Edition: Bendall. Translation: Goodman. 
 

Other Works Cited 

Bell, Sandra. “A Survey of Engaged Buddhism in Britain.” In Engaged Buddhism in the West, edited by Christopher S. Queen. Wisdom Publications, 2000, pp. 397-422. 
Bendall, Cecil, (ed.) Çikshāsamuccaya: A Compendium of Buddhistic Teachings, Compiled By Çāntideva Chiefly From Earlier Mahāyāna Sūtras. Vol. I, Bibliotheca Buddhica. Biblio Verlag, 1970. 
Bodhi, Bhikkhu. The Connected Discourses of the Buddha: A Translation of the Saṃyutta Nikāya. Wisdom Publications, 2000. 
Bond, George D. “A.T. Ariyaratne and the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement in Sri Lanka.” In Engaged Buddhism: Buddhist Liberation Movements in Asia, edited by Christopher S. Queen and Sallie B. King. SUNY UP, 1996, pp. 121-46. 
Cabezón, José Ignacio. “Buddhist Theology in the Academy.” In Buddhist Theology: Critical Reflections by Contemporary Scholars, edited by Roger Jackson and John Makransky. Curzon, 2000, pp. 25-52. 
Cheah, Joseph. Race and Religion in American Buddhism: White Supremacy and Immigrant Adaptation. Oxford UP, 2011.  
Collins, Steven. “The Discourse on What is Primary (Aggañña-Sutta): An Annotated Translation.” Journal of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 21, 1993, pp. 301-93. 
_______. Nirvana and Other Buddhist Felicities. Cambridge UP, 1998. 
Cowell, E.B. The Jātaka, or Stories of the Buddha’s Former Births. 6 vols. ed. Luzac & Co, 1969. 
Crosby, Kate, and Andrew Skilton. The Bodhicaryāvatāra: A New Translation. Oxford UP, 1995. 
Deitrick, James E. Mistaking the Boat for the Shore? A Critical Analysis of Socially Engaged Buddhism in the United States. 2000. University of Southern California. PhD dissertation, Religion.  
Fenn, Mavis. “Two Notions of Poverty in the Pāli Canon.” Journal of Buddhist Ethics, Vol. 3, 1996, pp. 98-125. 
Foster, Nelson. “To Enter the Marketplace.” In The Path of Compassion: Writings on Socially Engaged Buddhism, edited by Fred Eppsteiner. Parallax, 1988, pp. 47-64. 
Gombrich, Richard F. Theravāda Buddhism: A Social History From Ancient Benares to Modern Colombo. 2nd ed., Routledge, 2006. 
Goodman, Charles. The Training Anthology of Śāntideva: A Translation of the Śikṣā-Samuccaya. Oxford UP, 2016. 
Hiltebeitel, Alf. “Aśvaghoṣa’s Buddhacarita: The First Known Close and Critical Reading of the Brahmanical Sanskrit Epics.” Journal of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 34, 2006, pp. 229-86. 
Hu, Hsiao-Lan. This-Worldly Nibbāna: A Buddhist-Feminist Social Ethic for Peacemaking in the Global Community. SUNY UP, 2011. 
Hunt-Perry, Patricia, and Lyn Fine. “All Buddhism Is Engaged: Thich Nhat Hanh and the Order of Interbeing.” In Engaged Buddhism in the West, edited by Christopher S. Queen. Wisdom Publications, 2000, 35-66. 
Jenkins, Stephen. “Do Bodhisattvas Relieve Poverty? The Distinction Between Economic and Spiritual Development and Their Interrelation in Indian Buddhist Texts.” Journal of Buddhist Ethics, Vol. 7, 2000.  
_______. “Making Merit through Warfare and Torture according to the 
Arya-Bodhisattva-gocara-upāyaviṣaya-vikurvaṇa-nirdeśa Sūtra.” In Buddhist Warfare, edited by Michael Jerryson and Mark Juergensmeyer. Oxford UP, 2010, pp. 59-75. 
_______. “On the Auspiciousness of Compassionate Violence.” Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies, Vol. 33, 2011, pp. 299331. 
Keown, Damien. The Nature of Buddhist Ethics. Palgrave, 2001. Original edition 1992.  
King, Sallie B. “Buddhism and Social Engagement.” In The Sound of Liberating Truth: Buddhist-Christian Dialogues in Honor of Frederick J. Streng, edited by Sallie B. King and Paul O. Ingram. Curzon, 1999, pp. 159-80. 
_______. Being Benevolence: The Social Ethics of Engaged Buddhism. U of Hawai’i P, 2005. 
_______. “An Engaged Buddhist Response to John Rawls’s The Law of Peoples.” Journal of Religious Ethics, Vol. 34, 2006, pp. 637-61. 
_______. Socially Engaged Buddhism. U of Hawai’i P, 2009. 
_______. “The Problems and Promise of Karma From an Engaged Buddhist Perspective.” In A Mirror is for Reflection: Understanding Buddhist Ethics, edited by Jake H. Davis. Oxford UP, 2017, pp. 166-80. 
Kraft, Kenneth. “New Voices in Engaged Buddhist Studies.” In Engaged Buddhism in the West, edited by Christopher S. Queen. Wisdom Publications, 2000, pp. 485-512. 
Lang, Karen. Four Illusions: Candrakīrti’s Advice to Travelers on the Bodhisattva Path. Oxford UP, 2003. 
Lele, Amod. Ethical Revaluation in the Thought of Śāntideva. PhD dissertation, Committee on the Study of Religion, Harvard University, 2007. Available online from loveofallwisdom.com/otherwritings/ 
_______. “The Compassionate Gift of Vice: Śāntideva on Gifts, Altruism, and Poverty.” Journal of Buddhist Ethics, Vol. 20, 2013, pp. 702-34. 
_______. “The Metaphysical Basis of Śāntideva’s Ethics.” Journal of Buddhist Ethics, Vol. 22, 2015, pp. 249-83. 
_______. “The Psychological Case for Disengaged Buddhism.” Love of All 
Wisdom, 5 August 2018. Available online at 
http://loveofallwisdom.com/blog/2018/08/the-psychologicalcase-for-disengaged-buddhism/ 
Li, Shenghai. “The Nirvāṇa of the Buddha and the Afterlife of Aśvaghoṣa’s Life of the Buddha.” Journal of Indian Philosophy, Vol. 47, 2019, pp. 361-82. 
Macy, Joanna. “In Indra’s Net: Sarvodaya and Our Mutual Efforts for Peace.” In The Path of Compassion: Writings on Socially Engaged Buddhism, edited by Fred Eppsteiner. Parallax, 1988, pp. 170-81. 
Main, Jessica, and Lai, Rongdao. “Introduction: Reformulating ‘Socially Engaged Buddhism’ as an Analytical Category.” The Eastern Buddhist, Vol. 44, 2013, pp. 1-34. 
McDaniel, Justin. Architects of Buddhist Leisure: Socially Disengaged Buddhism in Asia’s Museums, Monuments, and Amusement Parks. U of Hawai’i Press, 2016. 
Moore, Matthew J. Buddhism and Political Theory. Oxford UP, 2016. 
Nhat Hanh, Thich. Love in Action: Writings on Nonviolent Social Change. Parallax, 1993. 
Olivelle, Patrick, (ed.) Life of the Buddha By Ashva-Ghosha. New York UP& JJC Foundation, 2009. 
Queen, Christopher S. “Introduction: The Shapes and Sources of Engaged Buddhism.” In Engaged Buddhism: Buddhist Liberation Movements in Asia, edited by Christopher S. Queen, and Sallie B. King. State U of New York P, 1996, pp. 1-44. 
Seneviratne, H.L. The Work of Kings: The New Buddhism in Sri Lanka. U of Chicago P, 1999. 
Simmer-Brown, Judith. “Speaking Truth to Power: The Buddhist Peace Fellowship.” In Engaged Buddhism in the West, edited by Christopher S. Queen. Wisdom Publications, 2000, pp. 67-94. 
Snyder, Gary. “Buddhism and the Possibilities of a Planetary Culture.” In The Path of Compassion: Writings on Socially Engaged Buddhism, edited by Fred Eppsteiner. Parallax, 1988, 82-85. 
Thanissaro Bhikkhu. Wisdom Over Justice. https://www.dhammatalks.org/books/uncollected/Justice.html (accessed 9 Jul 2019). 
Tweed, Thomas A. The American Encounter With Buddhism, 1844-1912: Victorian Culture and the Limits of Dissent. U of North Carolina P. Revised ed., 2000.  
Vaidya, P.L., (ed.) Bodhicaryāvatāra of Śāntideva With the Commentary Pañjikā of Prajñākaramati. Vol. 12, Buddhist Sanskrit Texts. Mithila Institute, 1960. 
Victoria, Brian. “Engaged Buddhism: A Skeleton in the Closet?” Journal of Global Buddhism, Vol. 72, 2001, pp. 72-91.  
_______. Zen at War. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield. Second ed., 2006.  
Walshe, Maurice. The Long Discourses of the Buddha: A Translation of the Dīgha Nikāya. Somerville, MA: Wisdom Publications, 1995. 
Weber, Max. The Religion of India. Translated by Hans. H. Gerth and Don Martindale. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal. 2000.  
White, Cecile Holmes. “‘Engaged Buddhism’: Monk Tells How to Put Feet onto Faith.” Houston Chronicle, 25 March 1989, p. 2.  
Yarnall, Thomas Freeman. “Engaged Buddhism: New and Improved!(?) Made in the U.S.A. Of Asian Materials.” Journal of Buddhist Ethics, Vol. 7, 2000, pp. 1-88. 
View publication stats

-----




Posted by at
Labels: , , , , ,
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)