Achieving sustainable waste management constitutes a challenge to several countries, especially in the Middle East region. Tremendous cost and effort are spent attempting to get communities to collaborate in sustaining waste management activities, which are usually carried out by the local authorities with various levels of success. Several approaches are often attempted to achieve this desired community collaboration, including public awareness campaigns, school curriculum incorporation, television and radio advertisements and shows, town hall meetings, technical approaches, and law enforcement. It has been proven that, without effective community participation and cooperative attitude towards waste management issues, large sums of money will keep being spent while achieving marginal results in this regard. For example, a wide-spread littering behavior in a country like Palestine, undermines solid waste management efforts by the local authorities and their attempts to maintain the streets clean and tidy. One approach that is rarely attempted to enhance community involvement is via religion. Religious teachings carry a heavy weight and impact in the daily citizen’s life in certain cultures, especially Islam. If religion can be utilized to promote positive societal participatory behavior towards waste management, sustainability may be achieved. This study attempts to explore aspects of Islamic traditions and teachings as examples of tools that can support sustainable waste management efforts. It will also discuss findings from several field studies that show a strong correlation between residents’ behavior related to waste management issues, such as littering, and their religious values. Moreover, the paper discusses the perspective of Muslim religious leaders in Palestine on the employment of religion as a tool to encourage people to acquire more responsibility towards waste management issues.

Conference Title

11th Mediterranean Research Meeting

Conference Country

Italy

Conference Date

March 24, 2010 - March 27, 2010

Conference Sponsor

Florence and Montecani Terme