Abstract

The focus of this chapter is to demonstrate that human wants and desires that direct the flow of development trends today are also directly entangled in creating an unsustainable development trajectory. It is important to consider the key concept of “dependent co-origination” drawn from the Buddha’s discourses, as an essential component in the sphere of sustainable development. This chapter illustrates how ancient Sri Lanka sustained development by creating awareness of dependent co-origination by adhering to a middle path consisting of right view, right action and right effort for right livelihood. It is a socio-economic system that was founded on tolerance, peace and one that also upheld that was of mutual benefit to society and the environment. This ecosystem of exchanges provides applicable methods to arrest the eroding culture of thought-based exchanges that are now overridden by a standpoint of extremewants.