Paper short abstract:

This paper explores plants as active subjects in urban contexts. Plants respond, resist or allow human activities and politics. The ethnography in Lucca, engaging tree climbers, exposes practices of intimacy and attention, contributing to new moral imaginaries in urban plant ethics and politics.

Paper long abstract:

Coluche, a renowned French comedian, suggested that for a true ecologist to be elected president, trees should be granted the right to vote. Starting from this, the paper reflects on the possibility of considering plants as active subjects and explores their agency and interests within urban contexts. Grounded in the assumption that plants are flourishing, goal-oriented entities, I align with Sandler’s position in the philosophical debate, asserting that biological interests determine plants’ well-being and thus their welfare (2018). Viewing plants as entities with their own interests and needs opens the possibility of exploring their role in the (un)doing of urban contexts and governance decisions. I argue that, in urban settings, plants adopt an ontological state of hybridity (in the Latourian sense), being both active subjects and “political artefacts” (Rival 1998), shaping and being shaped by urban policies.

By attentively “noticing” (Tsing 2015) their actions, responses, and reactions to human politics, we can investigate vegetal agency, often invisible but adjusting, resisting, and rebelling against human actions. This ethnographic research was conducted, in the city of Lucca, Italy, among tree climbers, i.e. the individuals engaged in the pruning of trees. Their work reveals relationships of intimacy, ethics of care, and practices of attention and communication between humans and plants. In conclusion, through ethnographic research, this paper explores the practices, imaginaries and possibilities of care generated around human-plant interactions. The aim is the construction of a novel approach to urban ethics and politics concerning plants’ rights and their role in shaping the city.