Paper short abstract:

In Ibadan, certain plants are given a particular agentivity while being the object of attachments by citizens. But they are also at the heart of a competition between religions, and threatened by authorities favouring building and land speculation, while claiming an urban sustainable governance.

Paper long abstract:

In the large city of Ibadan (Nigeria), with a predominantly Yoruba population, large trees that have survived despite land pressure are often attributed an agency by city dwellers, "asé" : associated with the living, and in particular with plants, this 'force' inherent in these old trees requires to interact with them with care and precaution, in the same way as with fellow citizens and any 'social partner'. These conceptions go with strong attachments to these plant elements, linked to the history of the city and its founding lineages, but also their position in its socio-political organisation.

However, in a context of increasing competition between Yoruba religion and other Muslim or Christian cults, these trees have been under threat because of the same conceptions and attachments to which they are subject. The city dwellers attached to them also often find themselves powerless in the face of abrupt interventions by the urban authorities, tending to favour concrete and land speculation over plants, even though they may also claim a certain ecological concern echoing the "sustainable city" urban model promoted by international funding agencies.

Interactions with plants in Ibadan thus help us to complexify conceptions of relations to plants in the city, in contrast to an ancient vision of the city as against nature, the anthropocentric proposals of an approach in terms of 'socio-ecological systems' taken up by the 'sustainable city' model, and the essentialist stereotype of an 'African animist thought', 'traditionally' benevolent towards nature, particularly popular in the West at the moment.