Paper short abstract:

This talk engages practices of self-reform among climate activists, arguing that intimate practices of ethical conduct appear closely entangled with more spectacular public actions. This might contribute to reconciling moral and political anthropology.

Paper long abstract:

Climate activists widely agree that attempts to divert planetary collapse involves both concerted action on the side of governments and diligent reform on the side of individuals and communities. Complementing existing research on highly visible and mediatized forms of public action, such as marches or blockades, this talk considers decidedly off-street and non-public forms of climate activism. Drawing on fieldwork among climate activists in Germany, I engage practices of self-reform and realignment geared toward realizing more just futures or avoiding ecological collapse. In so doing, I demonstrate that the intimate and the embodied self emerges here as the object of routinized practices of monitoring and control that aim at reforming habits, desires or tastes toward – what is perceived as – the planetary good. Against this background, I argue that intimate practices of ethical conduct appear closely entangled with more spectacular public actions, one frequently feeding into the other, yet to understand the working of selves requires different methodological stances and theoretical sensibilities. This might provide for grounds to reconcile moral and political anthropology.