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International audience ; This chapter discusses the contribution of the economics and sociology of conventions (EC/SC) to the study of environmental movements. The first section briefly reviews how EC/SC has contributed to a renewal in the study of collective action by relating it to processes of social construction of public problems. An examination of how actors succeed in turning their "private troubles" into "public issues" reveals that the observable diversity of environmental movements can be explained by the diversity of ways in which (1) material dependencies matter to people and (2) people try to have these concerns legitimized. As illustrated by the debates on "green justification", some arguments on the value of the environment relativize the political weight of the notion of justifiable social order in favor of the notions of ecosystem and biosphere and consequently challenge the "grammar of justification". Ecological arguments can also highlight the importance of "familiar attachments" as a specific source of emplaced valuations. In contrast to reductive frameworks (e.g. the NIMBY, "not in my backyard", syndrome), EC/SC takes into account not only how actors try to manage orders of worth, interest-based valuations, and familiar attachments in arguments about the value of the environment but also how they succeed or fail in having them recognized as publicly relevant. The final section discusses how EC/SC enables comparative and historical analyses of environmental movements, conflicts, and controversies and how it helps to shed light on the transformation of critique in an increasingly interconnected but still diverse world.

International audience ; In this contribution, I develop some reflections on the forms currently taken by the permaculture movement in Italy. The environmental activism supported by permaculture rests on the aspiration to "care for the earth" and "care for people". Permaculture care-based environmentalism focuses on practices and, specifically, on eco-design practices. There is, however, an important difference in practicing eco-design exclusively as the design of "permanent" ecosystems or instead as the design of places where to "reinhabit", through repairing social and ecological relations. The study of Italian permaculture activists and initiatives shows that it is still a challenge for eco-design activism to combine "technical courage" and "political courage". According to design thinker Tomás Maldonado, both of these forms of experimental courage are necessary for an ecological society to emerge out of struggles for socioenvironmental justice and emancipation.

International audience ; Le désastre de Seveso a été décrit comme une catastrophe classique et paradoxale. La fuite d'un nuage de 2,3,7,8-tétrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxine (ou TCDD) d'un des réacteurs de l'usine chimique ICMESA, en Italie, le 10 juillet 1976, déclencha une grave crise sanitaire. Elle conduisit à l'adoption, en 1982, de la première législation européenne sur le risque d'accidents industriels majeurs. La Directive 82/501/CEE (connue comme Seveso 1) prévoit la délimitation de zones à risques-dites "Seveso"-qui font désormais partie de nos paysages urbains. L'écho international du désastre a transformé une petite ville du nord de l'Italie en un lieu symbole des risques de l'industrialisation. Dans cet article, je souhaite tout d'abord préciser le caractère « paradoxal » de cette catastrophe. Mon pari est que l'analyse des contradictions, impasses et dilemmes qui ont émergé dans la gestion de la crise sanitaire à Seveso puisse contribuer à la compréhension de certains des processus qui favorisent, de manière plus générale, la production sociale de l'invisibilité des dommages à l'environnement et de leurs victimes. En même temps, je souhaite montrer comment l'expérience de la catastrophe, là où elle s'est passée, a été motrice d'une transformation des formes d'engagement politique pour l'environnement. En revenant sur le parcours des militants du groupe écologiste de Legambiente à Seveso, il s'agira de comprendre comment le fait d'avoir relevé le défi de restituer des milieux de vie « ruinés » par la contamination à la possibilité du vivre ensemble a pu conduire à une transformation profonde des modalités de cet engagement. Or, la condition d'engagement écologique dans un monde « ruiné » se généralise aujourd'hui. De ce point de vue, il est intéressant d'interroger ce que l'expérience de Seveso a à nous apprendre sur le potentiel transformateur des alternatives écologiques.

International audience ; In this contribution, I develop some reflections on the forms currently taken by the permaculture movement in Italy. The environmental activism supported by permaculture rests on the aspiration to "care for the earth" and "care for people". Permaculture care-based environmentalism focuses on practices and, specifically, on eco-design practices. There is, however, an important difference in practicing eco-design exclusively as the design of "permanent" ecosystems or instead as the design of places where to "reinhabit", through repairing social and ecological relations. The study of Italian permaculture activists and initiatives shows that it is still a challenge for eco-design activism to combine "technical courage" and "political courage". According to design thinker Tomás Maldonado, both of these forms of experimental courage are necessary for an ecological society to emerge out of struggles for socioenvironmental justice and emancipation.

International audience ; Il testo si propone di analizzare il contributo di Laura Conti alla comprensione delle dinamiche di mobilitazione in contesti di disastro ambientale, a partire dagli scritti da lei consacrati alla sua esperienza nel contesto della contaminazione di diossina a Seveso (1976). La riflessione della Conti si concentra sull'importanza della dimensione culturale nelle mobilitazioni ambientaliste, cioè l'importanza di considerare i modi concreti che gli abitanti hanno di relazionarsi all'ambiente. Questi ultimi rimandano a rappresentazioni di ciò che conta (o ha valore) nella relazione all'intorno materiale e ad argomenti che ne permettono la condivisione. Comprendere come si costruisce la relazione all'intorno è considerato come il primo passo per la costruzione di un'azione politica capace di trasformazione.

International audience ; Il testo si propone di analizzare il contributo di Laura Conti alla comprensione delle dinamiche di mobilitazione in contesti di disastro ambientale, a partire dagli scritti da lei consacrati alla sua esperienza nel contesto della contaminazione di diossina a Seveso (1976). La riflessione della Conti si concentra sull'importanza della dimensione culturale nelle mobilitazioni ambientaliste, cioè l'importanza di considerare i modi concreti che gli abitanti hanno di relazionarsi all'ambiente. Questi ultimi rimandano a rappresentazioni di ciò che conta (o ha valore) nella relazione all'intorno materiale e ad argomenti che ne permettono la condivisione. Comprendere come si costruisce la relazione all'intorno è considerato come il primo passo per la costruzione di un'azione politica capace di trasformazione.

International audience ; How do the meaning and practices of environmentalism change if we see the current environmental crisis as resulting not from accidental externalities but from a process of ordinary socio-ecological ruination brought about by the dominant logics of productivism and capitalist accumulation? In a world where socio-ecological ruination is ubiquitous, environmental engagement is not limited to protection from or denunciation against processes of socio-ecological exploitation. It also takes the shape of practices of care. I will discuss the notion of care as expression of environmental reflexivity and the case of the permaculture movement as an example of environmentalism grounded in practices of ecological care. Based on the results of a research project on the diffusion of the permaculture movement in Italy, my argument is that permaculture initiatives try to regenerate damaged socio-ecological systems through creating a variety of local pericapitalist economies. These alternative economies are always at risk of being recuperated by capitalist dynamics. One way of limiting this risk is to build networks of pericapitalist initiatives while multiplying the connections between the diverse forms of environmental engagement. This entails designing political ecotones in which environmental actors can coexist in their diversity and work to define a shared socio-technical imaginary.

International audience ; This article seeks to contribute to the elaboration of an analytically solid definition of the commons that can be used to identify organised practices with social transformative potential and aimed at increasing socio-ecological sustainability. I draw on the analysis of political economist Massimo De Angelis who reworks the notion of the commons in line with its growing centrality in the practices and discourses of contemporary social movements. Through the notion of modes of valuation, I expand on his definition of the commons as socio-ecological systems based on alternative value practices. I apply this framework to the analysis of the permaculture movement as a «new materialist movement» grounded on alternative value practices and «multispecies commoning». I discuss the results of a research project on the diffusion of permaculture in Italy to show how the subversive idea of redesigning the subsistence sphere in accordance with principles of earth care, people care and fair share is translated into a variety of «pericapitalist» socioeconomic initiatives resting on alternative value practices. I conclude by advocating the adoption of the commons framework to increase the permaculture movement's reflexivity on some of the internal and external challenges it faces.

International audience Through an analysis of the 40-year history of conflicts triggered by the repeated attempts to expand the Malpensa airport in northern Italy, this paper seeks to show the heuristic strength of using the concept of modes of valuation of the environment to discuss the transformations of environmental critique over time in their relation to social change. I argue that, beyond empirical specifics, the trajectory witnessed in this case – from public participation to place-based resistance – reflects more generalized dynamics that can be found in many other conflicts over large infrastructural projects in contemporary Europe. The article is organized as follows: in the first section I briefly introduce the concept of modes of valuation of the environment, which is inspired by recent work in pragmatic sociology. In particular, I distinguish between universal, local, and emplaced modes of valuation. In the second and third sections I provide an analysis of the struggles against the Malpensa airport expansion from 1970 to 2014. Here, I distinguish three phases of mobilization, which I discuss in terms of the transformations that can be observed in the arguments that actors develop to fight or support the airport expansion. I argue that these transformations are articulated not only with changing action repertoires but also with evolving social and sociotechnical imaginaries that convey specific understandings of the environment as a matter of political concern. This analysis shows that, far from being simply a case of citizens' resistance to change, the mobilization against the Malpensa airport has contributed to producing the cultural basis of an increased collective reflexivity about the many values that the environment takes on among community members in the airport region. In the final section I discuss some hypotheses concerning what modes of valuation of the environment reveal about the emergence of a new radicalism in environmental struggles.

International audience ; Through an analysis of the 40-year history of conflicts triggered by the repeated attempts to expand the Malpensa airport in northern Italy, this paper seeks to show the heuristic strength of using the concept of modes of valuation of the environment to discuss the transformations of environmental critique over time in their relation to social change. I argue that, beyond empirical specifics, the trajectory witnessed in this case – from public participation to place-based resistance – reflects more generalized dynamics that can be found in many other conflicts over large infrastructural projects in contemporary Europe. The article is organized as follows: in the first section I briefly introduce the concept of modes of valuation of the environment, which is inspired by recent work in pragmatic sociology. In particular, I distinguish between universal, local, and emplaced modes of valuation. In the second and third sections I provide an analysis of the struggles against the Malpensa airport expansion from 1970 to 2014. Here, I distinguish three phases of mobilization, which I discuss in terms of the transformations that can be observed in the arguments that actors develop to fight or support the airport expansion. I argue that these transformations are articulated not only with changing action repertoires but also with evolving social and sociotechnical imaginaries that convey specific understandings of the environment as a matter of political concern. This analysis shows that, far from being simply a case of citizens' resistance to change, the mobilization against the Malpensa airport has contributed to producing the cultural basis of an increased collective reflexivity about the many values that the environment takes on among community members in the airport region. In the final section I discuss some hypotheses concerning what modes of valuation of the environment reveal about the emergence of a new radicalism in environmental struggles.

Through an analysis of the 40-year history of conflicts triggered by the repeated attempts to expand the Malpensa airport in northern Italy, this paper seeks to show the heuristic strength of using the concept of modes of valuation of the environment to discuss the transformations of environmental critique over time in their relation to social change. I argue that, beyond empirical specifics, the trajectory witnessed in this case – from public participation to place-based resistance – reflects more generalized dynamics that can be found in many other conflicts over large infrastructural projects in contemporary Europe. The article is organized as follows: in the first section I briefly introduce the concept of modes of valuation of the environment, which is inspired by recent work in pragmatic sociology. In particular, I distinguish between universal, local, and emplaced modes of valuation. In the second and third sections I provide an analysis of the struggles against the Malpensa airport expansion from 1970 to 2014. Here, I distinguish three phases of mobilization, which I discuss in terms of the transformations that can be observed in the arguments that actors develop to fight or support the airport expansion. I argue that these transformations are articulated not only with changing action repertoires but also with evolving social and sociotechnical imaginaries that convey specific understandings of the environment as a matter of political concern. This analysis shows that, far from being simply a case of citizens' resistance to change, the mobilization against the Malpensa airport has contributed to producing the cultural basis of an increased collective reflexivity about the many values that the environment takes on among community members in the airport region. In the final section I discuss some hypotheses concerning what modes of valuation of the environment reveal about the emergence of a new radicalism in environmental struggles.

Through an analysis of the 40-year history of conflicts triggered by the repeated attempts to expand the Malpensa airport in northern Italy, this paper seeks to show the heuristic strength of using the concept of modes of valuation of the environment to discuss the transformations of environmental critique over time in their relation to social change. I argue that, beyond empirical specifics, the trajectory witnessed in this case - from public participation to place-based resistance - reflects more generalized dynamics that can be found in many other conflicts over large infrastructural projects in contemporary Europe. The article is organized as follows: in the first section I briefly introduce the concept of modes of valuation of the environment, which is inspired by recent work in pragmatic sociology. In particular, I distinguish between universal, local, and emplaced modes of valuation. In the second and third sections I provide an analysis of the struggles against the Malpensa airport expansion from 1970 to 2014. Here, I distinguish three phases of mobilization, which I discuss in terms of the transformations that can be observed in the arguments that actors develop to fight or support the airport expansion. I argue that these transformations are articulated not only with changing action repertoires but also with evolving social and sociotechnical imaginaries that convey specific understandings of the environment as a matter of political concern. This analysis shows that, far from being simply a case of citizens' resistance to change, the mobilization against the Malpensa airport has contributed to producing the cultural basis of an increased collective reflexivity about the many values that the environment takes on among community members in the airport region. In the final section I discuss some hypotheses concerning what modes of valuation of the environment reveal about the emergence of a new radicalism in environmental struggles.