Becoming a Care-Tizen: Contributing to Democracy Through Forest Commoning

Abstract

This paper aims to expand current understandings on the relationship between forest commoning, citizenship and democracy. For doing so, it presents a case study of a community forest in the periphery of Vigo city (Galicia, Spain). Using interviews and historical records of the city and the neighborhood, the paper tells the story of the emergence of a forest commons in relation to citizenship claims and struggles. Through time, communal practices of care for forest forge care-tizens, a self-organized form of citizenship performed through mutual care and care for the commons. This care-tizenship was enabled by commoners’ affective relations to forests and more-than-human subjectivities. The conclusion underlines the mutually reinforcing relationship between commoning forests and citizenship, suggesting the importance of community forests as arenas to nurture alternative, expanded more direct, and ecological forms of democracy