Ecological citizenship: a disruptive influence

In this article two distinct but related questions are addressed. First, can the politics of ecology be articulated in terms of citizenship? An affirmative answer is given to this question, and an outline of ‘ecological citizenship’ is presented. This gives rise to the second question: how does ecological citizenship affect the idea of citizenship itself? This question is answered through the articulation of an ‘architecture’ of citizenship theory, organised around the oppositions of rights and duties, public and private spheres, active and passive citizenship, and ‘territorialised’ and ‘deterritorialised’ conceptions of citizenship. It is argued that the idea of ecological citizenship disrupts standard citizenship architecture by emphasising citizen duties over citizen rights, by suggesting that the private sphere is as much a legitimate site of citizenship activity as the public sphere, by denying the usual association of ‘passive’ citizenship with the private sphere, and by endorsing ‘deterritorialised’ conceptions of citizenship. Finally, ecological citizenship is presented as contributing to a ‘remoralising’ of politics, and some of the resulting tensions with the impulses of liberal democracy are outlined. 1 A version of this paper was presented to the ........... Politics Department in November 1998, and it has been read by .............. I am grateful to all of them for helping me to move on from where they found me.