“L’agriculture urbaine, terreau de participation citoyenne” by Victoria Sachsè

On the 16th of January I discussed, together with Sandrine Glatron, Marion Carriel, Nathalie Blanc, Bruno Villalba and Barbara Morovich, the PhD thesis by Victoria Sachsè titled “L’agriculture urbaine, terreau de participation citoyenne: de l’appropriation de l’espace public à la construction du commun.Regards croisés entre la France et l’Italie” , at the Université de Strasbourg.

This presents a compelling and intriguing research on the emergence, planning and management of urban gardens -most notably allotment gardens- in Rome and Strasbourg, in order to find out what leads the transformation from individual engagement to collaborative participatory projects; and how these are able to revitalize existing commons and the production of new public spaces.

A generous number of conceptual insights (ranging from the critique of ordinary environmentalism, to informal planning, political gardening and the issue of commons), Sachsè presents a rich documentation (including detailed description of field works and cases) on two exemplary cases, the Tre Fontane garden in Rome and the Saint-Galles allotments in Strasbourg.

The full version of the thesis is available here.

Photo by Victoria Sachsè.