A1 Journal article (refereed)
The Plural Planet : A Democratic Culture of Earthlings (2024)

Hyvönen, A.-E. (2024). The Plural Planet : A Democratic Culture of Earthlings. Review of Politics, First View. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0034670524000238

JYU authors or editors

Publication details

All authors or editors: Hyvönen, Ari-Elmeri

Journal or series: Review of Politics

ISSN: 0034-6705

eISSN: 1748-6858

Publication year: 2024

Publication date: 07/05/2024

Volume: First View

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Publication country: United States

Publication language: English

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0034670524000238

Publication open access: Not open

Publication channel open access: 

Abstract

We are entering the age of planetary politics defined by consciousness of human impact on the Earth System, and the planetary ecosystem's responses to our activities. This poses a major challenge to democratic theory. How do we protect life without evoking a planetary sovereign? This article argues that the planetary condition requires imaginatively expanding existing democratic concepts to make room for new connections, realities, and beginnings. It demonstrates this by focusing on Hannah Arendt's notion of plurality as the law of the earth. Read through the Roman lex, which emerges from the conflict between the plebs and the patricians, this notion helps us imagine a planetary politics premised on the creation of new relationships between previously discrete entities. Building on this interpretation, I discuss scientific expertise and indigenous perspectives as modes of cultivating political imagination to expand our understanding of the democratic stage beyond the human species.

Keywords: humankind; relation to nature; Anthropocene; global problems; ecological catastrophes; democracy; pluralism; political philosophy

Free keywords: Arendt, Hannah

Contributing organizations

Ministry reporting: Yes

Preliminary JUFO rating: 2