WHOSE CITY, WHOSE ENVIRONMENT? Self-Determination, Ethics and the Urban Environment

e main concern of much traditional environmental philosophy and ethics has been the natural environment and wilderness. Natural conditions such as biodiversity, ecological health and integrity, and pristine nature as such, have been regarded as intrinsic values, considered to be absolute values in that they should not be compromised under any circumstance. Since humans and their activities and lifestyles are often opposed to what this kind of philosophy holds dear, there has not been much interest in the urban environment, except perhaps in a negative fashion. It is true that some environmental ethics has had room in its concern for environments that are outcomes of human activities affecting and modifying landscapes. Here one seeks the integration of humans and nature, of land use and land preservation. Some cultural landscapes and the human activi-ties that contribute to shaping them can be considered sustainable, even in the strong sense, proposed by Arne Næss, of being consistent with and enhancing the flourishing of all (natural) forms of life (Næss 1995: 447), and not just in the anthropocentric sense of leaving enough resources in order for all humans, including future generations, to be able to satisfy their needs. is widening of the concern of environmental ethics seems necessary in order for this kind of ethics to have relevance and application in a European context in the first place, for most, if not all, European landscapes have been affected by the activities of humans throughout thousands of years. But also for this kind of ethics, the ur-ban environment is often considered antithetical to the sort of environment the development and preservation of which are sought by environmental philosophy and ethics. For one thing, cities, considered in terms of their administrative boundaries, seem notoriously unsustainable (Wackernagel, Rees 1996: 10). In-deed, cities and the human lifestyles they embody seem to be the very source of environmental evils