Reimagining the More-Than-Human City: Stories from Singapore

Given the escalating effects of climate change and intense urbanisation, the development of sustainable and liveable cities is gaining traction. Yet, when a flourishing eco-futuristic urban imaginary is enacted, it is often driven by a specific version of sustainability tied to high-tech and persistent economic growth. What are the consequences and ethical implications of pursuing a singular narrative of progress that is only beneficial to select humans and non-humans? What else is diminished or backgrounded in this process? In exploring these questions, this thesis focuses on Singapore, a city-island-state known for its economic success, an authoritarian one-party government, a manicured green environment, and, in particular, its recent pursuit of the cachet of the world’s leading sustainable city. Each chapter focuses on a pressing environmental issue in the city-state, from urban greenery to housing development projects, transportation, water infrastructure and urban agriculture. Drawing on a diversity of human and more-than-human storylines that are woven together in urban life, this thesis reveals the disconnection and illogic of many taken-for-granted urban sustainability practices. By foregrounding reimagining as a consequential material and semiotic practice, the thesis further draws out the disavowal and yearnings that emerge in the multifaceted narratives of eco-modernised urban futures. At the same time, the thesis attends to the alternatives that aim to reconfigure contemporary urban approaches, from re-naturalising canals and growing edible gardens to building wildlife bridges. These new practices, though often involving significant compromises, craft different possibilities. This thesis is a critical intervention into human-centred, high-tech, capitalist modes of urban development, and proposes a kind of relational and careful imagining to open up space for more diverse and inclusive futures