Research on Kurdish societies has often overlooked ecological and climate crises, focusing instead on women’s mobilization, political movements, and cultural initiatives. However, growing environmental activism is a crucial aspect of social transformation in the region. This chapter, based on fieldwork, interviews with Kurdish environmental activists, and secondary sources, examines social mobilization in the struggle for water rights, framed as “acts of citizenship” (Isin & Nielsen, 2008). Kurdish women’s activism plays a key role, integrating feminist ideas into environmentalism and adding a gender dimension. Their ecological activities, shaped by long-standing discrimination, are part of a broader fight for justice, decision-making participation, and rights. Although ecology is often seen as apolitical, making it an accessible entry point for women activists, it frequently leads to broader citizenship actions. These acts of ecological citizenship encompass resistance to the neoliberal transformation of nature and prefigurative practices. While many initiatives are grassroots and limited in scale, others involve transnational cooperation, demonstrating both short- and long-term perspectives on ecological activism.

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Water as Life and Freedom: Rights to Water and Alternative Environmental Imaginaries in Kurdish Women’s Activism

  • Dobrosława Wiktor-Mach

摘要

Research on Kurdish societies has often overlooked ecological and climate crises, focusing instead on women’s mobilization, political movements, and cultural initiatives. However, growing environmental activism is a crucial aspect of social transformation in the region. This chapter, based on fieldwork, interviews with Kurdish environmental activists, and secondary sources, examines social mobilization in the struggle for water rights, framed as “acts of citizenship” (Isin & Nielsen, 2008). Kurdish women’s activism plays a key role, integrating feminist ideas into environmentalism and adding a gender dimension. Their ecological activities, shaped by long-standing discrimination, are part of a broader fight for justice, decision-making participation, and rights. Although ecology is often seen as apolitical, making it an accessible entry point for women activists, it frequently leads to broader citizenship actions. These acts of ecological citizenship encompass resistance to the neoliberal transformation of nature and prefigurative practices. While many initiatives are grassroots and limited in scale, others involve transnational cooperation, demonstrating both short- and long-term perspectives on ecological activism.