Environmental relationalities: how urban dwellers in Gothenburg, Sweden, understand and relate to <i>the environment</i>

In this article, we explore the ways in which urban dwellers understand and relate to ‘the environment’. Conceptualisations of ‘the environment’ deserve attention due to its elusive character, and due to the unbalanced relationship between humans and non-humans where understandings of ‘the environment’ shape human actions in relation to the non-human. The study takes a Constructivist Grounded Theory approach and is based on 35 semi-structured interviews conducted with people living in and around Gothenburg, Sweden. We conceptualise ways of understanding and relating to ‘the environment’ as environmental relationalities spanning from divisions and disconnections to connections and interdependencies, stances that exist alongside ambivalences and contradictions. Rather than approaching these as fixed categories, we suggest that environmental relationalities are best understood as a dynamic continuum where understandings and relations are constantly in the process of coming into being. Despite dualistic understandings of human/environment being prevalent in our findings, these exist alongside more interdependent understandings of humans as part of ‘the environment’. We reflect on how referring to something as ‘the environment’ is problematic as it tends to reproduce human/environment divisions and contend that environmental relationalities have the potential to move towards less divisive perspectives due to their dynamic character.