Emotions and attachments in land-use conflicts: the build-up of a political and affective capital

Our paper analyzes the evolution of emotions and place attachments in land-use struggles. To do so, three opposition movements against different development projects (highway, prison, landfill) have been examined on the long run in France and Belgium. Our results highlight the transformations of emotions and attachments throughout the conflict, both socially (transmission of attachments) and spatially (new behaviors and knowledge). We call “affective capital” this socio-spatial built-up of attachments, that can lay the foundations of politicization and belonging processes. As a discussion, we propose a framework aiming at distinguishing the phases of emotions and attachments throughout territorial mobilizations: 1-Emotional clash: individual shock and deepening attachments; 2-Emotional buzz: socio-spatial translations of attachments; 3-Affective capital: collective acquired attachments bridging local and global issues.