Do plants have a politics? It听may seem like an absurd question. We might recognize something like politics in social animals such as听ants, crows, and elephants. But plants鈥攁ren鈥檛 they just vegetables?听

鈥淏y perceiving plants as being much closer to the inorganic world than to the fullness of life, we commit a fundamental error of perspective, which could cost us dearly,鈥�听warns the Italian botanist Stefano Mancuso in his latest book,听.听Mancuso is director of the at the University of Florence听and a leader听in the emerging study of what he calls听plant intelligence. Some biologists say that听since plants lack neurons, plant neurobiology is an oxymoron. They dismiss the field as much ado about nothing鈥攍ike the famous but ultimately 听1973 work听The Secret Life of Plants,听听but is now seen as a confused and wishful attempt to endow plants with a sentience听they just don鈥檛 have.听

Yet research by Mancuso and others has shown that plants听communicate, perceive, and respond to each other and their environment, and can even exhibit something like memory. Plants may lack brains, but, as Mancuso has argued in popular books like (coauthored with听journalist Alessandra Viola in 2015), they鈥檙e in no way inferior听in biological sophistication or evolutionary ingenuity听to animals. In听,听Mancuso half-seriously suggests that they may even be smarter than humans when it comes to the way they live together.听

In this brief, breezy book, ably translated by Gregory Conti, Mancuso argues that we should see plant life as more than听just听a backdrop for our campsites, a decoration for our garden, or even a tool for carbon capture, but听as a resource for our politics. He invites us to conduct听an unlikely thought experiment: If plants could write a constitution, what would it say? The book opens with an imagined address by a representative of the Nation of Plants to our United Nations. The speaker鈥擬ancuso does not specify its species鈥攎akes a plea to attend to the wisdom of the community that represents 80 percent of the world鈥檚 biomass (humanity weighs in at just 0.0000001 percent) and has members who have survived continuously for as long as 350 million years. Mancuso offers his services as our interpreter for the plants听and then guides us through the eight articles of their constitution.

Much of that听constitution won鈥檛 surprise anyone who has spent any time thinking about environmental preservation, or anyone who has a garden. Take Article One: 鈥淭he Earth shall be the common home of life. Sovereignty shall pertain to every living being.鈥� We鈥檝e entrusted the fate of the world to what Mancuso calls the Lords of the Planet,听a tiny group within a 鈥渧ery presumptuous single species鈥濃�攕ay, U.S.听senators. It鈥檚 absurd when you think about it, Mancuso writes, and The Nation of Plants听offers a more democratic alternative.

The book becomes more radical in Article Three, where Mancuso introduces his key political proposition: 鈥淭he Nation of Plants shall not recognize animal hierarchies, which are founded on command centers and centralized functions, and shall foster diffuse and decentralized vegetable democracies.鈥� Hierarchies reproduce the natural organization of animal anatomy, with its specialized organs and central nervous system. They鈥檙e good for certain things, Mancuso explains, above all听speed. A central nervous system can coordinate rapid movement,听just as听a powerful CEO can force a company to adapt to changing market conditions. But if a major organ like the brain gets damaged, the whole organism fails. Plants, by contrast, 鈥渟ee, hear, breathe, and think with their whole bodies.鈥� They detect light through leaves听and soil conditions through a complex network of roots. As a result, they favor not concentration听but distribution听as an organizing principle. Just like individual plants, forests听or fields of wildflowers make decisions based on what the environment can support and not what a sovereign power desires to accomplish.

The Nation of Plants听doesn鈥檛 just topple hierarchies, it also erases borders. Lines on the map, Mancuso reminds us, are the most imaginary of political and ecological fictions. Rehearsing a favorite contrarian line (and the central idea of his last book, ), Mancuso argues that most so-called invasive species are anything but unnatural: they鈥檙e just clever responses to the shifting conditions of a changing world. But more importantly, the free movement of species and communities to the places where they can thrive should serve as a model for humans. 鈥淧eople should always be able to migrate,鈥� Mancuso writes, 鈥渃ertainly when remaining in a place means compromising one鈥檚 chances of survival.鈥�

This short book is full of bold claims, and Mancuso makes them with the assuredness鈥攐r the naivety鈥攐f someone who (as the author freely admits) has no professional experience in law or politics. Mancuso doesn鈥檛 have time to consider objections听or even address the fraught history听of adapting natural principles to human politics, from social Darwinism to , which lingers beneath the cheery surface of this well-intentioned work. He gestures toward philosophy at times, citing,听for example,听Hannah Arendt鈥檚 concept of the banality of evil when discussing the moral wrongs brought about by hierarchy. But The Nation of Plants doesn鈥檛 ask to be taken very seriously. It鈥檚 a provocation听rather than a treatise鈥攁nd, at 168 pages, it works.听听

Mancuso听writes听in the old tradition of Aesop鈥檚听fables: he invites us to see human problems through the lens of nonhuman creatures.听It鈥檚 a playful book, and one that, like most games of make believe, speaks to an uncomfortable reality: we need to听rethink how we live together on earth, and who and what we include in our politics.听The Nation of Plants is small enough to fit in a coat pocket or slip into a backpack, and it鈥檚 best read on a park bench or in the woods, where for a brief moment we can forget about practicalities and just listen to the plants.

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