Yet the politics inscribed therein do not model themselves solely on the Platonic ideal. The political reading of the animal world-its models of governance, territorial negotiations and social dynamicsare, as many have argued, a primary pattern from which politics is derived.2 “From the time the term ‘politics’ was invented, every

type of politics has been defined by its relation to nature, whose every feature, property, and function depends on the political will to limit, reform, establish, short-circuit or enlightened public life,”3 notes Latour as he challenges the dichotomy between nature and society, asserting in its place a collective that incorporates humans and nonhumans.