ABSTRACT
Xylella Fastidiosa is a bacterium, believed to be at the root of CoDiRO: a disease that has been affecting the olive trees of Southern Apulia (Italy), since 2013. To curb the spread of the disease, the political and scientific communities recommended the felling of hundreds of trees. These measures have been strongly opposed by a number of citizens, including those who go by the name of “Il Popolo degli Ulivi” (The Olive Trees People, or PdU): a variegated environmentalist group, with populist orientations. This chapter offers a reading of the conspiracist and anti-scientific themes, practices, and claims of PdU activists focused on the role of neo-animist ontologies and relationalities.
