Stray agency and interspecies care: The amsterdam stray cats and their humans

Abstract

This chapter discusses the Stichting Amsterdamse Zwerfkatten (Amsterdam Stray Cat Foundation, afterwards SAZ), who work with and for stray cats. In their practices and views they challenge common assumptions about cat subjectivity and agency, the cats’ right to a habitat and social relations, as well as the idea that there is a strict difference between cats and humans. Their approach offers an alternative way of thinking about cat agency and human agency, networks of cat-human relations, sharing the city with cats, and working towards more freedom for cats and humans. In the chapter I examine these relations from the perspective of agency, care, and politics, and investigate whether or not this can function as a model for building new communities with other animals, which centres their agency.