Jean-Baptiste Vidalou is a dry stone wall builder and philosopher who lives in France.
"Selected by Mongabay as one of 10 notable books on conservation and the environment published in 2023 “Jean-Baptiste Vidalou investigates the rise of people fighting for forests around the world… he bristles at the idea that something as wild and unruly as a forest needs to be measured to have value… He also reflects on what he sees as the limitations of the way we currently approach forests, and in doing so, finds a mirror for human society at large.” —Mongabay ""We are Forests is the outstanding implementation of a lyrical counter-expertise. Jean-Baptiste Vidalou explains how a political struggle is required to truly understand all the components at stake in our relationship to the environment. If we don’t defend a territory, a forest or a lake, we simply see the proposed changes by engineers, administrations and experts as necessary 'progress', smart management, without being sensitive to the ecological devastation at play."" —Frédéric Neyrat, University of Wisconsin-Madison ""If you, like me, doubt the only way we can see nature is through the data we so obsessively collect and pore over – trying to detect all that which we cannot see – and wonder if ours is just a newer form of an older, discredited interventionism; or, if, in fact you have pondered about why we still stumble for some kind of 'complete picture' of nature, then this book is for you."" —Ecos"