[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.In the age of neoliberalism, hunger has again become a matter for char-ity rather than for state action, and the issue of hunger in wealthy Westernsocieties has been depoliticized (Riches 1997).Charity was the approachtaken for hunger relief before federal food assistance programs were intro-duced.At that time food assistance consisted of voluntary organizationsserving neighborhoods or specific religious or ethnic groups (Poppendieck1986).Interestingly, the Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman s 1996announcement of the Community Food Project grants stated, Thesegrants will enable 13 communities to implement their own ideas for help-ing their neighbors. This statement sounds like a long step backward inhistory.Community food projects are primarily focused on developingstrategies for reducing dependence and increasing self-reliance.Less atten-tion is given to understanding and changing the system that has producedfood insecurity in the first place.So far, community food projects haveavoided addressing basic social contradictions or inequities.Instead, theytend to embrace concepts of decentralization and self-reliance, seeminglyreflecting an affinity with contemporary individualistic, neoliberal approachesto solving social problems.Of course, meeting social needs is neither the goal nor the function ofa capitalist economy.Maximizing profit requires the subordination of usevalue such as nutrition to exchange value (money).A clear example in theagrifood system is the production of junk foods that have incidental ornegative nutritional qualities and health effects, but very high profit mar- Reflections on Ideologies in Alternative Agrifood Movements 131gins.In many impoverished countries, agricultural production has beenshifted from meeting basic food needs to producing crops for profit, reduc-ing local food production and consumption (Kirkby et al.1995).In Mexico,for example, increases in the production of livestock feed for the globalmarket has displaced the production of basic foods and worsened condi-tions for the already malnourished.Far from serving people s food needs,growth in agricultural productivity has resulted in continued immisera-tion and the creation of scarcity (De Walt 1985: 54).Another example isdiet foods, one of the fastest-growing segments of the American food indus-try.Americans spend $5 billion every year on special diets to lower theircalorie consumption, while 400 million people worldwide suffer physicaland mental deterioration from undernourishment (Durning 1990).Dietfoods are a paradoxical source of profits in a world rampant with hunger(Friedmann 1995).In a capitalist economic system, natural resources, labor, capital, tech-nology, and food have all become commodities that are sold and bought ata price set by the free market.The insatiable search for profit has cre-ated negative environmental and social consequences.As Karl Polanyiobserved long ago in The Great Transformation (1944), While productioncould theoretically be organized this way, the commodity fiction disre-garded the fact that leaving the fate of the soil and people to the marketwould be tantamount to annihilating them. Achieving agricultural sus-tainability and food security requires changing the social relations and mate-rial processes that structure and maintain the conditions of production andpeople s access to resources.Ideologies of Class and MeritIf there is one concept that neoclassical economics refuses to address, it isthat of social class, particularly as defined as relationship to the means ofproduction such as land ownership.Alternative agrifood movements havealso tended to turn away from the issue of class, in that they rarely addressthe material interests or forces behind the ideology of economic liberalism.In these movements, economic critique of the conventional agrifood sys-tem generally revolves around issues of corporatization, globalization, andindustrialization.In our California study of alternative agrifood institutions,for example, interviewees tended to see problems and solutions in the agri-food system as centered much more around these kinds of economic issues 132 Together at the Tablethan around class or the fundamental dynamics of the market economy [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl trzylatki.xlx.pl
.In the age of neoliberalism, hunger has again become a matter for char-ity rather than for state action, and the issue of hunger in wealthy Westernsocieties has been depoliticized (Riches 1997).Charity was the approachtaken for hunger relief before federal food assistance programs were intro-duced.At that time food assistance consisted of voluntary organizationsserving neighborhoods or specific religious or ethnic groups (Poppendieck1986).Interestingly, the Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman s 1996announcement of the Community Food Project grants stated, Thesegrants will enable 13 communities to implement their own ideas for help-ing their neighbors. This statement sounds like a long step backward inhistory.Community food projects are primarily focused on developingstrategies for reducing dependence and increasing self-reliance.Less atten-tion is given to understanding and changing the system that has producedfood insecurity in the first place.So far, community food projects haveavoided addressing basic social contradictions or inequities.Instead, theytend to embrace concepts of decentralization and self-reliance, seeminglyreflecting an affinity with contemporary individualistic, neoliberal approachesto solving social problems.Of course, meeting social needs is neither the goal nor the function ofa capitalist economy.Maximizing profit requires the subordination of usevalue such as nutrition to exchange value (money).A clear example in theagrifood system is the production of junk foods that have incidental ornegative nutritional qualities and health effects, but very high profit mar- Reflections on Ideologies in Alternative Agrifood Movements 131gins.In many impoverished countries, agricultural production has beenshifted from meeting basic food needs to producing crops for profit, reduc-ing local food production and consumption (Kirkby et al.1995).In Mexico,for example, increases in the production of livestock feed for the globalmarket has displaced the production of basic foods and worsened condi-tions for the already malnourished.Far from serving people s food needs,growth in agricultural productivity has resulted in continued immisera-tion and the creation of scarcity (De Walt 1985: 54).Another example isdiet foods, one of the fastest-growing segments of the American food indus-try.Americans spend $5 billion every year on special diets to lower theircalorie consumption, while 400 million people worldwide suffer physicaland mental deterioration from undernourishment (Durning 1990).Dietfoods are a paradoxical source of profits in a world rampant with hunger(Friedmann 1995).In a capitalist economic system, natural resources, labor, capital, tech-nology, and food have all become commodities that are sold and bought ata price set by the free market.The insatiable search for profit has cre-ated negative environmental and social consequences.As Karl Polanyiobserved long ago in The Great Transformation (1944), While productioncould theoretically be organized this way, the commodity fiction disre-garded the fact that leaving the fate of the soil and people to the marketwould be tantamount to annihilating them. Achieving agricultural sus-tainability and food security requires changing the social relations and mate-rial processes that structure and maintain the conditions of production andpeople s access to resources.Ideologies of Class and MeritIf there is one concept that neoclassical economics refuses to address, it isthat of social class, particularly as defined as relationship to the means ofproduction such as land ownership.Alternative agrifood movements havealso tended to turn away from the issue of class, in that they rarely addressthe material interests or forces behind the ideology of economic liberalism.In these movements, economic critique of the conventional agrifood sys-tem generally revolves around issues of corporatization, globalization, andindustrialization.In our California study of alternative agrifood institutions,for example, interviewees tended to see problems and solutions in the agri-food system as centered much more around these kinds of economic issues 132 Together at the Tablethan around class or the fundamental dynamics of the market economy [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]