Tenth International Conference on Food Studies

Abstract

“How are we going to feed the world?” This question is the subject of heated debates, with different interests competing to shape the agrarian present and futures. Social mobilisation for food justice targets the issue of access to food and arises out of various conflicts related to how and what kind of food is produced, distributed and consumed. Consequently, food movements have increasingly gained public interest. They pursue and enact their own views on a (bio)economy and provide alternative ways to navigate the politics of the current system. The research group “Food for Justice: Power, Politics, and Food Inequalities in a Bioeconomy” looks into social mobilisation targeted at injustices in the food system. Combining theoretical perspectives on intersectional and global inequalities with social movement research on food justice, the project aims to analyze challenges and solutions both in Europe (with focus on Germany) and in Latin America (focusing on Brazil). In this colloquium we will present the findings from our collaborative research (surveys, documents, participant observations and interviews) of two case studies: The Marcha das Margaridas (“Daisy’s March”), Brazil’s largest protest by rural area women; Wir haben es statt! (“We are fed up!”), Germany’s most popular farmer’s protest. We will address the following questions: What are the main justice claims against inequalities in the food system that mobilize people in different world regions? What is defined as ‘good food’ and who has access to it? What are similarities and differences between Brazil and Germany?

Presenters

Eryka Silva Galindo
Doctoral Researcher, Institute for Latin American Studies, Freie Universität Berlin

Renata Motta
Junior Professor of Sociology, Institute for Latin American Studies, Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany

Carolin Küppers
Professor Gender and Social Work, Faculty of Applied Social Sciences, Institute for Gender Studies, University of Applied Sciences Cologne, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany

Madalena Meinecke
Researcher, Sociology, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany

Marco Antonio Teixeira
Post-Doctoral Researcher, Institute for Latin American Studies, Freie Universität Berlin