Résultat de la recherche
The Good Farmer Culture and Identity in Food and Agriculture
Developed by leading authors in the field, this book offers a cohesive and definitive theorisation of the concept of the 'good farmer', integrating historical analysis, critique of contemporary applications of good farming concepts, and new case studies, providing a springboard for future research. The concept of the good farmer has emerged in recent years as part of a move away from attitude and economic-based understandings of farm decision-making towards a deeper understanding of culture and symbolism in agriculture. The Good Farmer shows why agricultural production is socially and culturally, as well as economically, important. It explores the history of the concept and its position in contemporary theory, as well as its use and meaning in a variety of different contexts, including landscape, environment, gender, society, and as a tool for resistance. By exploring the idea of the good farmer, it reveals the often-unforeseen assumptions implicit in food and agricultural policy that draw on culture, identity, and presumed notions of what is 'good'. The book concludes by considering the potential of the good farmer concept for addressing future, emerging issues in agriculture. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of food and agriculture and rural development, as well as professionals and policymakers involved in the food and agricultural industry. Table of Contents 1. The ‘good farmer’: cultural dimensions of farming and social change 2. The origins of the ‘good farmer’ 3. How symbols of ‘good farming’ develop: the historical development of ‘tidy farming’ 4. Theorising the ‘good farmer’: from common sense category to analytical construct 5. Morality and the ‘good farmer’ 6. The gendered ‘good farmer’ 7. The ‘good farmer’ in communities of practice 8. Future challenges for the ‘good farmer’
Farmer Autonomy and the Farming Self
Drawing on interviews in Switzerland and New Zealand, we explore the concept of autonomy as part of a farming self. The farming self encompasses the dialectical relationship of autonomy as both value and tool that help us understand farmers within a wider set of economic, environmental and interpersonal relations. Farmers describe autonomy as a value in three related but slightly different ways. First, autonomy invokes a particular lifestyle connected to farming. Second, autonomy is understood as the equivalent of being one's own boss. Third, farmers describe autonomy negatively by enumerating the constraints that limit the first two iterations of autonomy in their farming operations. Beyond the value of autonomy for farmer identity, the farming self captures autonomy as a tool: a tool of identification, a tool to mitigate, navigate and translate the experiences of being a farmer in a wider network of agricultural relations
Neoliberal Natures on the Farm: Farmer Autonomy and Cooperation in Comparative Perspective
The struggle over autonomy in farming is emblematic of the philosophical and practical tensions inherent in solving multi-scalar environmental issues. We explore the multiplicities of autonomy through comparative case studies of agricultural cooperation in England, Switzerland, New Zealand, and Brazil, which allow consideration of the implications of a range of approaches to managing farmed environments under different variations of neoliberalism. The original data emerge from separate projects examining aspects of cooperative autonomy in relation to the effects of the neoliberalisation of nature in agriculture. The comparative examination of autonomy and cooperation across distinct agri-food contexts highlights diversity in the social, ecological and economic outcomes of alternative forms of agri-environmental governance. This analysis provides a sobering corrective to both the over-romanticization of cooperation across global peasant movements and the over-romanticization of the individual entrepreneur in agro-industrial and family farming sectors. Our examination highlights the need for greater attention to the relationships between actors at and across different scales (the farm level, organizations and communities, the state, and industry) to understand how, in contrasting contexts of neoliberalisation, alternative conceptions of autonomy serve to mediate particular interventions and their material environmental consequences. A focus on actual autonomy, via the peasant principle and territorial cooperatives, creates an opening in theoretical and political dialogue to bridge concerns about farmers, livelihoods, and environmental outcomes.