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about local communities having more control about what they eat. Leitch
(2003) argues that slow food came about at a time when the European Union
was seeking to standardize food and hospitality; it represented a counter-bal-
ance to:
a rationalising project which potentially limits the capacity of
marginalised rural communities to reproduce themselves as
active subjects of history. The Slow Food Movement, with its
emphasis on the protection of threatened foods and the diversity
of cultural landscapes is, perhaps, one response. (Leitch, 2003,
p441)
Slow food also relates to food with ties to local culture and heritage; in many
respects it is an approach to maintaining traditional values within each local-
ity (Jones et al, 2003). Food, in this respect, has taken on a symbolic role in
relation to the identity of each locality; it is as much a comment about the rel-
evance of place to people's lives (Pietryowski, 2004). Thus, the movement has
aptly been described as a 'new kind of civic associationism' (Leitch, 2003,
p457).
There have been criticisms of the concept. Chrzan (2004) argues that the
term 'slow food' has been used in an indiscriminate manner, and could be the
subject of exploitation for commercial gain by companies or destinations.
Another criticism is that the slow food movement has sought to focus on the
ethics of taste, but that this has the potential drawback of sentimentalizing
such regional struggles against global forces (Donati, 2005). Thus, whilst slow
food is not political in the sense of partisan politics, the movement represents
a counter culture that seeks to protect the 'dignity of the local economy' (Slow
Food, 2009). It poses questions indirectly about the late modern societal
dimensions of globalization and corporatism in relation to localism and the
peculiarities or curiosities of each locality.
Therein lies the main interface with Cittáslow, otherwise known as the
slow cities movement. The Cittáslow idea is commonly attributed to Paolo
Saturnini, the mayor of Greve-in-Chianti (Italy), getting together with three
other mayors to form an association. It was borne out of the success of the
slow food movement and engaging similar motives, as explained by one of the
four founding mayors, Silvio Barbero:
It is a logical extension to our opposition to the homogenisation
of tastes and traditions … just as we don't want teenagers the
world over consuming Coca-Cola and hamburgers, neither do
we want cities to erase or pillage their pasts. If the local butcher
is replaced by a jeans shop, or the local farmers' market folds
because there is a hypermarket in the next town, towns look
sadly similar. (Kennedy, 2000)
The initial group of cities were all in Italy; there are now 100 across the
world, although mostly situated in Europe (Miele, 2008). Cittáslow is
