How Is Food Political? Market, State, and Knowledge - The Oxford Topic of Food, Politics, and Society - page 3

Simultaneously, the numbers and causes of people asserting political interests in food
and agriculture beyond their own grain pile have likewise shifted out and up. Europeans
have used a variety of policy and social-movement tactics to influence what Africans
can grow and eat (Paarlberg 2008, chap. 4). American diplomats apply pressure to alter
European political choices about what not to grow and eat. An international organiza-
tion of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals ( http://www.peta.org ) challenges
traditional practices confining and slaughtering animals—and thus livestock as liveli-
hood and meat as market. Trade conflicts over whether or not phyto-safety regulations
constitute another form of agricultural protectionism or an expression of democratic
sovereignty cross powerful currents of science and culture: if Americans and Chinese
can eat transgenic virus-resistant papayas, how can Japanese legally regulate them out
of their markets? In theory, the Codex Alimentarius represents species-wide knowledge
of standards for food safety,3 which should allow deliberation within the World Trade
Organization to set lines between agricultural protectionism and justifiable precaution
in regulating novel foods. In practice, there are trade conflicts, ineffectual rulings, and
intermittent rejection of WTO rulings. Bans on whale slaughter pit Japan against inter-
national political coalitions. Bans on eating companion animals such as horses and dogs,
or intelligent animals such as dolphins, raise persistent politics in some places but not
others, with consequences for international trade (Goodyear 2013). Shark fin is a valued
and traditional food in some cultures, but restaurants are routinely raided for surrepti-
tiously serving it in many jurisdictions. Demands for a ban on cow slaughter have raised
intermittently powerful politics in India but not in Pakistan or Texas. Signs on bridges in
Europe declare “GMOs Kill.” If true (Ho 2000), such a claim would justify, perhaps mor-
ally compel, political mobilization to ban GMOs, create GMO-free zones, attack biotech
research facilities, and restrict international trade in genetically engineered foods.4
Food politics thus depends fundamentally—and increasingly—on ideas, not simply
the material interests that have dominated political economy as an approach (Blyth
2002). Conventional food politics was answerable in a context of classical political
economy: the dynamic of interests within social systems. Major interests were fairly
clear: control of surplus from the land. The landless fought for land that produced
food, the landed resisted. Tenants mobilized around securing their interests; landlords
mobilized around defending theirs. The hungry demanded food as traditional obliga-
tion or political right. Farmers demanded better deals from traders and moneylend-
ers and state intervention to protect their livelihoods (Goodwyn 1991; Stinchcombe
1961). These demands on the state for protection from the market continue today, and
have become globalized with international allies with less direct material interests in
outcomes. The new world of food politics thus adds distinctly different dimensions.
Contention exists not only around the expertise of agricultural and nutritional sci-
ences, but also around what have been called, since the mid-20th century, alternative
paths to “development.”5 Not only are distal populations recognizing a political imper-
ative to alleviate hunger in societies our moms probably knew little about, but justifica-
tions differ, as do contending development theories advocating proper roles for states
and markets.6