[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
.At this point, the contemporary American food and agriculture systemsustains neither humans nor the environment.Agricultural policy andadministrative agencies in their current forms are unlikely to develop effec-tive solutions to problems of poverty, poor health, and environmentaldegradation.Instead, new agents of change are needed to develop a newunited platform through the redefinition of issues centered on the pro-duction and consumption of food (Friedmann 1995: 25).Through theirideas and practices, alternative agrifood movements are positioned tobecome these agents.They have brought attention to many crucial issuesof sustainability and sustenance in the American agrifood system, whichhas led to the creation of sustainable agriculture and community food secu-rity programs in traditional institutions.These institutions are positionedto become sites of transformation toward a food system that can sustain allof us.These groups have done an incredible job of making progress towardgoals of sustainability and sustenance within the context and frame of206 Together at the Tabletraditional agrifood institutions.Agricultural sustainability and communityfood security programs are becoming institutionalized, and alternative agri-food movements are actively connecting social and environmental goals.This success at the institutional level begs the question of the role ofreforms versus deeper change in the agrifood system.Tension Between Incremental and Structural ChangeThe extent to which social movements should focus on incremental reformversus structural change is a central dilemma.For Raymond Williams(1973), practices, experiences, meanings, and values that are not part of theeffective dominant culture can be either alternative or oppositional.Alter-natives to the dominant effective culture are expressed by a person or agroup finding a different way to live and wanting to be left alone with it.Oppositions are expressed when the person or group wants to change thesociety based on this discovery or new way of doing things.Williams hasobserved that small-group solutions to social problems are generally ori-ented toward alternatives, while large-scale movements focus on opposi-tion to the social and political system itself.In the context of agrifood systems, alternative meanings, values, andpractices are those that do not provide a deep critique of the existing dom-inant culture and practice of conventional agriculture and food distribu-tion.Instead, they offer another way of doing things, an alternative.Oppositions are based on a deep critique of conventional agriculture andfood distribution and propose meanings, values, and practices that chal-lenge and restructure the very core of the food and agriculture system.Bothalternative and oppositional strategies are necessary to create short- andlong-term change in the agrifood system.Alternatives consist of different ways to accomplish established goalswithin the existing overarching social structure.There is wisdom in pick-ing winnable campaigns that can build broad bases of support and energizethe movement.Alternative agrifood movements have been smart and strate-gic in this way.One example is the Community Food Security movement ssupport of a law that would ban the sale of unhealthy food in Californiaelementary schools beginning January 2004.1 This was an issue that galva-1.California SB 19 is a bill to regulate the sale of unhealthy food and beverage items inall public schools (by setting standards for portion size, fat and sugar content, etc.).After beingWorking Toward Sustainability and Sustenance 207nized a significant number of participants at the California Food Securitysummit held in June 2003 because it is a concrete, targeted issue that, atleast among the group at the conference, is noncontroversial.Social andpolitical change is an iterative process, and useful actions can be taken inthe short term, even if they are insufficient for long-term change
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]