This study aimed to explore the constraining and facilitating factors impacting the emergence and consolidation of different types of alternative food networks (AFNs) in different countries. Drawing on the expertise of organizers of seventeen AFNs, we investigated the conditions and actors that hinder and promote the development of different types of AFNs in Poland, Portugal and the Netherlands. Using a multi-actor perspective framework, we categorized six types of AFNs according to their logic and characteristics: consumer-led, producer-led, third-sector led, community supported agriculture, public-led, and business platforms. Key challenges and facilitating conditions varied according to AFN type, and depended on AFN particularities. In contrast to the Netherlands, low social capital was commonly cited as a challenge in Portugal and Poland. AFN organizers appeared to exercise innovative power when creating new forms of food provision; however, a wide scope of actions by governmental and non-governmental actors are needed to support the emergence of more AFNs.

Organising Alternative Food Networks (AFNs): Challenges and Facilitating Conditions of different AFN types in three EU countries

Trust is often an assumed outcome of participation in Alternative Food Networks (AFNs) as they directly connect producers with consumers. It is based on this potential for trust “between producers and consumers” that AFNs have emerged as a significant field of food studies analysis as it also suggests a capacity for AFNs to foster associated embedded qualities, like ‘morality’, ‘social justice’, ‘ecology’ and ‘equity’. These positive benefits of AFNs, however, cannot be taken for granted as trust is not necessarily an outcome of AFN participation. Using Chinese case studies of AFNs, which are characterised by a distinct form of trust pressure—consumers who are particularly cynical about small scale farmers, food safety and the organic credentials of producers—this paper highlights how the dynamics of trust are in constant flux between producers and consumers. I suggest that it is the careful construction of the aesthetic and multi-sensory qualities of food, which is often celebrated via social media, that human centred relations in Chinese AFNs are mediated. This leads to two key conclusions: first, that the key variable for establishing trust is satisfying the consumer's desire for safe (i.e. "fresh") food; and second, the materiality of the food and the perception of foods materiality (especially through social media), must both be actively constructed by the farmer to fit the consumer's ideal of freshness.

/pdf/i-will-know-it-when-i-taste-it-trust-food-materialities-and-36kd5z2c8g.pdf

‘I will know it when I taste it’: trust, food materialities and social media in Chinese alternative food networks

The primary, original contribution to knowledge of this thesis lies in understanding Alternative Food Networks (AFNs) as central in the ongoing reconfiguration of ‘civil society’ in the enduring period of austerity following the 2007-8 global financial crisis. Drawing on a qualitative research study in Lancashire, I show how the conceptual ‘austerity foodscape’ of the United Kingdom that has developed following the financial crisis plays host to complex geographies of food, with organisations within AFNs positioned in relation to capitalist political economy, as well as the interrelated entrenchment of austerity, in diverse ways. The theoretical framework underpinning this thesis therefore draws primarily on the diverse economies approach of J.K. Gibson- Graham (2006b; 2006a), developing a productive dialogue with Marxian ‘food regime’ theory (see, notably, Friedmann and McMichael, 1989). Whilst these two approaches have often shared little in terms of dialogue, I suggest that taken together they help us to make sense of the varied aims of AFNs. As attempts to ‘do’ food differently (Dowler et al., 2010) when contrasted against the mainstream, many accounts continue to narrowly interpret AFNs, painting them simply as oppositional and reactive against hegemonic political-economic structures. A more contextually-aware interpretation (following Calvario and Kallis, 2017) helps us to understand the ways in which AFNs are not merely ‘against’ capitalism and/or austerity, but themselves generative of diverse economic logics and practices, altering wider relationships to food. These are theoretical and empirical gaps that, both within the United Kingdom context and AFN research more broadly, remain underexplored. Given these complex geographies, I argue that whilst some organisations within AFNs have been conditioned by austerity, they retain a generative capacity. Consequently, I broaden the understanding of ‘alternative’ to capture a wide range of food provisioning models that have proliferated from within ‘civil society’ post-2008, most notably in practices of food banking and food waste initiatives. I argue that this broader conceptualisation of alternatives within a contextually-aware analysis reveals the powerful role that AFNs can play in articulating more positive relationships to food, and with it wider reconfigurations of both civil society and the foodscape beyond the austere here-and-now.

Spaces of difference, spaces of possibility?:An exploration of Alternative Food Networks (AFNs) in the austerity foodscape of the United Kingdom

Practices of Food Sovereignty in Italy and England: Short Food Supply Chains and the Promise of De‐Commodification

The current literature on Alternative Food Networks (AFNs) is split between two camps regarding their potential to transform the food system: the ‘progressives’ and the ‘radicals’, or ‘optimists’ and ‘pessimists’. Likewise, China’s concept of Ecological Civilization has prompted a polarised debate, with scholars arguing Ecological Civilization is either an authentic ecological ethos or a form of greenwashing. Exploring AFNs in China, this PhD suggest that these differing camps regarding AFNs overlap more than previously supposed and that the current debate regarding Ecological Civilization is the wrong debate to be having. By intertwining AFNs and Ecological Civilization, this thesis argues that the pragmatic approach Chinese AFN actors adopt in response to three core tensions of AFNs, reveals how radical change does not necessarily require a radical form of politics. It is this pragmatic approach that allows China to begin navigating the emerging cosmological rift of our times, namely that between human development (i.e. global capitalism) and the immovable ecological limits of this development. Based on qualitative fieldwork of Chinese AFNs (Guangdong), this thesis suggests that Ecological Civilization, as a pragmatic approach, can be characterised in three different ways. First, through the expectations participants have of the material (sensory and aesthetic) qualities of an Ecological Civilization. Second, through Chinese middle class subjectivities, which are both pragmatic and idealistic in form. Third, through forms of (rural) cosmopolitanism, which suggest that Ecological Civilization has the capacity to ‘ruralise’ global capitalism as a distinctive Chinese form of ‘cosmopolitanization’. Together, these three insights indicate that AFNs have a transformative potential despite their internal tensions, and that Ecological Civilization is a productive and mobilising concept, not just an ambiguous slogan of an authoritarian government.

Tasting the cosmological rift : alternative food networks in China's ecological civilization

By comparing insights from three different fields sites located in the UK, Italy, and China, the authors explore how AFNs, in different ways that are context dependent, are providing a variety of alternatives to the mainstream food system. We argue that "alternatives" have both emerged and been constructed through a variety of social, political and economic responses which are dependent on the local conditions AFNs are derived from, and employing the lenses of locality, scale and food materialities, they suggest that alterity across spatial contexts points to a (hyper) generalised typology that may have interesting implications f or future research.

/pdf/varieties-of-alterity-alternative-food-networks-in-the-uk-m3iuvrvclj.pdf

Varieties of Alterity:Alternative Food Networks in the UK, Italy and China

Handle everyday research tasks with reliable, citation-backed results

Your personal Research Agent to handle research tasks with citation-backed results

Popular Tasks used by Researchers

How can I help with your research?

Meet SciSpace

Get more enhanced response by uploading the PDFs you want me to reference.

No relevant PDFs in your library

SciSpace is the AI research assistant for academics. Run systematic literature reviews on 280M+ papers, and write papers with cited sources. Trusted by 1M+ students, PhDs & researchers.

SciSpace | AI for Research

Analyze PDFs

Code & Manuscripts

Funding & Grants

Literature & Patents

Medical & Clinical Data

Systematic Review

Visualize & Present

Web & Data

Build a Google Scholar-like website for your research.

Build a website

Create charts and images for your research

Create a Chart

Write a paper for submission to a journal

Draft a manuscript

Patent Search

Design eye-catching scientific posters in minutes.

Scientific Poster Generation

Systematic Literature Review

One task is running at the moment. Your messages will be shown right after.

Drag and drop or click here to browse

Loved by <highlight>1 million+</highlight> researchers

Extract a list of specific topics and their sources from unstructured text

Topics

Compare and analyze relevant papers that matches with your search

Papers

Get insights from PDFs and bookmarked papers from your library

My library

Recent searches

Try searching for:

Catch AI-generated content in scholarly and non-scholarly content

{ai} Detector

Ai Writer

Get PDF Summaries, highlighted text explanations 

Chat with PDF

Effortlessly create in-text citations and bibliographies in APA and 2,500 other formats

Citation generator

Get explanations, summaries, and answers on academic papers

Ease up your research workflow with {scispace}'s cohort of exciting AI tools

Elevate your academic writing skills and convey your ideas the way you want

Paraphraser

Explore our range of reading and writing tools

Your file is being prepared and should be ready in a few minutes. If it's a large file, it might take a bit longer. You can close this window, and we'll email you the file when it's done.

You have reached a maximum limit of <strong>{limit}</strong> columns in the table. Remove at least <strong>1</strong> column to add or create another one.

Leigh Martindale

Author Tools

Chat about Author

Papers

Varieties of Alterity:Alternative Food Networks in the UK, Italy and China