from the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development |
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While scholars who study issues of food justice use the term food power rarely—if at all, their arguments often place the rise of the food justice movement in the context of food power that sustains oppression in the food system. Similarly, many food justice activists and organizations analyze oppressive forms of food power, while placing the goals of the movement to create sustainable, community-based interventions in the periphery. Yet the pursuit of food justice is a dual process related to power.
In this From the Vault article, Building emancipatory food power: Freedom Farms, Rocky Acres, and the struggle for food justice, author Bobby J. Smith II presents findings from a study that explores this dual process by examining how it is navigated by Black communities in both historical and contemporary contexts. He juxtaposes two cases of Black farm projects—the historical case of Freedom Farms Cooperative in Mississippi and the contemporary case of the Rocky Acres Community Farm in New York (shown on the issue's cover, above)—to show how this process is characterized by the simultaneous acts of dismantling oppressive forms of food power and building emancipatory food power.
KEY POINTS
After juxtaposing the two cases, Smith found that the dual process of food justice has deep roots in the historical arc of food politics in the Black freedom struggle of the civil rights era. It is characterized by simultaneous acts of dismantling oppressive forms of food power and building emancipatory food power that involve: -
A vision and strategy of resistance to power struggles intertwined with a structural understanding of the inequalities that perpetuate inadequate access to food and agriculture.
- The use of food as an entry point to facilitate a larger agenda of racial justice, self-determination, economic power, and community power.
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The reimagining of land relations as a form of empowerment among communities in which inequality has reshaped their view of land. In this way, the dual process positions land beyond the politics of access to property or a site to farm.
RECOMMENDATIONS FOR POLICY, PRACTICE, AND RESEARCH
Given the burgeoning scholarly literature on food justice and strong interest in understanding it among communities and practitioners, the research presented in this article offers a fresh contribution and perspective. While this article focused more on the emancipatory component of the dual process of food justice in the context of black communities, future research is needed. For instance, there is a need to explore and expand the analysis of food power and investigate other cases, both historical and contemporary, that could build additional understandings of emancipatory food power.
Thus, this new way of thinking about food power also illustrates the use of food power as an analytic to: - understand and interpret contemporary and historical instances of food justice;
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challenge the food justice movement to include, more explicitly, issues of race, land, self-determination, and economic autonomy by positioning an analysis that considers this dual process of food justice at the core of the movement’s organizing framework; and
- provide insights that illuminate the possibilities of the movement to include race, land, self-determination, and economic autonomy.
SHARE ON YOUR SOCIALS
#FoodJustice is a dual process related to power with deep roots in the historical arc of #FoodPolitics in the #BlackFreedomStruggle. Yet we know little about this dual process and how Black communities have engaged in it. This @JAFSCD article explores this process. #Farmland #BlackFarmers. Read for free: https://doi.org/10.5304/jafscd.2019.084.009
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Image above: North Brooklyn Farm (NBF), across the river from the Empire State Building and uptown Manhattan, is a site for agritourism where crops are grown. USDA Photo by Preston Keres on Flickr. |
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