Doctoral Dissertation Research: Alternative Agrifood Politics in Massachusetts: Social Movements and Policy Change

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The alternative agrifood movement is a broad-based social movement that is working to build more sustainable and socially just agriculture and food systems in the United States. The movement is gaining influence among policy-makers, both at the municipal and state levels through new institutional structures such as Food Policy Councils, and at the national level, in debate concerning U.S. agricultural policy. Alternative agrifood movement politics emphasize the advantages of localized or regionalized agrifood systems, yet the imaginaries of local places that form the foundation for these alternative visions remain understudied. This doctoral dissertation research project works with the leaders of alternative agrifood movement organizations in one state (Massachusetts) to answer the following questions: (1) How do alternative agrifood movement actors envision future agrifood systems?; (2) What spatial imaginaries are present in narratives of agrifood system change?; and (3) How are alternative agrifood movement ideals communicated to policy makers? In-depth, narrative interviews with organization leaders and documentary analysis of organization publications will be used to conduct a thematic analysis of the objectives and visions for change present within the movement, and will focus on the role played by imaginaries of local places in the formation of these political objectives. In addition, focus groups will be used to bring movement leaders together to produce scenarios for future agrifood system change. The findings will demonstrate whether and how individuals and groups of actors within the alternative agrifood movement draw on imaginaries of "local" places to develop visions for future agrifood system change, and the ways in which these visions are communicated to policy-makers. The investigators expect to find a wide variety of visions for the future of agrifood systems and anticipate that this research will generate an improved understanding of the dynamics of such place-based politics and their role in contemporary debates surrounding sustainability and justice in the agrifood system.Drawn from geographic theories of place and place-based politics, political ecology, and narrative approaches to social movement theory, this research will build a place-based analysis of visions for agrifood system change with the alternative agrifood movement in Massachusetts. The focus on movement narratives draws attention to the shared generation of meaning that is used to develop and communicate political goals to the public and to policy-makers. Contemporary alternative agrifood movement narratives are overwhelmingly place-based, focusing on a vision of small-scale, rural agriculture that is accessible to consumers and integrated into communities. The analysis conducted for this research will examine the ways in which such place-based narratives are constructed, and the ways in which movement organizations work to translate these political visions of agrifood system change through policy reform at the state level. This doctoral dissertation research project also contributes to an emerging national research agenda that seeks to better understand visions for transformative change in agrifood systems, and by focusing on the connection of agrifood politics to constructions place, will provide new tools for dialogue between policy-makers and the alternative agrifood movement.