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Research theme: Institutions, Governance and Power

Towards Food Sovereignty: Democratising the

Governance of Food Systems

Project Dates / Duration: Start 2005 - ongoing

Images of the citizens' jury on Genetically Modified Organisms and the future of farming in Mali (Sikasso, January 2006) more on the citizens' jury ..

Background

The concept of ‘food sovereignty’ affirms that people in every country have the right and ability to define their own food, farming, and agricultural policies, the right to protect their domestic markets, and the right to maintain public subsidies that support family farms and peasant-based sustainable production, at the same time ensuring safe and affordable food for all members of society.

Finding more equitable ways of including citizens in policy making and the governance of food systems has become a central challenge today. As Mary Robinson, the former President of Ireland and former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, has argued:

“When the international human rights framework began to be shaped at the end of World War II, the responsibility for protecting the rights and welfare of all citizens was explicitly assumed by national governments. Now, in many areas, power has shifted from the public to the private, from national governments to multinational corporations and international organisations. This has resulted in a gap in accountability for human rights protection and an absence of transparency and broad public participation in critical policy decisions. In developing countries in particular, people increasingly perceive their respective national governments to be unwilling or unable to stand up to or influence their political and economic conditions, which are shaped more by the policies of rich nations, powerful non-state actors, and international rules and institutions. Dealing with this situation is a central challenge of our times”.

Objectives and scope of action research

The objective of this action research is to identify and support processes that can help correct the existing democratic deficit in the design of policies, food regulations, science, technologies and institutions that shape food systems.

Case studies and research methodology

Case studies will primarily be drawn from four regions: (1) South Asia; (2) Southeast Asia; (3) West Africa, (4) Latin America, and (5) Europe.

In each setting, the primary focus (e.g. farming policy, trade agreement, regulatory framework, agenda setting for scientific & technological research….) and details of the methodological design are determined through contextual analysis and dialogues with local, national and international partners.

At this stage of project development, in country dialogues with partners have identified the following themes of significance for this action research:

1. Food and farming futures for small producers and indigenous peoples

2. Agri-food research, participation and the public good

3. Protected Areas, wildlife utilization and indigenous peoples: Policy scenarios

In each case, the methodological design will link local, national and international processes and policy making.

Cross fertilization of ideas and practices amongst different actors at local, national and international levels is ensured through a methodological approach that:

• includes relevant and diverse social actors in participatory processes and safe spaces for communication, deliberation and action e.g. citizen juries, consensus conferences, scenario workshops, future search, multi-criteria mapping, and other culturally appropriate fora for deliberation and inclusion

• uses a set of carefully designed safeguards to ensure the quality and validity of the knowledge and actions generated. Safeguards are needed in collaborative inquiries where the political stakes in the outcome of this way of knowing are high. Safeguards will be combined in mutually reinforcing ways to ensure that deliberative processes are broadly credible, trustworthy, fair and not captured by any interest group or perspective. The aim here is to meet broader criteria of process validity, including quality and inclusivity of deliberation, diverse control, transparent oversight, practical outcomes, empowerment and enduring consequences

• embeds the production of knowledge and the transformative ways of knowing (that methods for deliberation and inclusion allow) within formal processes of policy making, institutional governance and professional practice

• links activities and sites through exchanges of farmers, specialist witnesses, policy makers, donor representatives, corporate players and other citizens,- continuously associating/drawing in new actors and their networks

• facilitates the emergence of new trans-national communities of inquiry to realise the full potential of these action research approaches to large scale issues of governance or macro structural problems such as food sovereignty in the context of globalisation

• brings together practice with critical reflection ,- by situating, comparing and analyzing each deliberative process and its outcomes within wider theoretical and policy debates on democratic governance, food system dynamics, biodiversity and livelihoods.

Outcomes of the action research

Marginalised and excluded social groups stand to gain most from the development and spread of more inclusive forms of governance based on the principles of deliberative and direct democracy. It is anticipated that increased food security, biodiversity and other benefits will accrue to these social groups as their knowledge, realities and priorities are made to count more in policy processes, research priorities, technological designs, regulatory frameworks, resource allocation and institutions. Moreover, both the process lessons and outcomes of this action research should also be broadly relevant for citizens and governments seeking more food sovereignty and democratic governance throughout the world.

Related links and publications:

Farmers' Views on the Future of Food and Small Scale Producers, Michel Pimbert, Khanh Tran-Thanh, Estelle Deléage, Magali Reinert, Christophe Trehet and Elizabeth Bennett (Editors). The outcomes of an electronic conference on the ‘Future of Food and Small Scale Producers’ are presented in this report. The electronic discussion primarily involved indigenous, small and family farmers, landless and fisherfolk as well as their representative organisations (available in English, Spanish and French). Read more..
Prajateerpu: the People's Verdict Prajateerpu was devised as a means of allowing those people most affected by the government's 'Vision 2020' for food and farming in Andhra Pradesh to shape a vision of their own. Grounded in the diverse traditions that are often collectively described as participatory action research, this deliberative process aimed to link local voices and visions of food and farming futures with national and international policy making. http://www.prajateerpu.org http://www.diversefoodsystems.org/lfs_docs/Prajateerpu.pdf
Prajateerpu, power and knowledge: The politics of participatory action research in development. Part 1: Context, process and safeguards Part 1: Action Research 1 (2): 185-207 [PDF 159KB] Prajateerpu, power and knowledge: The politics of participatory action research in development Part 2: Analysis, reflections and implications [PDF 138KB]

LogoLink is a global network of practitioners from civil society organisations, research institutions and governments working to deepen democracy through greater citizen participation in local governance.

http://www.ids.ac.uk/logolink/index.htm

A Citizens' Jury on GMOs and the future of farming in Mali

The Citizens Jury on GMOs took place in Sikasso between 25 and 29 January 2006. The Citizens' Jury was a space to share knowledge, dialogue and inform decisions on genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in relation to the future of farming in Mali. This event involved farmers, -men and women-, from all districts of the Sikasso region in Mali. Read more about the citizens' jury

General information on Citizens' Juries and Processes of Deliberation and Inclusion

http://www.juryworld.com/

PLA Notes 40: Deliberative Democracy and Citizen Empowerment

Contact:

Dr Michel Pimbert, Project Coordinator
michel.pimbert@iied.org

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