‘We don't want to Manage Poverty’: Community Groups Politicise Food Insecurity and Charitable Food Donations

Abstract

Charitable assistance is a common response to food insecurity in many affluent countries. The coalition featured in this case study is explicitly concerned with social justice, mitigating the potential for charitable assistance to mask the extent of food insecurity, its root causes and its long-term consequences. The coalition structure has assisted community workers in transcending day-to-day routines, so as to reflect on the politics of food insecurity and institutionalised responses to this problem. Coalition members have defined food security as an objective whose achievement will entail comprehensive reform. One noteworthy outcome has been to recommend that member groups not redistribute a number of foodstuffs commonly donated by individuals and corporations. In grappling with a tension between responding to immediate needs for food and addressing the root causes of these needs, community workers have paid attention to public health.