Territorializing local public policy: Building social muscle,sustaining participation in food system transformation

Abstract

This article focuses on experiences of engagement with public institutions to explore the nature of local level state-society relations that might enable the construction of food sovereignty. It illustrates how peasants and activists struggling for food sovereignty can benefit from and shape the impact of a variety of institutional supports to enable food system transformation. It draws on the concept of territorialized food systems, to illustrate the importance of considering the what and the how of policy and on feminist social reproduction theory to add nuance and depth to how we think about the process of leveraging public policy to enable food sovereignty. I develop the concept of social muscle to describe some of the ways that social movements try to build strength and resilience in order to navigate contradictions as they arise in this process. I argue that territorializing food systems can help reclaim control over food policy at the local level, but it also requires coordination among a range of diverse actors. A feminist analytical lens helps to visibilize this diversity of actors, understand and overcome some of the barriers to participation in policy processes that they may face. Finally, I suggest that no political opportunity can be seized upon or sustained without social muscle, which is required to guide policy making towards the construction of food sovereignty and which needs to be constantly strengthened.