Post-socialist alternative food networks
Petr Jehlička (The Open University, Milton Keynes), Lenka Fendrychová (Charles University, Prague)
Systems of food provisioning in post-socialist
Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) have undergone a profound transformation over
the last twenty years. Transition from socialism to capitalism in CEE has been
a part of broader changes worldwide. Post-socialist societies and their food
systems have been subject to neoliberal restructuring based on deregulation,
marketisation and privatisation, and driven by championing individual choice
and responsibility.
‘Supermarketisation’ of the post-socialist food
system contrasting with the limited choice of the previous era’s ‘shortage
economy’ represents the mainstream. However, alternative relocalised and
socially embedded food systems with their origins in the 1990s have recently
gained increased prominence and have taken on different forms, varying in their
aims and values, extent, radicalism and scale. They include, apart from the
trends and innovations imported from the West such as certified organic and
fair trade food, community supported agriculture and framers’ markets, more traditional
practices of food
self-provisioning and sharing which go back to the socialist and pre-socialist
past. Food scares in the 1980s and 1990s and the ensuing erosion of the
consumers’ trust in the industrialised food system
was a major factor in the rise of western AFNs. Consumers have increasingly
preferred direct engagements with producers and demanded healthy, often locally
sourced food. The literature on western AFNs highlights their importance for
the promotion of environmentally, socially and economically sustainable food
system. Modern AFNs in the post-socialist region have developed in a different
historical and geographical context than those in the West. Apart from
agricultural restructuring and supermarketisation of the food chain, an
important factor in their development has been the extension of the EU’s Common
Agriculture Policy to the CEE region. Responses to imported western innovations
and policies have ranged from adoption and pragmatic utilization to revision
and refusal. Combined with historically determined intra-regional differences
in the structure of agriculture this has resulted in diverse yet little
explored post-socialist alternative foodscapes.
The aim of this panel is to explore the diversity of
the post-socialist alternative food networks and their potential as well as
actual contributions to enhancing food sustainability and social justice. We
also invite papers exploring the relevance of western food alternatives in the
post-socialist context and contesting the perception of the region as an
exclusive importer of western innovations.
Please send you abstract (200-300 words), including 3 keywords, your e-mail address and affiliation to [log in to unmask] [log in to unmask] and [log in to unmask] by 15.06.2013
Information on the conference: https://foodscapesgraz.wordpress.com/