In the last two centuries, agriculture has been an outstanding, if somewhat neglected, success story. Agriculture has fed an ever-growing population with an increasing variety of products at falling ...prices, even as it has released a growing number of workers to the rest of the economy. This book, a comprehensive history of world agriculture during this period, explains how these feats were accomplished.
Feeding the Worldsynthesizes two hundred years of agricultural development throughout the world, providing all essential data and extensive references to the literature. It covers, systematically, all the factors that have affected agricultural performance: environment, accumulation of inputs, technical progress, institutional change, commercialization, agricultural policies, and more. The last chapter discusses the contribution of agriculture to modern economic growth. The book is global in its reach and analysis, and represents a grand synthesis of an enormous topic.
An Economist Best History Book 2017
"History as it should be written."-Barry Cunliffe,
Guardian "Scott hits the nail squarely on
the head by exposing the staggering price our ancestors paid for
...civilization and political order."-Walter Scheidel, Financial
Times Why did humans abandon hunting and gathering
for sedentary communities dependent on livestock and cereal grains,
and governed by precursors of today's states? Most people believe
that plant and animal domestication allowed humans, finally, to
settle down and form agricultural villages, towns, and states,
which made possible civilization, law, public order, and a
presumably secure way of living. But archaeological and historical
evidence challenges this narrative. The first agrarian states, says
James C. Scott, were born of accumulations of domestications: first
fire, then plants, livestock, subjects of the state, captives, and
finally women in the patriarchal family-all of which can be viewed
as a way of gaining control over reproduction. Scott explores why
we avoided sedentism and plow agriculture, the advantages of mobile
subsistence, the unforeseeable disease epidemics arising from
crowding plants, animals, and grain, and why all early states are
based on millets and cereal grains and unfree labor. He also
discusses the "barbarians" who long evaded state control, as a way
of understanding continuing tension between states and nonsubject
peoples.
This handbook includes contributions from established and emerging scholars from around the world and draws on multiple approaches and subjects to explore the socio-economic, cultural, ecological, ...institutional, legal, and policy aspects of regenerative food practices.
The future of food is uncertain. We are facing an overwhelming number of interconnected and complex challenges related to the ways we grow, distribute, access, eat, and dispose of food. Yet, there are stories of hope and opportunities for radical change towards food systems that enhance the ability of living things to co-evolve. Given this, activities and imaginaries looking to improve, rather than just sustain, communities and ecosystems are needed, as are fresh perspectives and new terminology. The Routledge Handbook of Sustainable and Regenerative Food Systems addresses this need. The chapters cover diverse practices, geographies, scales, and entry-points. They focus not only on the core requirements to deliver sustainable agriculture and food supply, but go beyond this to think about how these can also actively participate with social-ecological systems. The book is presented in an accessible way, with reflection questions meant to spark discussion and debate on how to transition to safe, just, and healthy food systems. Taken together, the chapters in this handbook highlight the consequences of current food practices and showcase the multiple ways that people are doing food differently.
The Routledge Handbook of Sustainable and Regenerative Food Systems is essential reading for students and scholars interested in food systems, governance and practices, agroecology, rural sociology, and socio-environmental studies.
Peasants under siege Kligman, Gail; Verdery, Katherine
2011, 2011., 20110725, c2011., 2011-07-25
eBook, Book
In 1949, Romania's fledgling communist regime unleashed a radical and brutal campaign to collectivize agriculture in this largely agrarian country, following the Soviet model. Peasants under Siege ...provides the first comprehensive look at the far-reaching social engineering process that ensued. Gail Kligman and Katherine Verdery examine how collectivization assaulted the very foundations of rural life, transforming village communities that were organized around kinship and status hierarchies into segments of large bureaucratic organizations, forged by the language of "class warfare" yet saturated with vindictive personal struggles.
Black, White, and Green Alkon, Alison Hope; Cowen, Deborah; Heynen, Nik ...
11/2012, Letnik:
13
eBook
Farmers markets are much more than places to buy produce. According to advocates for sustainable food systems, they are also places to "vote with your fork" for environmental protection, vibrant ...communities, and strong local economies. Farmers markets have become essential to the movement for food-system reform and are a shining example of a growing green economy where consumers can shop their way to social change. Black, White, and Green brings new energy to this topic by exploring dimensions of race and class as they relate to farmers markets and the green economy. With a focus on two Bay Area markets-one in the primarily white neighborhood of North Berkeley, and the other in largely black West Oakland-Alison Hope Alkon investigates the possibilities for social and environmental change embodied by farmers markets and the green economy. Drawing on ethnographic and historical sources, Alkon describes the meanings that farmers market managers, vendors, and consumers attribute to the buying and selling of local organic food, and the ways that those meanings are raced and classed. She mobilizes this research to understand how the green economy fosters visions of social change that are compatible with economic growth while marginalizing those that are not. Black, White, and Green is one of the first books to carefully theorize the green economy, to examine the racial dynamics of food politics, and to approach issues of food access from an environmental-justice perspective. In a practical sense, Alkon offers an empathetic critique of a newly popular strategy for social change, highlighting both its strengths and limitations.
Industrial agriculture is responsible for widespread environmental
degradation and undermines the pursuit of human well-being. With a
projected global population of 10 billion by 2050, it is urgent ...for
humanity to achieve a more sustainable approach to farming and food
systems. This concise text offers an overview of the key issues in
sustainable food production for all readers interested in the
ecology and environmental impacts of agriculture. It details the
ecological foundations of farming and food systems, showing how
knowledge from the natural and social sciences can be used to
create sustainable alternatives to the industrial production
methods used today. Beginning with a discussion of the role of
agriculture in human development, the primer examines how
twentieth-century farming methods are environmentally and socially
unsustainable, contributing to global change and perpetuating
inequalities. The authors explain the principles of environmental
sustainability and explore how these principles can be put into
practice in agrifood systems. They emphasize the importance of
human well-being and insist on the centrality of social and
environmental equity and justice. Sustainable Food
Production is a compelling guide to how we can improve our
ability to feed each other today and preserve the ability of our
planet to do so tomorrow. Appropriate for a range of courses in the
natural and social sciences, it provides a comprehensive yet
accessible framework for achieving agricultural sustainability in
the Anthropocene.
This Open Access book compiles the findings of the Scientific Group of the United Nations Food Systems Summit 2021 and its research partners. The Scientific Group was an independent group of 28 food ...systems scientists from all over the world with a mandate from the Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations. The chapters provide science- and research-based, state-of-the-art, solution-oriented knowledge and evidence to inform the transformation of contemporary food systems in order to achieve more sustainable, equitable and resilient systems.
The New Food Activismexplores how food activism can be pushed toward deeper and more complex engagement with social, racial, and economic justice and toward advocating for broader and more ...transformational shifts in the food system. Topics examined include struggles against pesticides and GMOs, efforts to improve workers' pay and conditions throughout the food system, and ways to push food activism beyond its typical reliance on individualism, consumerism, and private property. The authors challenge and advance existing discourse on consumer trends, food movements, and the intersection of food with racial and economic inequalities.
