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Symposia
Symposium on Networks and Identities
In today's globalised, localised and regionalised world, nationally embedded social structures appear to hold less and less significance for explanations of social action. In this context, a new concern for 'fluid', 'reflexive' and 'hybrid' social identities comes to the fore. In 'post-modern', 'late-modern' or 'non-modern' societies, identity is no longer determined by socio-structural belonging but derives from many varied and shifting social affiliations. Identity is now complex and fluid; it apparently mutates in line with cross-cutting social relations. Social identities therefore come to be seen as firmly relational (rather than structural) in character.
In order to discuss this new context of shifting relations and identities, social theorists have increasingly adopted the network metaphor. The term 'network' seemingly permits the simultaneous examination of both stability and fluidity as relationships are fabricated, stabilised and eroded. It also holds the potential to combine the local, regional, and global spatial scales of social life as differing networks extend over distances of varied lengths. Thus, we now hear talk of the 'network society', the 'network economy', the 'networked organisation', the 'networked region', the 'networked community' and so forth. In short, each network form demarcates its own network space. In order to explore these spaces new network theories are required. Such theories come in various guises, including actor-network theory, social network analysis, policy network approaches and economic network theory.
These empirical and theoretical trends have begun to affect rural sociology. Rural sociologists have recently begun to investigate agro-food networks, community networks, economic networks, environmental networks, planning networks, and governance networks. The symposium will therefore aim to stock of the emerging network 'paradigm' and will investigate how far it assists the sociological analysis of contemporary rural trends, especially as these unfold within the agro-food sector. The papers will examine differing facets of the food system in order to highlight the significance of network analysis. In general, the symposium will address the significance of differing network theories, the extent to which new network forms are supplanting earlier modes of organisation, the impact of network relations on social identities within consumption and production arenas, and the implications of network formations for the development of rural space. The papers will combine theoretical and empirical approaches and will provide contrasting perspectives on networks and identities in the contemporary agro-food sector.
Symposium Chair:
Jonathan Murdoch, University (UK)
Symposium Speakers:
Post-rural Processes in Wealthy Rural Areas: the Consolidation of Hegemonic Fields and the Struggle Over Symbolic Capital
Gianluca Brunori, Italy
One of the conditions for success of rural areas is the creation of symbolic capital, that is names, signs, narratives and physical 'rural signifiers' which allow identification of a locality and its products by its population and by the outside. The importance of symbolic capital is well recognised as source of consolidation of social networks and internal organisational patterns, as well as for territorial marketing. By using a constructionist approach, the paper tries to conceptualise the process of construction of symbolic capital in wealthy rural areas, characterised by a high density of organised actors and interests and a high level of strategic behaviour. Drawing on a case study on Chianti, the paper works out the concept of 'hegemonic field' and discusses the implications for appropriate metagovernance policies.
Networks of Agri-environmental Action: Identities, Relationships and Australian Agricultural Environments
Stewart Lockie, Australia
Agrifood theory has been characterised, in recent years, by debates over the extent to which a number of purportedly novel theoretical and methodological approaches actually have moved beyond established approaches. In order to explore this issue in relation to actor-network theory, this paper examines relationships between network membership, identity and changes in farming practice: first, from the perspectives of social network theory and actor-oriented sociology; and second, from the perspective of actor-network theory or the sociology of scientific knowledge. Despite their common reliance on the metaphor of 'networks' to focus sociological analysis, these approaches are based on divergent ontological assumptions and suggest a number of different research foci. The paper finds that while social networks embedded in group membership and interactions among farmers appear to have had dramatic impacts on the expression of personal and group identities-particularly in relation to women - their impact on the adoption of more overtly environmentally sound farming practices has been limited in several important ways. By contrast, less visible relationships of knowledge and expertise that extend beyond the co-present interactions of producers appear to shape farming identities and practices, 'at a distance', in ways that contribute to the limited impact of agri-environment group membership.
Catering for Sustainability: The Creative Procurement of School Meals in Italy and the UK
Kevin Morgan, Cardiff University, UK
Conspicuous by their absence in agri-food studies, public-sector institutions are belatedly being recognized as having at least two important roles to play in fashioning short and sustainable food networks. First, through the public catering service, the public realm constitutes an enormous market for food, and public procurement is being used more creatively to raise the quality of food in ordinary or prosaic settings like schools, hospitals and care homes for example. Second, through its regulatory regimes, the public realm has a major role to play as an arbiter of taste, thereby influencing the type and provenance of the food provided in public canteens. In this regard, the public realm is a key means of asserting specific food 'identities'. Through the prism of the 'school meal' this paper examines these issues in Italy and the UK, two radically different food cultures. In both cases, however, we argue that creative procurement depends on the mobilization of new horizontal networks within each country (especially between production, consumption, health and education) and new vertical networks in the EU to ensure that European public procurement directives begin to foster rather than frustrate local food chains.
Social Networks and Food Practices
Alan Warde, UK
This presentation considers the application of social network analysis to the understanding of patterns of food consumption and the practice of eating. The appeal of social network analysis is that it provides a basis for a relational account of social life which starts from the condition of the interdependence of positioned agents. This offers a potentially distinct explanation of consumption. It might consider how social connections and position influence participation, knowledge, preferences and taste. Or, in other words, it might help explain what people want, what they obtain, and how they use what they get. On the basis of network data for members of three voluntary associations in Northern England, I give a preliminary analysis of members' engagements in two practices, eating out and entertaining. We know from ethnographic and interview data that there is much localised variation in the frequency, styles and conventions governing these activities. I speculate about the value of social network analysis in formally explaining the range of variation and the localised conventions of preference and performance. I also assess the worth of explicitly trying to understand practice in terms of the structure of networks. This paper is part of project being conducted with Mike Savage, Gindo Tampubolon and John Scott under the auspices of ESRC Research Methods Programme.
The Potential and Limits of Network Analysis of Production Systems in Agrofood Studies
John Wilkinson, Brazil
Two radically opposed currents have accelerated the adoption of network analysis in agrofood studies. It was introduced, often in its Actor Network Theory (ANT) variant, to counter the perceived determinism (in relation to actors) and instrumentalism (in relation to nature) of filière and production chain approaches. It has also become the privileged focus of Transaction Costs (TC) increasing attention to hybrid organizational forms as alternatives to market and hierarchy. These tendencies have followed in the wake of a more generalized adoption of networks as the ideal type for coordination and governance in the new economy, and indeed for globalised society. On the other hand, production chain analysis has seen a certain revitalization, both in the context of globalisation (global commodity/value chains) and within the TC tradition in the form of the "netchain" combination, where networks have filled out what were earlier conceived as simple stages in the vertically organized production chain. Our paper will review the above developments and analyse the relevance of network analysis for agrofood production systems through the lens of the shift to a quality based competitive environment. Recent contributions from ANT and Convention theory will be drawn on to explore the degree to which networks can respond both to the fluidity and the tightness demanded of coordination and governance in the value-laden transactions of the quality economy. |
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XI World Congress of Rural Sociology