Need not greed

The full marketisation of our food chain actively erodes democratic, community and popular control. The myths of the marketplace reduce value to money, shifting power towards corporate and elite interests. Economic justice and participatory democracy are central components for an ecologically sustainable food system that produces good food for everyone forever.

In place of food production methods and systems that prioritise private profit and socialise costs – and the abstract economic theories that support these – we need policies, markets and distribution systems that guarantee food security for all. That fundamental need stands in contrast with the regrettable direction of mainstream environmentalism – where crude neoliberal ‘solutions’ to our climate and nature crises are offered through the uncritical promotion of nature financialisation/commodification and ambiguous concepts such as ‘natural capital’.

The links between democracy and food security operate in both directions. Without universal and meaningful access to food, social democracy withers on the vine. Food and farming nourish democratic energy. But that relationship hinges on food justice and democratic oversight of our food chain in the first instance. Economic democracy is a prerequisite for society’s nutrition.