ISS-4343 Political Economy of the Global Food System Code Weight of the course Period Course Leader Lecturer Teaching Methods Modes of Assessment Contact ISS-4343 8 ECTS TERM 3 Mindi Schneider & Harriet Friedmann Mindi Schneider, Harriet Friedmann, Olivier de Schutter, Jun Borras Participatory Lecture, Tutorials, Workshop (Group work) Assignments: 90% (40% and 50% Essays), Group Assignment: 10% Nalini Harnam Learning objectives The course is designed both for AES participants and for students of other Majors whose research interests relate to the political economy of hunger and the global food system. The course aims to strengthen your capacity for critical analysis of the broad issue of food and farming systems. You will become familiar with theoretical tools for understanding the roles of powerful corporations and states in the organization of agrifood systems, the social and ecological implications of present trends, and emerging alternatives aiming for food justice and sustainability. On completion of the course you will have gained confidence in critical theoretical and policy analysis at inter-connected local, national and international levels. Course description Why do we have a coexistence of a billion hungry and a billion overweight people across and within the North-South divide? Why is agriculture now acknowledged as a major contributor to climate change and biodiversity loss, while evicting millions of farmers from countrysides? How did we get here? Who are the winners, and who are the losers? What are the trajectories of the current model , and what and where are the emerging alternatives for a just and sustainable agrifood system? What political and institutional instruments are being developed and deployed in the hope of agrifood system transformation? These are some of the most challenging questions confronting humanity today, and the questions we want to explore in the course. Block 1 examines key theoretical explanations of world hunger and related food issues. Block 2 is devoted to understanding the historical origins, current conditions, and most pressing issues in the global agrifood system. We focus on power relations that underlie global and local inequalities in the production, circulation, and consumption of food, asking questions about how these relations came to be, and how they are resisted. Block 3 considers how ‘alternative’ food initiatives might constellate into a different and better agrifood system, including discussions on citizen-led initiatives for change, food sovereignty, urban and peri-urban agriculture, and agroecology. Block 4 will be a day-long, student-led, peer review/seminar discussion among students on the outline of their final essay assignment. Indicative readings McMichael, P. (2013) Food Regimes and Agrarian Questions. Halifex: Fernwood Publishing. Sen, A. K. (1983) Poverty and Famines: An Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation. Oxford: Oxford University Press. van der Ploeg, J. D. (2010) ‘The Food Crisis, Industrialized Farming and the Imperial Regime’, Journal of Agrarian Change 10(1): 98-106. Friedmann, H. (2005) ‘Feeding the Empire: The Pathologies of Globalized Agriculture’. Socialist Register 41: 124-143. Weis, T. (2010) ‘The Accelerating Biophysical Contradictions of Industrial Capitalist Agriculture’. Journal of Agrarian Change 10(3): 315-341. Gonzalez de Molina, M. (2013) ‘Agroecology and Politics. How to Get Sustainability? About the Necessity for a Political Agroecology’, Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems 37(1): 4559.