The ontological politics of freshness: Qualities of food and sustainability governance

David M Evans*, Peter Jackson, Monica Truninger, Joao Baptista

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticle (Academic Journal)peer-review

7 Citations (Scopus)
105 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Freshness is a key feature of contemporary food systems, however its industrial production as a quality of food carries adverse consequences. Accordingly, this paper approaches freshness as a matter of concern. Drawing on extensive fieldwork across sites of food production and consumption in the UK and Portugal, we identify four enactments of freshness. The analysis zooms in on the specific case of plastic food packaging and uses these enactments to consider a series of questions about realities and the relationships between them. Since packaging is an issue that readily overflows to encompass a broader suite of propositions about food, we argue that freshness is a suitable focus around which to assemble hybrid forums to debate future possibilities. Joining a body of recent work that brings relational-materialist sensibilities to bear on sustainability governance, we demonstrate that these ideas are not exhausted by a concern with the ways in which existing ontologies are brought together in policy. To conclude, we suggest that attention to the multiple ontologies of qualities complements and extends approaches that focus on objects by offering a conduit that brings understandings of markets into discussions of ontological politics.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)461-476
Number of pages16
JournalEnvironment and Planning A
Volume54
Issue number3
Early online date25 Nov 2021
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 May 2022

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by the Economic and Social Research Council (grant number ES/N009649/1).

Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2021.

Keywords

  • Actor-network theory
  • market studies
  • plastic packaging
  • sustainable food

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