Guilherme Raj presents at STS conference 2022 in Graz

Last week Guilherme Raj presented the paper titled ‘Rural queer (dis)empowerment in community-supported agriculture‘, in the session ‘Food Justice in Alternative Food Networks: theoretical, empirical and transdisciplinary perspectives’ at the Science and Technology Studies conference 2022 in Graz, Austria.

Abstract.

This paper examines if and how community-supported agriculture initiatives (CSA) (dis)empower rural queer dwellers involved in agri-food systems. One Portuguese CSA led by rural queer and non-queer dwellers serves as a case study. The CSA is located in the rural Alentejo, South of Portugal, where a conservative, traditional culture contrasts with progressive values embodied by a growing neo-rural population and reveals implicit heteropatriarchal discrimination at the foundations of local agri-food systems. Data is collected through semi-structured interviews and a focus group with CSA participants and analysed through Open Coding, followed by Focused Coding. This paper contributes to rural queer studies that have overlooked rural queer engagement in grassroots collective action.

Research on rural queer sociology, predominant in the United States, suggests that rural queer farmers (both those who own land or work at someone else’s land) often engage with ecologically sound and socially just modes of agriculture and are viewed as critical change agents to foster just agri-food sustainability transitions. However, heteropatriarchal discrimination deeply ingrained in agri-food systems undermines their agency. Rural queer farmers who do not comply with gendered stereotypes or sexual relationships inscribed in the “family farm” institution struggle to have legal and financial access to farmland, access and control human and technical farming resources and secure commercial operations in the long term. Conversely, rural queer farmers employ strategies to anticipate and avoid discrimination, such as selectively revealing their sexual orientation or gender identity only to people identified as necessary, beneficial or trustworthy.

Yet, it remains unclear whether and how the participation of queer farmers in agri-food collectives impact their agency. Exploring queer farmers’ engagements in collective action can cast new light into processes of collective awareness-raising of, and resistance to, social-cultural, political and economic heteropatriarchal discrimination. Additionally, the rural queer sociology literature has primarily focused on the lives and experiences of queer farmers while obscuring the experiences of other rural queer agri-food actors (e.g. whole-sellers, transporters, consumers). A well-known agri-food initiative that connects different agri-food actors and has yet not been investigated through the queer lens is community-supported agriculture (CSA).

We employ Allen’s (2021) framework on feminist approaches to empowerment that distinguishes between five types: power-from-within, power over one-self, power with, power feminism, and power to pursue one’s own flourishing. This variety of empowerment manifestations enables the analysis of diverse, contradictory and complementary power dynamics that can constitute a comprehensive understanding of rural queer (dis)empowerment through CSAs. This analysis of the experiences of rural queer dwellers in the selected CSA offers insights into structural and everyday barriers and opportunities for just agri-food sustainability transitions in practice.