Systemic ethics and inclusive governance: two key prerequisites for sustainability transitions of agri-food systems

Abstract

Food retailers are powerful actors of the agro-industrial food system. They exert strong lock-in effects that hinder transitions towards more sustainable agri-food systems. Indeed, their marketing practices generally result in excluding the most sustainable food products, such as local, low-input, small-scale farmers' products. Recently in Belgium, several initiatives have been created to enable the introduction of local products on supermarket shelves. In this article, we study three of those initiatives to analyse if the development of local sourcing in supermarkets opens up an opportunity for a transition towards more sustainable agri-food systems. We conceptualise transitions as a shift in governance and ethical values and adopt a pragmatist approach of ethics combined with the systemic perspective of transition studies, to evaluate the impact of these initiatives. Our analysis shows that they mainly contribute to the reproduction of the incumbent agri-food system. It also highlights that first, to be a driver for sustainability transitions, food ethics need to be systemic i.e. relate to a systemic understanding of problems and perspective of sustainability, including social justice. And second, it highlights that governance arrangements involving not only representative organisations of the various agri-food and non-agricultural actors, but also actors upholding ethical values that are currently missing in conventional supply chains and representing excluded and marginalised interests, favour the uptake of such systemic ethics by incumbent actors. Hence, systemic ethics and inclusive governance are key features for initiatives to contribute to a sustainability transition.

Towards an integral perspective on leveraging sustainability transformations using the theory of modal aspects

“…In addition, related to the idea of trade-offs, normativity plays out in change processes where one good may come at the expense of another good (e.g., functionality without beauty) provoking the question on the grounds of such priority. Therefore, normative perspectives will always be involved in deciding how and where to intervene in the context of sustainability transformations (Blythe et al 2018;Bui et al 2019;de Vries and Jochemsen 2019;Jochemsen 2018;Schlaile et al 2017;Scoones et al 2018) stressing the need for a consistent, coherent, and transparent reference framework to guide related debates and decision making (Kibert et al 2012).…”

“…Sustainability transformations and (food) system performance are inherently political and involve different views and visions, requiring 'systemic ethics', as Bui et al (2019) argue. We suggest that LPA does not provide a sufficient basis for systematically exploring related normative perspectives at all relevant levels and scales.…”

Sustainable Agri-Food Systems: Environment, Economy, Society, and Policy

“…The scholarship on the sustainability of agri-food systems has also addressed several ethical issues [293][294][295][296][297][298][299][300], such as animal welfare [55,294,301,302] or those relating to the use of biotechnologies [303]. Allievi et al [293] went even farther and made a strong case for considering "ethics" as the fourth dimension of sustainability.…”

Feeding the melting pot: inclusive strategies for the multi-ethnic city

“…As Hammelman and Hayes-Conroy (2015) argue, the focus of current urban policy is often just on availability of culturally appropriate food, whereas food is much more than just a 'nutrient vessel': it comes with important cultural values and identity. This is particularly relevant in light of increasing calls for more inclusive food system transformations (Bui et al 2019;Dubbeling et al 2017;Raja et al 2017): what exactly does this inclusiveness mean?…”