Abstract
In recent years, a plethora of spaces have been created that allow citizens and civil society organizations to participate in governance processes at local, regional, national and international levels. This chapter tells the story of one civil society organization’s efforts to navigate such newly opened space in an effort to facilitate transformations aligned with its alternative agri-food system agenda. Specifically, it is the story of the Mexican Network of Local Organic Markets and its work to influence the national policy governing Mexico’s organic sector. The case study highlights how the development of a network structure helped build the kind of social capital necessary for the country’s relatively small-scale local organic movement to engage in effective collective action, and how that action was translated into political support for its work. However, this story is also one of compromises, limitations and frustrations that raises questions regarding the implications of acting within spaces that may be new but still subject to old power dynamics.
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Notes
- 1.
All direct quotes included in the chapter are drawn from that data, and I have translated them from the original Spanish.
- 2.
The International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM) defines Participatory Guarantee Systems (or participatory certification) as “locally focused quality assurance systems [that] certify producers based on active participation of stakeholders and are built on a foundation of trust, social networks and knowledge exchange.” They are increasingly being used by local or regional marketing associations as a means of making the organic label more accessible to small-scale producers, as well as for capacity-building and community development (Nelson et al. 2015).
- 3.
Criticism of Network centralization in Chapingo became the subject of increasing conflict that, in the aftermath of the political work discussed in this chapter, eventually led to significant shifts toward a more decentralized governance structure. The challenges associated with Chapingo’s powerful role are reflective of Flora and Flora’s (2006) caution that an over-abundance of bridging social capital, while useful in some ways, can contribute to elite capture of a group’s agenda and the marginalization of other voices.
- 4.
Cynicism regarding government in Mexico has only worsened in the years since the research presented here was conducted. For example, incidents such as the murder of 43 students in Ayotzinapa have highlighted the linkages between organized crime and political institutions at all levels, and allegations of corruption against President Enrique Peña Nieto and a number of close colleagues demonstrate that the corruption and clientelism associated with Mexico’s days as a one-party state have not been eradicated.
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Nelson, E., Tovar, L.G. (2017). Navigating Spaces for Political Action: Victories and Compromises for Mexico’s Local Organic Movement. In: Knezevic, I., Blay-Palmer, A., Levkoe, C., Mount, P., Nelson, E. (eds) Nourishing Communities. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-57000-6_10
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