Food as a Commons
Increasingly initiatives and movements which consider the provision and use of food as a commons emerge. The aim of this dissertation project is to first of all define and conceptualize food as a commons appearing in various discourses, each in turn realized in manifold initiatives. Drawing on commons theory should facilitate a better description of the initiatives, not least to find explanations for the success of some discourses over others, in terms of being institutionalized in the society and performing policy change. Another aim of the work is to analyze if there is an ideological construction of a new policy paradigm around the concept of food as a commons and how it is evolving. Mrs. Carceller-Sauras aims to observe and analyze the pace of discourse articulation and institutionalization at different policy levels in Germany. One focus lies on the political, sociological and economic forces influencing these processes. A working hypothesis of the current research of Carceller-Sauras in her doctoral project is that general values have an influence and drive support for certain initiatives in the field of food as a commons.