Markets as arenas of struggle for Rrecognition: moral disputes in the construction of food qualification devices

Abstract

The sense of the markets as arenas where economic agents are engaged in struggles for recognition has not yet been appropriately incorporated in the agri-food studies, which make it difficult to understand some process of distinction and qualification. By proposing a dialogue between Theory of Recognition and Economic Sociology, this paper analyzes the moral disputes that take place in the construction of food qualities. The focus turns to the labels that identify products from family farmers, indigenous and quilombolas communities. In response to a history of disrespect and injustice, these farmers are beginning to use markets for their struggles for recognition, claiming values that distinguish their social identities. The institutionalization of these labels, under government protagonism, reveals a kind of evaluative conflict opposing a particularistic logic that defends the labels only in products closely associated with the identities of these social groups, and a generalistic logic that argues for a wide dissemination strategy, by associating the labels with a large range of agro-industrial companies and cooperatives products.