Category Archives: publication

New publication: Contesting an exclusive citizenship regime: the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and its electoral mobilisation in Batman in the late 1970’s

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Joost Jongerden and Francis O’Connor have been working on spatial (rural) dimensions of political mobilisation and violence. In this article, they look into the politics of the Kurdistan Workers Party (Partiya Karkerên Kurdistan, PKK) through its engagement in municipal politics in the late 1970s in Batman, then a rural town in the Kurdistan region in Turkey, which rapidly industrialised after the local discovery of oil. Using a citizenship analytical lens, this article makes two substantial contributions. The article challenges overly simplistic, linear narratives regarding the PKK’s origins and its eventual embrace of violence. By analysing the PKK’s electoral and representational politics in the late 1970s, it emphasises the political dynamics of that period rather than reinterpreting its emergence solely through the later insurgency. Empirically, the article illustrates how the Kurdish political movement’s pursuit of representation directly challenged the ethnically exclusionary citizenship regime of the Turkish state.

The article is published open access in Third World Quarterly.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01436597.2025.2518501?src=exp-la#abstract

Publication | Garden time and market time: Finding seasonality in diverse food economies

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by Lucie Sovová and Petr Jehlička, available open access at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2025.104322

This paper combines two fast-developing perspectives on food provision: diverse economies and temporality. Building on an in-depth study of urban gardening in Czechia, we show that non-market economies play a central role in household food practices and that their specific temporality shapes how other parts of a household’s diverse food economy are mobilised at certain times and for certain purposes. Following the diverse economies approach of reading for difference and not dominance, this paper investigates the interrelations and hierarchies among market, alternative market, and non-market food economies on the household level. We decentre the presumed dominance of market-based provisioning by showing that gardeners’ food behaviours are crucially shaped by their engagement with food self-provisioning (FSP), which creates particular understandings of food quality. What is more, the cyclical, natural time of gardening seasons determines the social rhythm of food provisioning in a contemporary urban context. This provides a counter-narrative to the dominant account about the dislodging of cyclical time embedded in natural processes by modern, accelerated time, with the former carrying a lower value than the latter. Finally, we engage with temporality on a discursive level as we counterpose our case of traditional FSP against the fascination with novelty permeating much of the search for alternative foodways. With this, we contribute to the debate on the temporality underpinning the ideas of capitalist modernity as well as post-capitalist prefiguration.

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(Alternative) food consumption practices in Central and Eastern Europe: an integrative critical literature review

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New publication by Lani Trenouth & Lucie Sovová 

Trenouth, L., Sovová, L. (Alternative) food consumption practices in Central and Eastern Europe: an integrative critical literature review. Agriculture and Human Values (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-025-10717-0

Abstract

Research on food consumption practices in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) has grown significantly over the last two decades, documenting the region’s diverse food practices. By focusing on the region’s distinct history and socio-cultural dynamics, this body of work enriches global food studies scholarship and increasingly challenges dominant narratives surrounding alternative food networks (AFNs), which are primarily based on empirical and theoretical work from Western Europe and North America. In this study, we conducted an integrative critical literature review and thematic analysis to explore “alternative” food consumption practices in CEE. Our exploratory, content-driven approach involved reviewing a wide range of empirical and theoretical studies, synthesizing existing knowledge, and extending it through an interpretive thematic analysis. We identified key themes depicted in the English-language academic literature on alternative food consumption practices in CEE, including autonomy, resistance, tradition, identity, informal networks, (dis)trust, choice, and values. We also noted tensions in the literature related to concepts of tradition, culture, Europeanization, overt and covert sustainability, “normal” consumption, and ethical consumption. A recurrent concept in this literature is hybridity, suggesting that many food consumption practices in CEE occupy an ambivalent space, raising questions about notions of “alternative” and “conventional” consumption. Overall, our synthesis underscores the importance of cultural nuances and historical trajectories in shaping regional food systems. With this review, we aim to advance food studies scholarship through an analysis of the evidence emerging from this under-represented region.

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Publication | With whom do you want to be interdependent in producing food?

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JAFSCD article by Margriet Goris (Wageningen University & Research) Daphne Schoop (Wageningen Research), Dirk Roep (Wageningen University) en Jan Hassink (Wageningen Research)

Intentionally shifting interdependencies through territorial food networks

Values-based territorial food networks (VTFNs) hold immense potential for reshaping our food supply, but little is known about how they bring about change. In a new JAFSCD article, “Relational autonomy highlights how interdependencies shift in the transformation of food provisioning,” Goris, Schoop, Roep and Hassink present findings from narrative interviews and observations during fieldwork in three different VFTNs in The Netherlands.

They aimed to understand how shifts in interdependencies in VFTNs come about and what this means for autonomy in food provisioning. The scholars show how mutual autonomy is promoted in relations among farmers, livestock, soil life, plants, citizens by creating opportunities, rights, respect, trust, and capacities amongst others. They state that autonomy is not an individual matter but is created in relationships of interdependency.

This helps us explain how people and nature depend on each other. For example, when we stop using agrochemicals, we depend more on natural processes and other market relations. To make this work, farmers and rural workers need to be able to mimic those natural processes, and to be able to create a fairer food market where everyone shares the risks, acknowledging mutual vulnerabilities and interdependencies.

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Visit members VOKO Utrecht to food forest by VOKO Utrecht

Publicatie | Gebiedsgericht werken: hoe maken we transitie écht werkbaar? 

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“Erken het politieke karakter van transities, combineer actie en leren, want blauwdrukken zijn er niet voor. Ken de mensen en hun emoties, en probeer wat zij doen, ook als is het klein, te zien als zaaigoed voor grotere verandering”  – Marleen Buizer (Rurale Sociologie, Wageningen University & Research)

Hoe geef je gebiedsgericht werken vorm in de complexe transities van het Zuid-Hollandse landelijk gebied? Dit rapport biedt houvast met zeven principes, gebaseerd op twee jaar actie-onderzoek. De inzichten komen voort uit intensieve samenwerking met mensen uit beleid en praktijk die werken aan opgaven op het gebied van water, natuur, stikstof, klimaat en landbouw.

Gebiedsgericht werken vraagt om een samenhangende en context-specifieke aanpak, waarbij de kracht en kennis in gebieden centraal staan. In de praktijk blijkt dit uitdagend: de focus ligt vaak op juridisch-technische maatregelen, sectorale beleidsdoelen en win-win oplossingen, terwijl er in beleid en recht een schijnbare tegenstelling is ontstaan tussen landbouw en natuur.

Dit rapport pleit voor het serieus nemen en voortvarend ondersteunen van gebiedssamenwerking en de mogelijkheden daarvan voor een duurzamere toekomst van het landelijk gebied. Het  biedt handvatten voor beleid en praktijk. Elk principe wordt toegelicht met concrete voorbeelden uit de provincie Zuid-Holland, waar gebiedsgericht werken in de praktijk wordt gebracht.

Dit rapport is het resultaat van het project ‘Actieleren gebiedsgericht werken’, een samenwerking tussen ACCEZ, de provincie Zuid-Holland en diverse kennisinstellingen.

Lees het volledige rapport:

Eindrapport-Gebiedsgericht-werkenDownload
2pager-gebiedgerichtwerken-in-zeven-principes (1)Download

Auteurs: Marleen Buizer (WUR), Mara de Pater (DRIFT, EUR), Saskia Ruijsink (TU Delft/LDE), Tobias Hofland (ACCEZ).