Post-environmentalism: origins and evolution of a strange idea

Markets dominate the world’s food systems. Today’s food systems fail to realize the normative foundations of ecological economics: justice, sustainability, efficiency, and value pluralism. Drawing on empirical and theoretical literature from diverse intellectual traditions, I argue that markets, as an institution for governing food systems, hinder the realization of these objectives. Markets allocate food toward money, not hunger. They encourage shifting costs on others, including nonhuman nature. They rarely signal unsustainability, and in many ways cause it. They do not resemble the efficient markets of economic theory. They organize food systems according to exchange value at the expense of all other social, cultural, spiritual, moral, and environmental values. I argue that food systems can approach the objectives of ecological economics roughly to the degree that they subordinate market mechanisms to social institutions that embody those values. But such “embedding” processes, whether through creating state policy or alternative markets, face steep barriers and can only partially remedy food markets’ inherent shortcomings. Thus, ecological economists should also study, promote, and theorize non-market food systems.

Purpose of Review Many people in high-income countries obtain considerable portions of their diets from gardening, hunting, fishing, foraging, and raising animals. Yet food security research in these countries has focused on the roles of commercial and charitable food systems, ignoring non-market food self-provisioning. This review brings together existing evidence to build a holistic understanding of how home and wild food procurement (HWFP) interacts with various dimensions of food security in high-income societies. Recent Findings HWFP impacts food security in multiple ways. It can increase food availability, improve dietary quality, provide access to otherwise unaffordable foods, and support the stability of household food supplies through personal hardships and societal shocks, though further research is needed to substantiate when, where, and how these relationships hold. Engaging in HWFP provides people with agency over their food sources and can contribute to shrinking the ecological consequences of food sourcing. However, researchers have identified numerous food safety risks associated with HWFP, as well as ways in which these practices can threaten the sustainability of food systems. More research is needed regarding HWFP’s potential to contribute to the overall food supplies of high-income countries, during crises as well as in periods of stability. Summary HWFP clearly contributes to food security in high-income countries, but many of the concrete contours of this contribution remain to be revealed. Food security researchers should further account for the effects of HWFP, and scholars studying HWFP activities should consider food security as both a driver and potential consequence of engaging in these practices.

Markets dominate the world’s food systems. Today’s food systems fail to realize the normative foundations of ecological economics: justice, sustainability, efficiency, and value pluralism. I argue that markets, as an institution for governing food systems, hinder the realization of these objectives. Markets allocate food toward money, not hunger. They encourage shifting costs on others, including nonhuman nature. They rarely signal unsustainability, and in many ways cause it. They do not resemble the efficient markets of economic theory. They organize food systems according to exchange value at the expense of all other social, cultural, spiritual, moral, and environmental values. I argue that food systems can approach the objectives of ecological economics roughly to the degree that they subordinate market mechanisms to social institutions that embody those values. But such “embedding” processes, whether through creating state policy or alternative markets, face steep barriers and can only partially remedy food markets’ inherent shortcomings. Thus, ecological economists should also study, promote, and theorize non-market food systems.