Michael A Haedicke

Organizing Organic

Conflict and Compromise in an Emerging Market

• Gebundenes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

Drawing on extensive interviews and archival sources, Growing Markets, Cultivating Change tells a new story about the organic foods sector. Michael A. Haedicke shows how the development of this market was spurred on by attempts to reconcile diverging goals of expansion and social transformation.

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Produktdetails

• Verlag: Stanford University Press
• Seitenzahl: 240
• Erscheinungstermin: 18. Mai 2016
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 231mm x 155mm x 20mm
• Gewicht: 481g
• ISBN-13: 9780804795906
• ISBN-10: 0804795908
• Artikelnr.: 44382526

Autorenporträt

Michael A. Haedicke is Associate Professor of Sociology at Drake University.

Inhaltsangabe

Contents and Abstracts
Introduction: Visions of Transformation and Growth: Institutional Logics
and Social Processes in the Organic Sector
chapter abstract
This chapter introduces the transformative and expansionary logics that
exist in the organic sector, using both illustrative vignettes and formal
exposition, and explains the book's twin goals of (1) understanding the
development of these logics during the sector's history and (2) examining
the relationship between these logics and the activities of sector
participants. It locates this project in the context of scholarship about
institutional logics and discusses the book's relationship to other
literature about organic farming and the organic movement. It also explains
how the concepts of interpretive framing and organizational/institutional
work provide insight into links between contradictory logics and social
processes of conflict and compromise. Finally, the chapter provides a
summary of key arguments and a plan of the book as a whole.
1Breaking Ground for a New Agriculture: Transformation and Expansion during
the Organic Sector's Early Years
chapter abstract
This chapter examines the origins of the transformative and expansionary
logics in the organic sector and makes the argument that ideas and
practices related to both market expansion and sociocultural change were
present during the sector's early years. It discusses a number of cultural
influences that shaped organic farming between approximately 1945 and 1975,
including advocacy for alternative agriculture and natural foods, the 1960s
counterculture and ecology movements, and mainstream understandings of
efficient market organization. The chapter also contends that widespread
conflict did not occur, despite the existence of divergent cultural
understandings, for two reasons: (1) the organic sector's decentralized
character and (2) the tendency of advocates to downplay tensions between
the divergent understandings. These arguments are supported by examinations
of farmers' groups and retailing arrangements and by analysis of the work
of the organic advocate J.I. Rodale and other writers in the magazine
Organic Gardening and Farming.
2Stabilizing the Market, Dividing the Field: Federal Regulation, Field
Settlement, and the Emergence of Conflict
chapter abstract
This chapter discusses the passage of the Organic Foods Production Act
(OFPA) of 1990 and the subsequent development of the National Organic
Program (NOP), which established federal rules for the organic trade. It
argues that OFPA and the NOP sparked conflict in the organic sector by
prioritizing market growth and by marginalizing transformative ideas and
practices. The chapter explains how problems associated with the expanding
organic trade and a disruptive food scare created the conditions for OFPA's
passage. It also examines how sector members worked at the legislative and
institutional levels to bring democratic arrangements associated with the
transformative logic into the regulations. These efforts resulted in a
stakeholder advisory group known as the National Organic Standards Board
(NOSB), but they did not prevent dissident organic foods farmers and
consumers from mobilizing around frames that questioned the legitimacy of
the federal regulations.
3The Rise of Big Organic: Market Convergence and the Elaboration of the
Expansionary Vision
chapter abstract
The finalization of the National Organic Program (NOP) accelerated the
growth of the organic market. This chapter unpacks related changes that
have occurred in the post-NOP period. First, it describes the erosion of
economic and organizational partitions between the organic foods sector and
the mainstream food industry through a process that is labeled convergence,
paying special attention to organic foods retailing. It then argues that
newly arrived sector members have transposed cultural schemas from the
mainstream business world to organize their work in the organic sector.
This has elaborated expansionary understandings by (1) providing a moral
justification for market growth, (2) contributing to the marginalization of
countercultural businesses and critical activists through boundary work,
and (3) relegating consumers to the role of purchasers by encouraging their
exclusion from discussions related to organic regulations.
4The Politics of Organic Integrity: Reasserting Transformative Ideals from
the Margins
chapter abstract
The organic foods market's growth has fueled the efforts of activist groups
who reassert transformative understandings of organic farming. This chapter
discusses how activists frame market growth and convergence as a corporate
takeover of the organic foods sector. It explains how this frame provides a
means to link specific regulatory issues, including those related to
synthetic ingredients, antibiotics, livestock management, and others to the
larger issue of organic integrity. It identifies specific obstacles that
activists face when they try to influence the federal organic regulations,
and it also discusses how they use this frame to mobilize consumers to
participate in boycott campaigns. Finally, it describes an alternative,
less contentious response to market growth and convergence: the decision of
some small-scale farmers to exit the sector and organize alternative
certification programs that go "beyond organic."
5Caught in the Middle: Negotiating Compromise in Organic Co-op Stores
chapter abstract
This chapter analyzes how co-op stores, which were created as part of the
1970s counterculture, have navigated the organic sector's shift in the
direction of market expansion. It argues that the history of co-cops and
their position in the organic market create ambivalence about their
activities and priorities, and that this ambivalence also appears in co-op
leaders' assessments of the organic sector's convergence with the
mainstream food industry. The chapter also documents how members of co-ops
have negotiated hybrid organizational arrangements and practices that
strive for compromise between the goals of market growth and systemic
change. Several examples of hybrid arrangements are discussed, including
(1) the unification of co-ops into a democratically run "virtual chain,"
(2) flexible store policies related to merchandising and product selection,
and (3) education programs that encourage consumers to think reflexively
about the products they buy.
6Institutional Logics and Social Processes Revisited: Insights from the
Organic Sector
chapter abstract
This chapter reviews the book's major arguments and discusses the study's
implications for understanding multi-institutional fields (in general) and
the future of the organic foods sector (in particular). Four arguments
regarding multi-institutional fields are advanced: (1)scholars should
examine moral and emotional, as well as cognitive, aspects of logics,
(2)multi-institutional fields encourage reflexive creativity,
(3)identifying social mechanisms will increase knowledge about how conflict
emerges (or fails to emerge) in multi-institutional fields, and
(4)consumers may play a minor role in guiding the development of ethical
markets. Regarding the organic sector's future, the chapter argues that the
expansionary logic's dominance has yielded important gains, but that
attention should be paid to revitalizing democratic arrangements and
practices.