The New Food Activism

New book with contributions from Real Food Media staff and partners

The just-released book includes a chapter authored by Real Food Media team member Tanya Kerssen on land access and a chapter by Joann Lo from our partner Food Chain Workers Alliance on food worker organizing. Check it out!

The New Food Activism: Opposition, Cooperation, and Collective Action (available from UC Press) explores how food activism can be pushed toward deeper and more complex engagement with social, racial, and economic justice and toward advocating for broader and more transformational shifts in the food system. Topics examined include struggles against pesticides and GMOs, efforts to improve workers’ pay and conditions throughout the food system, and ways to push food activism beyond its typical reliance on individualism, consumerism, and private property.

“A convincing roundup that demonstrates that the food movement is (finally) coming of age, The New Food Activism is a chronicle of a dozen important victories around agriculture, justice, public health, and more, which points the way toward a future in which food is increasingly a focus of crucial rights movements. A must-read for food organizers and their allies.”—Mark Bittman, food columnist and author of How to Cook Everything

“People want to eat ethically, and to do that, they need to care about the well-being of workers throughout the food system. This book highlights a promising direction for food activism, one that puts the lived experience of those who grow, cook, and serve our food at the center of its call for systemic transformation.”— Saru Jayaraman, author of Forked: A New Standard for American Dining