Boundary Negotiations in a Self-Organized Grassroots-Led Food Network: The Case of REKO in Finland

Maria Ehrnström-Fuentes and Hanna Leipämaa-Leskinen
Additional contact information
Maria Ehrnström-Fuentes: Department of Management and Organisation, Hanken School of Economics, 65100 Vaasa, Finland
Hanna Leipämaa-Leskinen: Department of Marketing and Communication, University of Vaasa, 65200 Vaasa, Finland

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 11, issue 15, 1-22

Abstract: Self-organization is a term that is increasingly used to describe how engaged citizens come together to create sustainable food systems at the local community level. Yet, there is a lack of understanding of what this self-organizing activity actually means. While previous literature has addressed self-organization as an outcome of building consensus and a collective intentionality shared by the members of a group, we focus on the complex social processes involved when people with a diverse set of interests and motivations interact in the food network. In this study, we analyze what kinds of boundary negotiations emerge when grassroots-led food networks scale up. Our embedded single case study focuses on a REKO (‘REjäl KOnsumtion’, meaning ‘fair consumption’ in English) network in Finland comprising distributed local food groups and three types of actors: consumers, producers, and local administrators. We examine a conflict that arose within the REKO network in May–June 2016 when a small group of actors demanded that all local groups should implement similar rules, principles, and ethical standards. Our findings illustrate how moral, geographic, market, and power boundaries emerge in a self-organized grassroots-led food network. We further explicate the challenges that may appear within a self-organized grassroots-led food network, as it grows in scale and scope.

Keywords: alternative food network; boundary negotiation; grassroots innovation; food ethics; self-organizing community; sustainable food (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/15/4137/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/11/15/4137/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:11:y:2019:i:15:p:4137-:d:253360

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().