For the love of goats: the advantages of alterity

Ann Finan ()

Agriculture and Human Values, 2011, vol. 28, issue 1, 96 pages

Abstract: Small-scale, artisanal livestock production is framed as “other” by conventional livestock producers, and rural communities. This alterity, although not without cost, allows women to be involved as active entrepreneurs and managers in artisanal livestock production and also allows farmers to pursue management strategies with the explicit purpose of enhancing animal welfare. The case study presented here, an artisanal goat dairy farm managed by three women, demonstrates that by embracing feminine care identities, these women carve a space for themselves within livestock production in which they can pursue their own economic and affective goals. Analysis of ethnographic data also demonstrates that farmers’ decision-making regarding animal production is based on both affective and instrumental concerns. If we are to understand and operationalize the affective component of farmer decision making based on the livestock–farmer relationship, we must begin to consider to what extent livestock themselves are social actors. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011

Keywords: Animal welfare; Farmer decision making; Goats; Livestock—Rationality—Sustainable agriculture; Women farmers (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2011
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s10460-010-9284-8 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

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:spr:agrhuv:v:28:y:2011:i:1:p:81-96

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/10460

DOI: 10.1007/s10460-010-9284-8

Access Statistics for this article

Agriculture and Human Values is currently edited by Harvey S. James Jr.

More articles in Agriculture and Human Values from Springer, The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS)
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().