Introduction: Covid‐19 and the conditions and struggles of agrarian classes of labour

Abstract

Covid-19 generated a crisis in capitalism, but not of capitalism. Capitalism reproduces itself in crisis and in ways that have significant but uneven impacts on the conditions and struggles of agrarian classes of labour. This article explores preliminary studies of how Covid-19 has affected agrarian social formations in Africa, Asia and Latin America and the farmers, petty commodity producers, labourers and agribusinesses who populate them. It considers some of the implications for wage-labour, agriculture, accumulation and social reproduction including care work. And it briefly considers Covid-19's political impacts-in terms of the role of the state and possibilities for challenging capitalism, its violence and its ecological crisis.

A critical agrarian approach to food crises: Social distance as a specific food crisis arising from the COVID-19 pandemic in Japan

“…The Covid-19 pandemic reveals the complex and manifold ways in which food systems respond to disruption. At the global scale, Covid-19 underscores the deepening crises inherent to the corporate food regime and the imperative for questioning, resisting, and supporting alternatives (Altieri and Nicholls, 2020;Clapp and Moseley, 2020;Nemes et al, 2021;Pattenden et al, 2021;van der Ploeg, 2020). Specific food crises thus have the potential to reconfigure food systems.…”

“…Just as the general food Crisis intersects with specific food crises, so too does the Covid-19 crisis introduce global dynamics that enact and respond to situated disruptions. The Covid-19 pandemic originated from a virus, but its impact soon extended beyond public health to encompass economic, food, and mental health crises that intersected with structural inequalities and discrimination that operate across racial, sexual, and geographic lines (Mehta et al, 2022;Pattenden et al, 2021;Sultana, 2021;van der Ploeg, 2020). Rather than enacting a single specific food crisis, Covid-19 can be better understood as triggering multiple specific food crises simultaneously.…”

Global food insecurity as a crisis of social reproduction for the classes of labour

“…The commodified world food system, from its production to distribution, circulation and consumption under neoliberalism, revealed its contradictions and fragilities under the pandemic to an unprecedented degree. On the one hand, the agrarian capital faced significant challenges, especially during the first months of the pandemic, due to the factors such as the slow-down of commodity flows; on the other hand, the classes of labour – small-scale producers and consumer households – faced challenges such as the micro-food crisis of difficulty in selling and buying products (Pattenden et al, 2021; Stevano et al, 2021). These were the direct reflections of the commodification of the means of production and social reproduction under the corporate food regime.…”

Peasant Livelihoods in Times of Covid-19: A Classical Agrarian and Political Economy Perspective

“…This is particularly evident, given the way in which it is seen as having intensified inequalities and exposed the multiple structural flaws of capitalism (Stevans et al 2021). It is also seen as having exposed the weaknesses and vulnerabilities caused by neo-liberal policy priorities particularly in processes of social reproduction and in capitalist-oriented world food systems (Pattenden et al, 2021). For Lambert et al (2020), Covid-19 has been significant in exacerbating already existing inequalities with ethnic and geographical differences becoming clearer.…”

“…For Lambert et al (2020), Covid-19 has been significant in exacerbating already existing inequalities with ethnic and geographical differences becoming clearer. It has exposed hitherto hidden fault lines in social structures resulting in mistrust, fuelled xenophobic tendencies, degraded political and legal institutions, exposed racism in care work and reproduction, increased women’s work burdens and exploitation (Stevano et al, 2021, From a labour perspective, it has negatively impacted on all classes of labour with the hardest hit being the precarious casual labourers, the different agrarian classes, migrant labourers and petty commodity producers in different parts of the world (Kaur and Kaur, 2021; Pattenden et al, 2021).…”