‘We’re just an ambulance at the bottom of the cliff’: Strategies and (a)politics of change in Berlin's community food spaces

Abstract

The benefits of community-based, grassroots food practices, such as community gardens or kitchens, are widely acknowledged. However, they have also been shown to support neoliberal and exclusionary dynamics. This paper examines this contradiction on the ground by unpacking the processes and mechanisms through which these initiatives reproduce, reinforce or challenge social inequities and injustices in the city. It suggests the concept of community food space to look at the articulation of practices and intentions within these groups, and highlight emancipatory practices situated around food rather than simply about food. The paper draws upon an ongoing militant ethnography into community food spaces in Berlin, Germany. Exploring the complex and diverse landscape of Berlin food activism, it illuminates the ways in which food may be used to perpetuate unjust social configurations or, on the contrary, to advance social justice at both local and structural levels.

“It's about how you use your privilege”: Privilege, Power, and Social (In)justice in Berlin's Community Food Spaces

“…Over the last two decades, community‐based practices such as guerrilla gardening, food co‐operatives, and community kitchens have challenged conventional food cultivation, preparation, distribution, and consumption in many cities around the world. I use the term community food spaces (CFSs) (Véron 2023) to refer to these grassroots, micro‐political initiatives that counter conventional agri‐food systems and use food to advance progressive politics—from reformist to radical claims. While the notion of community can be ambiguous and post‐political (Aiken 2017; Pudup 2008), I use it to refer, not to a reified and homogeneous object, but to the provisional bonds of solidarity and fluid process of being and doing together in a common space that is characteristic of these initiatives (Kumar and Aiken 2021).…”