Food, Protest and Collective Action in Córdoba: Eruption, Unrest and Normalization

Dr Martín Eynard, Center for Research and Studies on Culture and Society, National University of Córdoba
& National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CIECS-CONICET-UNC), Argentina.

Photo credit: Daniel Cáceres (2001), Villa El Libertador, Córdoba, Argentina

Organised by PhD Student Eve Hayes de Kalaf
in collaboration with the Department of Sociology and CISRUL
Chair:  Cristina Flesher Fominaya

24 January 2018
Time: 14.00-15.30
Place: Edward Wright F61

Topics of interest: food studies, bodies, collective action, social protest, conflict, access to food, state power

This event builds on the international collaboration of two CISRUL students, Eve Hayes de Kalaf and Chuck Sturtevant with CIECS-CONICET-UNC in Córdoba, Argentina.  Eve and Chuck travelled to the country in September 2017 where they presented their doctoral research at the event (De)constructing Citizens: Nation, Documentation and Bureaucracy in the Dominican Republic and Bolivia

Abstract
At the turn of the millennium, Argentineans witnessed a new phenomenon: the emergence of collective actions to visibilise conflicts over access to food. These activities developed in a variety of ways. They included a rise in social movements demanding improvements in state-led social programs and protests over the closure of soup kitchens. They also led to supermarket lootings and widespread food riots.

We can interpret a lack of food as a threat to the material reproduction of the body, thus limiting its compatibility with the social system (Melucci, 1996). The demand for food can also be considered a network of various conflicts (Scribano, 2005). These are relationally structured to society over any given time and/or space (Giddens, 1995).

This study combines a qualitative approach (semi-structured, in-depth individual and group interviews and observation) with quantitative data (local newspaper articles on conflicts around food). It divides the Argentinean conflict into three key stages: eruption (2001-2002), unrest (2002-2003) and normalization (2003-2007). Each of these stages involves a combination of diverse actors: grassroots activists, piqueteros, government representatives, neighborhood associations as well as other forms of protests and emerging demands. In sum, the project traces the gradual development of a process to facilitate the re-concentration of state power whilst taming and subduing social conflicts over access to food.

Bio
Martin Eynard is an Argentinean sociologist. He holds a degree in Sociology, National University of Villa María (2007) and a PhD in Social Sciences and Humanities, National University of Quilmes (2013). Martin examines issues of health and disease from a socio-anthropological prospective. He has an interest in food studies, including collective action in relation to food. In 2013, he was awarded an ARTESS EMA2 and later a PRECIOSA/EMA2 scholarship at the University of Padua, Italy. In 2015, he participated at the Brown International Advanced Research Institutes (BIARI) and subsequently secured two BIARI Seed Grants to develop research projects in public policy and health in the Global South. Martin teaches at both a graduate and postgraduate level. He is also an active member of numerous academic networks and organizations, including the Street Food Global Network, the International Sociology Association (ISA), the Latin American Studies Association (LASA), the International Commission on the Anthropology of Food (ICAF), the Asociación Latino Americana de Sociología (ALAS) and the Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Sociológicos (CIES).

For more information on this event, please email eve.hayesdekalaf@abdn.ac.uk