Family farmers, real regulation, and the experience of food regimes

The literature on food regimes gives insufficient attention to the national and regional variability in the experience of food regimes. Two analytical frameworks are integrated for this purpose in this paper. Recent debates on the nature of family farming as a form of production and its relationships to the capitalist economy and further development of the concept of ‘real’ regulation enable us better to understand past food regimes and the processes of uneven development in western economies. Social and political movements in the countryside, often supported by legislation, are suggested as neglected elements in understanding the experience of individual nations within historical and emerging global food systems. By their association in communities, in cooperatives, and in more politically-oriented organizations, farmers are able to influence the form of agro-commodity chains and legislation governing the rural sector, key factors which influence the variability of the experience of food regimes. Our examples are France and the settler economy of New Zealand.