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Creating pathways to just and sustainable food systems with citizen assemblies
Patricia Schmid1,2, Léa Lamotte1, Michael Curran3
1Centre for Development and Environment (CDE), University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland.
Innovation (Abingdon, England)
|September 5, 2024
Summary
Citizen assemblies can foster sustainable food systems by including diverse knowledge and environmental justice principles. This approach enhances decision-making for a just transformation towards sustainability.
Area of Science:
- Environmental Science
- Political Science
- Sociology
Background:
- Food systems are deeply intertwined with global crises like climate change, biodiversity loss, and health issues.
- Transforming food systems towards sustainability faces challenges due to complexity, uncertainty, and stakeholder value conflicts.
- Citizen assemblies offer a deliberative approach to engage the public in addressing these complex crises.
Purpose of the Study:
- To analyze how citizen assemblies incorporate diverse viewpoints for more effective political responses to current crises.
- To assess the inclusion of environmental justice aspects within citizen assemblies to promote social change.
- To explore how deliberative processes can facilitate a just transformation towards sustainable food systems.
Main Methods:
- Analysis of three nation-wide citizens' assemblies on climate change and food systems in Western Europe.
- Theoretical anchoring in environmental justice concepts.
- Assessment of viewpoint inclusion and environmental justice integration within assembly outcomes.
Main Results:
- Citizen assemblies can integrate a wide array of perspectives, leading to more substantial political solutions.
- Methodologically sound inclusion of diverse positionalities inspires decision-making processes.
- Assemblies can incorporate procedural, recognition, and distributional justice to tackle climate change and food system challenges.
Conclusions:
- Systematic inclusion of varied perspectives in deliberative processes is key for just sustainability transformations.
- Citizen assemblies have the potential to address environmental justice concerns within food system reform.
- Further approaches are needed to integrate non-scientific knowledge into deliberative processes for equitable outcomes.
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