food commons

This entry introduces the concept of food commons in the context of scholarship and activism on commons, commoning, and food systems transformation. I then draw out some key tensions and issues that have surfaced in research on food commons related to questions of materiality, scale, and urban-rural relations. I close with recommendations for approaches that future research can take to address these issues.

Food sharing and food commons have both been raised as possible solutions to unsustainable and unjust urban food systems. This paper draws upon ethnographic research conducted in Berlin and New York to examine self-organizing in community food initiatives that are to varying degrees creating urban food commons by opening up urban space and its fruits to community use, sharing, and governance.