Food Riots or Food Rebellions?

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via CommonDreams:




Published on Thursday, March 25, 2010 by Civil Eats

Food Riots or Food Rebellions?
Eric Holt-Giménez Looks at the World Food Crisis

by Julia Landau


Eric Holt-Giménez, Executive Director of Food First/Institute for Food and Development Policy recently partnered with Raj Patel and Annie Shattuck to bring us Food Rebellions: Crisis and the Hunger for Justice. Recently, Holt-Giménez spent a weekend in New York to introduce his new book and open a conversation about these rebellions.

Perhaps you've heard the stats: between 2007 and 2008 approximately 40 food riots occurred around the world. In Mexico, corn prices made tortilla, a staple of the country's diet, prohibitively expensive for the nation's poor. In Haiti, soaring food prices led people to the streets, and eventually to overthrow the Prime Minister.

Yet were these riots or rebellions? For some, the distinction may seem small. These were not spontaneous anger outbursts fueled by mob mentality. They were not riots. Rather, they were conscious, political acts. They were rebellions. The objectives of a rebellion-agency and intention-are the essential implications of the word itself. They are not just a reaction to food prices-they are a protest.

But a protest against what, exactly? The simple answer: against the causes of the food crisis. But Holt-Giménez draws an important distinction between what he calls the "proximate" and "root" causes of the global food crisis. It is the difference between symptoms and sickness. .........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/03/25-11