volunteerism
Movements in general – whether political, economic, social, or, as in this case, food-associated and therefore spanning the categories – experience moments of creation and constant questioning and adjustment of their values and motivations in the continual process of their operation;
indeed, this is also the mode of their existence. As their name implies, movements are entities on the move, whether they are local (like TP or GAS in Italy [Grasseni 2013]) or global (like Slow Food or the Urban Farming Movement); they are also rather complex structures with the potential for inner conflict and constant negotiation (Siniscalchi 2013: 296). Identifying and defining TP’s values, developed in the course of conflict and negotiation, acknowledges the complexity of its formative circumstances and developmental processes – and it with this task that this chapter engages.
Following Tronto, Muehlebach and Puig de la Bellacasa’s division between ethics and the practice of care in which ethics alludes to caring about and practice implies caring for (I talk in detail about this in Chapter Two), the focus of this chapter lies mainly on the aspects and implications of caring about inherent in the movement’s values and motivations displayed in the process of making the movement. Thus, I provide an in-depth reflection on my perceptions and interpretations of the values, motivations and ideals behind TP as well as those of its participants. I focus on three central values of the movement – organicity, friendship and volunteerism – which were manifestly the most important in the movement’s communication and self-perception during my fieldwork, for a number of reasons. They were listed as values (vērtības) by the participants themselves and, thus, are approached as emic concepts in this chapter. I also show throughout this
dissertation that in practice these three values were both ideals (for example, the imagined tropes of identification in the notion of human-made nature, see Chapter Four) and motivations for the very practical care acts. Moreover, organicity, friendship and volunteerism were also officially defined as central values of the movement and were included in core descriptions of it and often cited in different presentations including educational seminars and the media. Finally, as will become clear in the course of the chapter, these three values became of the utmost importance when the movement was experiencing crucial transitions in its ideas and work and when new and essential changes were suggested and discussed. Indeed, conceptualising the three values became one of the methodological entry points of my research and a theme to which I always referred during semi-structured interviews and conversations with research participants. I aimed to discover how they perceive these values, and what, if anything, they mean in general and for them personally.
This chapter weaves together observations from several events during which these values were raised and questioned, analysis of individual perceptions and interpretations provided by research participants, and my interpretation of the three values in light of participant observation and interviews. The chapter’s narrative follows the linear temporality of a series of changes in the movement connected with what was called bio pāreja (organic transition). I start with a description of the first and one of the most critical meetings (during my fieldwork), held in November 2016, which exhibited some interesting elements of the movement’s politics. It was also my first significant encounter with the movement as a community, rather than as separate participants in the form of my host families.
The organic transition project was intended to mobilise and reorganise the movement in ways that would ensure that the produce it sold would be provided solely by certified organic producers. This intended directionality created or at least illuminated accumulations of understanding of the three main values among the various actors of the movement, accumulations characterised by cracks, ruptures and diversity of perception and enactment. As the chapter progresses, I look at the various perspectives more closely through the lens of consecutive, smaller meetings and conversations with participants.
The organic transition meeting
At the end of October 2015, Zita, one of the founders and leaders of the movement, sent out an email, initially to the members of her branch (in Riga, that was one of the first and core branches of the movement), although it was later circulated among the other branches in Riga and the regions. It contained a call for an urgent get-together. Zita explained that now, as the movement had become almost a brand and symbol for organic provisioning practices, it was time to come together and evaluate whether it was living up to its values and whether the change was required. She went on to list some examples of bad practice that were spreading across the branches: collaboration with too many producers, not enough of whom were ‘honest’;
misperceptions about voluntary work among practitioners and so on. She invited everybody to join the meeting, reflect together on the current situation and engage in a workshop whose goal would be to draw up more specific working principles for the movement in the future.
Zita added that the core of her branch, the founders and unofficial leaders of the movement, were drafting a proposal for these new principles, which would be discussed and used for the workshop; this was necessary to protect the producers and also the consumers’ needs for organic produce (Also in Lammer 2017: 3). Holding meetings and workshops of this nature regularly is not unusual in alternative provisioning systems. Grasseni (2013) writes that GAS (Gruppo de Acquisto Solidale or solidarity purchase groups), in Italy, organises a range of regular meetups, workshops and assemblies to discuss issues including securing produce quality; the role certification plays; balancing informality with the legality in GAS activities; and how to make a more significant impact by educating society and promoting food sovereignty (2013: 10–11). These matters were also topical on a regular basis in TP and were raised at the meeting discussed in this section as well as at other public and more private gatherings of movement participants during my fieldwork.
On the afternoon of Sunday, November 8, I attended the meeting with Jana, the mother of the consumer family with whom I was staying at that time. The room was almost full as we entered and I took a quick count – 20 women,
including me, and nine men. There were representatives from four regional and four Riga branches. One of the male attendees opened the gathering promptly, introducing the first speakers, Zita and Elza – both TP founders – whom he titled ‘mothers of the movement’ with a note of pride in his voice. Indeed, in the popular discourse that circulated among the movement’s most active participants, they were mothers in at least two senses – symbolically as the mothers (founders and caretakers) of the movement and, in very real terms, as mothers to their children. The birth of their daughters also provided the main impetus for establishing the movement in the first place.
Zita presented first and I noted that she did an excellent job.
Her voice was firm and engaging and she had prepared a compelling visual presentation with data on, and evaluation of, the movement’s work so far. I also noticed, however, that Zita had a slight yet detectable hint of irony or even sarcasm in her voice. The tone became explicitly sarcastic as she pointed out that the movement had come to be associated with the organic brand and greenness mainly thanks to ample media coverage during the previous year.
The ironic undertone left me wondering. Did she doubt the movement? Was it a pose? Why did she not want to admit that the movement was an achievement? Irony and even sarcasm are not rare in the tone of voice in an everyday public speech in Latvia. An awkward feeling of imperfection and insufficient achievement is not an unusual component in presentations of business and work results to colleagues and stakeholders in different spheres of social and economic activity. This can be explained by a discourse of envy of others’ achievements and discouragement of success, which have been described in ethnographic work on Latvia in the last ten years. Anthropologist Dace Dzenovska shows that this kind of social environment has influenced recent emigrants to the extent that they do not find the option of a return to the homeland appealing (2012: 180). Sedlenieks, in his research on the collaboration and cohabitation aspects in the small town of Mierpils, Latvia has found that the constant denial and diminishing of one’s own success are, in fact, a strategy – or, as he calls it, a form of ‘therapeutic magic’ – aimed at avoiding possible envy. This overly critical attitude towards one’s own achievements does not necessarily represent
‘reality’; rather, it is an imagined and performed form of
reality that covers up the ‘real’, possibly successful state of affairs. Such a strategy, Sedlenieks points out, has also been common elsewhere in Latvia (2014: 75).
As the presentation at the meeting proceeded, it became apparent that one of the main reasons why people had been gathered was to examine the problems and weaknesses of the movement by reassessing the three primary values:
organicity, friendship and volunteerism. Both ‘mothers’
had gathered some preliminary comments and evaluations about the work of the movement from participants of several branches. Based on this feedback and discussions among the leaders, three main weaknesses in the current work of the movement had been established. Firstly, there were branches with ‘deformed’ ideals (according to the leaders); in practice that meant that these branches were paying the persons in charge, which contravened one of the main principles and values of the movement – volunteerism (more about the challenges of voluntary work in Chapter Nine). Secondly, there was growing disappointment with the fact that the movement was not entirely organic (also one of the main reasons why the meeting was held in the first place). In practice, it meant that branches were collaborating with both certified and non-certified providers. Thirdly, branches were continually struggling with several practical problems and mishaps that were affecting the work efficiency of the movement at large.
To support their stance, Zita and Elza then invited Laima, one of the key influencers and activists of the movement, to join the presentation. At the time of my fieldwork, Laima was working as a consultant in the Countryside support organisation (Lauku atbalsta dienests), thus meeting farmers regularly; she knew their problems and interests better than anyone else present at the meeting. Laima assured the audience that she was ready to talk to them about their willingness to continue collaboration with the movement as entirely organic farmers (meaning certified or on the certification path). She also hoped that these visits would strengthen the friendly relationships between farmers and consumers. Laima’s smile was soon replaced by something between disappointment and anger, however, as she pointed out that, unfortunately, many farmers she sees in her daily work are not living up to the movement’s values, adding sadly that the profit motive drives many of them. Paige West (2012) describes similar attitudes among
actors involved in organic coffee production in Goroka, Papua New Guinea. She explains that those who are not involved in the production of the coffee but rather in the promotion of valuation of it (such as the governor of the province or coffee industry executives) have a ‘clear-cut’
opinion about the motivations and abilities of the farmers’
organic principles (2012: 149). As the promoters and distributors of the organic produce knew better what farmers think and what motivates them to engage in organic production.
According to common perceptions among TP consumers, some farmers’ sole focus on profit was directly reflected in the quality and even the credibility of their produce. The reputations of such farmers were tarnished by accusations of substandard quality, old or tainted produce, irregularities in weight and similar, their dishonesty being seen as both a pursuit of profit and a poor attitude to their crops: two sides of the same coin (I return to the theme of farmers’ profit motives in Chapter Eight).
Laima continued by suggesting that long-term communication with the farmers on the importance of organic principles could change their ambiguous attitude.
She was convinced that mainstreaming the value of organic farming is a doable task, one enabled by the empowerment supplied by the friendship between producers and consumers, another founding TP value. A similar situation appears to exist in alternative food provisioning practice in China where, according to Lammer’s descriptions (2017:
11), consumers also manifest their care towards their
‘peasant friends’ by educating them. To conclude her speech, Laima announced, ‘Let’s claim back a farmer’s face on every product. The farmers need to be known.’
Putting somebody’s face to their produce results in substantially shortening the distance between producers and consumers (physical and emotional), thereby sustaining regular working relationships between actors involved (for a more detailed discussion, see Chapter Nine).
By choosing the value of friendship as one of TP’s building blocks, the founders and active promoters of the movement had the precise aim of reducing the distance between the food producer and consumer; the building and maintenance of friendly relations if not actual friendships were considered a perfect tool to facilitate short term
collaboration. As this subject was also discussed later in the working groups after the meeting, I examine practical suggestions for implementing friendly relations when describing this stage of proceedings.
As an observer, to me, it seemed daunting that all the proposals and solutions for bettering relations and establishing higher standards of collaboration between producers and consumers were discussed solely among consumers themselves. Some attendees also raised this question by asking whether they should invite producers to later meetings to address these issues jointly. The proposal was not discarded, yet there were several persuasive arguments offered against such joint work, mainly expressed by the leaders. Laima also explained that it might be not such a good idea because farmers have such diverse motivations for participation in the movement; moreover, consumers must first be united in, and secure about, their values before they share them with the farmers and the broader social world.
In the following sections, I present more detailed discussions on each of the values listed above. I start with volunteerism as an embodiment of relational care work and then proceed with friendship, which was considered the weakest value by the various participants in the movement.
Finally, I conclude with the value of organic principles, examining different approaches to the view that full organicity would secure the other two values, and the view of TP leaders that the overall existence of the movement was tied up with organic certification.
Building relationality through volunteer work
In the conversations with farmers during my fieldwork, many of the same issues came up repeatedly: why farmers find it necessary to participate in the movement, their motivations, and the values that generate these motivations. There is no doubt that all the farmers with whom I spoke valued the ideological side of organic farming and the crops it produced; as many of them stressed, they did not see an alternative. Organic, in their opinion, was the only way to farm, to treat their own and Latvian land with the highest respect. Many of them thought that TP was a
growing movement that has proved that it can work, one which lets them follow their calling and simultaneously benefit financially – at least to some extent.
It must be stated that none of the farmers that participated in my research solely relied on the income from produce distributed through TP. For most, participation in the movement accounted for, on average, one-fifth of their income from produce they were selling for profit; however, most also admitted that it was not just income which motivated them to be a part of the movement (Lammer 2017: 12). Ideas about taking care of the land and preserving it for future generations were important, even though doing so is challenging and comes with more, mainly emotional, investments than expected. On the ideological and emotional level, the movement allows farmers to feel valued for choosing organic farming practices. On the practical level, some farmers pointed out that the opportunity to avoid the middleman in the form of shops was an advantage. Indeed, one young (under 30) farmer who produced herbs and teas and appeared to be one of the most entrepreneurial and business-oriented producers I met during fieldwork argued that, as he sees it, the movement is not an example of an informal economy in any case. Instead, he says, ‘It has a normal economic formation.’
On the other hand, Gatis, one of the leading organic cereal producers in Latvia, admitted very openly that for his farm, participation in the movement is beneficial mainly because it means they can avoid paying taxes. While appreciative of the so-called grey income, Gatis was very sceptical about what he regarded as the ‘murky’ status of the movement. At the time of my departure from the field in August 2016, the movement was considered to be a non-standard business formation according to the Lativian State Income Office (Valsts ieņēmumu dienests or VID). Even after several negotiations with the ‘leaders’ of the movement, no agreement has been reached between the movement and the VID on how to control the former’s financial flows and regulate its tax collection. Due to this lack of clarity, farmers could choose whether to pay taxes on their income from the movement or not. Furthermore, Gatis was not convinced that the voluntary work of consumers, on which the movement is based, was legitimate. He compared it with the situation on his farm, where no one – not even a family
member if she or he were working in some capacity to produce something that was going to be sold on the market – could be accounted a volunteer. They all had to be registered as employees, as they were participating in a market production scheme.
As we continued the discussion, I gradually changed the focus as I felt that we had a different understanding of the principle of voluntary work. That is not surprising, as, in its popular Western form, it has been introduced to Latvia to only a limited degree in a narrow NGO sector since independence; furthermore, it has not been the object of public education or mainstream, due to the prioritising of other more urgent democratising matters by the state.
Nonetheless, our discussion seemed to leave Gatis with a firm opinion about what are, in his mind, the dishonest workings of the movement.
Voluntarism, like the two other core values of TP’s ideology, must be viewed as having a combination of ethical, social and economic importance. Volunteer work on a practical level is considered valuable because, firstly, it helps to retain and enact the values of organicism and friendship. It
Voluntarism, like the two other core values of TP’s ideology, must be viewed as having a combination of ethical, social and economic importance. Volunteer work on a practical level is considered valuable because, firstly, it helps to retain and enact the values of organicism and friendship. It