The Reformed Committee on Food Security. A briefing paper for ...

For rural social movements whose existence is often founded upon grassroots struggles for survivalin the context of antagonistic power relations and competing interests, the move to collaborative action– especially with the range of “stakeholders” included within the category of participants, someof whose actions and attitudes are associated in the experiences of the movements with the difficultiesthey face on the ground – will be difficult and more than likely undesirable for them.For these actors the historical project has been to defend the interests of their members - and the waysof life within which they are embedded – through, amongst others, the articulation of rights claimsmaking use of existing legal frameworks – such as the Right to Food; through seeking the enactmentof new legal instruments – such as a Charter on Peasants Rights; and through the development offrameworks such as Food Sovereignty – which assert both the political meaning of food and the politicalsubjecthood of smallholder producer and providers, whilst seeking to defend locally orientedand ecologically sustainable (agri)food systems. A defensive posture is not a collaborative one and,for those charged with managing the implementation of the CFS reforms such as the Bureau, creatinga process which recognizes and accommodates the historical (and contemporary) experience of ruralmovements (and the virtual impossibility of participating in a collaborative project whilst your owngrassroots existence is under threat) – will be fundamental to the CFS realizing its mandate of ensuring:That the voices of all relevant stakeholders – particularly those most affected by food insecurity - areheard.(CFS:2009/2: Paragraph 7).35