Abstract
Good nutrition plays an important role in the optimal growth, development, health and well-being of individuals in all stages of life. Healthy eating can reduce the risk of chronic diseases, such as heart disease, stroke, diabetes and some types of cancer. However, the capitalist mindset that shapes the food environment has led to the commoditization of food. Food is not just a marketable commodity like any other commodity. Food is different from other commodities on the market in that it is explicitly and intrinsically linked to our human existence. While possessing another commodity allows for social benefits, food ensures survival. Millions of people in United States of America are either malnourished or food insecure. The purpose of this paper is to present a critique of the current food system using four meanings of the common good--as a framework, rhetorical device, ethical concept and practical tool for social justice. The first section of this paper provides a general overview of the notion of the common good. The second section outlines how each of the four meanings of the common good helps us understand public practices, social policies and market values that shape the distal causal factors of nutritious food inaccessibility. We then outline policy and empowerment initiatives for nutritious food access.
Highlights
A significant number of people in the United States of America (USA) are confronted with food insecurity [1,2,3]
We will refer to the common good as an analytical tool, an accusatory-rhetorical device, a normative concept and a practical tool that may possibly shape the search for a better understanding of the origin of and concrete solutions to nutritious food inaccessibility
When we use the common good to address the accessibility to healthy food in the USA, we move away from focusing on the individual access to food and on individual vulnerability to poor diet to a focus on the social determinants of access
Summary
A significant number of people in the United States of America (USA) are confronted with food insecurity [1,2,3]. The market imposes limits on the state’s intervention in individual pathology and welfare, and favors the growth of unjustifiable inequalities that weaken the cohesiveness of society and validate, implicitly or not, racism and socioeconomic exclusion It is, regrettable that an important public health issue such as the access to healthy food would be discussed among some policymakers and intellectuals “exclusively within the dominant discourse of political individualism, relying either on the harm principle of Mill or a narrow paternalism justified on grounds of self-protection alone [22]”. They have to develop and implement policies focused on favoring the social inclusion of low-income population groups, challenging neighborhood segregation and addressing other forms of social inequities To achieve these goals, both federal and state government would expand their partnerships with marketing boards, transportation providers, and food manufacturers to increase availability while limiting increase in cost of healthy foods. To increase chances for locally-grounded actions, federal governments need to support and encourage the work of subsidiary bodies
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