Authority, power and value in contemporary industrial food systems.

Abstract

Within agro-food studies there is a growing appreciation that power is not limited to the interplay between actors engaged in production and consumption. Belatedly, actors in the spheres of distribution and exchange are being acknowledged, as is their role in the processes being enacted to constantly recommodify foods through reconceptualizing their values. The mobilisation of product branding and other “intangible assets”, including a corporate persona as authoritative, helps to explain the restructuring of contemporary industrial food systems. An examination of the Australian chicken meat commodity complex reveals how large food retail chains are positioning themselves as authority figures. The study confirms the emergence of a new form of authority in relation to food, i.e. market-mediated authority. The argument pivots around the activities of an ‘intermediary sector of the economy’, comprising experts and professionals who contribute to the setting of cultural standards around what is legitimate in food systems. This particular class fraction undertakes three activities in support of market-based authorities. First, it provides corporations with third party associations with more traditional authorities, especially health authorities; second, it mobilises symbolic capital to renew corporate charisma; and third, it brokers producer-consumer relations through providing expertise. The paper concludes that consumer authority is fleeting within a context of the corporate manipulation of intangible assets.