Practicing social change during COVID-19:Ethical food consumption and activism pre- and post-outbreak

Abstract

In addition to upending nearly every segment of the economy, COVID-19 has uprooted social life as we know it and the innumerable discourses and practices therein contained. While a terrible event, it can also be approached as offering a once-in-a-lifetime (hopefully) natural experiment. This is certainly true as far as the global pandemic applies to how and what we eat, given how it has radically altered many everyday food-related practices, whether due to supply chain failures or state-mandates (e.g., shelter-in-place orders). This paper is based on data collected pre- and post-outbreak, triangulating survey and qualitative data, in an attempt to further interrogate the concepts of ethical consumption and activism broadly defined, including the idea of consumer activism. With conceptual assistance from social practice theory, the paper interrogates certain long-standing questions in the literature, such as ethical consumption's link to other forms of political action. It also poses new ones, such as by disentangling the various ways individuals do (and do not do) ethical consumption. Finally, the data suggest tentative empirical and conceptual paths forward as we contemplate ethical consumption and social activism more generally in the shadow of COVID-19.