Organizing for Fair Food: An analysis of a campaign to incorporate farmworker rights into the alternative food movement

In the American alternative food movement’s promotion of local, animal-friendly food systems, concern for workers who produce our food is largely absent. Farmworkers, the majority whom are Latino immigrants, are among the most exploited workers in the U.S, rendered vulnerable by both immigration policy and agricultural laborers’ exclusion of from the National Labor Relations Act. 

Drawing on participant observation in the organizing campaign for Farmworker Justice in New York, this presentation uses Gusfield’s work on the formulation of public problems to discuss a reframing of the food movement’s calls for local, farmer-friendly, and sustainable food systems to include the largely invisible struggle for farmworker justice.

A food justice approach to reforming the food system requires fighting for farmworker rights alongside local food. One means to realizing a more just food system in New York is rendering visible farmworkers’ role in the food system in order to engage allies across social movements in the work of campaigning for a new labor law that would advance farmworkers’ rights and political power. 

Building alliances between the movements for food justice and immigrant and worker rights is critical for creating a fair, well-functioning food system. In order to develop multisectoral alliances, it is vital for advocates to critically examine what strategies work to connect with audiences in different places (suburban communities, on farms, in Albany). This presentation analyzes the ideological work that is part of effective social movement building, and presents recommendations for food justice advocates in other states across the U.S.