Forging forms of authority through the sociomateriality of food in partial organizations
Pascucci, S; Dentoni, D; Clements, J; et al.Poldner, K; Gartner, W
Date: 26 November 2020
Journal
Organization Studies
Publisher
SAGE Publications / European Group for Organizational Studies (EGOS)
Publisher DOI
Abstract
This study theorizes on the sociomateriality of food in authority-building processes of partial
organizations by exploring Alternative Food Networks (AFNs). Through the construction of
arenas for food provisioning, AFNs represent grassroots collectives that deliberately juxtapose
their practices from mainstream forms of food ...
This study theorizes on the sociomateriality of food in authority-building processes of partial
organizations by exploring Alternative Food Networks (AFNs). Through the construction of
arenas for food provisioning, AFNs represent grassroots collectives that deliberately juxtapose
their practices from mainstream forms of food provisioning. Based on a sequential mixed
method analysis of 24 AFNs, where an inductive chronological analysis is followed by a
Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA), we found that the entanglements between
participants’ food provisioning practices and food itself shape how authority emerges in AFNs.
Food generates biological, physiological and social struggles for AFN participants who, in turn,
respond by embracing or avoiding them. As an outcome, most AFNs tend to bureaucratize over
time according to four identified patterns while a few idiosyncratically build a more shared
basis of authority. We conclude that the sociomateriality of food plays an important yet indirect
role in understanding why and how food provisioning arenas re-organise and forge their forms
of authority over time.
Management
Faculty of Environment, Science and Economy
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