Inspiration through material
The know-how about clay can and must be understood in a broad sense; let us remember, among others, that of the peasant and the farmer or that of the ceramist and the potter, to mention but a few. For a long time, the two professional communities worked hand in hand, one providing the content and the other the container. With the industrial revolutions and modernity, the links that gave us direct knowledge of who did what were gradually broken. For these two sectors, the industrialisation of processes, that brought about the transition from mixed farming to specialised intensive agriculture the former, and from local manufacturing, using locally extracted raw materials for the most part, to mass-produced objects, often made far away and in other materials, in the latter - has destroyed the intelligence (from inter legere, which means to make connections between things) of our world. In this forum, we will focus more specifically on the content, i.e. the produce of the land, our daily diet.
This observation, which is very briefly summarised here, has triggered a remarkable trend in contemporary sociology: the importance of questioning intermediation and information distribution channels. This work, most often in the sociology of work, produces a snapshot of today’s society revealing growing aspirations for relationships unobstructed by intermediaries. In a business context, they refer to more direct interpersonal relationships in management and to an explicit flow of information, without the filter of intermediaries, the accumulation of which would obscure a good understanding of what is done at work and to what end. This desire for a society without mediation seems to be permeating all areas: social networks are preferred to traditional media, which are steadily losing ground, and the purchase of raw materials to be processed oneself is valued and promoted ahead of the ready meal, which is certainly a symbol of modernity but whose ingredients are largely unknown to us. Sociology, particularly Durkheimian sociology, however, implies leaving this observation without it becoming speculative, i.e. it leaves it up to politicians to make decisions about the social choices that it could imply. It is clear that this lack of mediation leads in two pathways, one positive – it is undoubtedly better, for example, to know what we are eating and who produced it – and the other negative – social networks have also given voice to the most outlandish and even dangerous theories, including conspiracy theories, lies and the manipulation of opinions or votes. This aside was necessary to better understand the current interest, unfolding against the backdrop of an environmental crisis unprecedented in the history of humanity, in the know-how of the earth.
Today, an increasingly small portion of the working population provides us with our food. Decade after decade, this drastic reduction in the agricultural sector is also contributing to this loss of intelligence that characterises this sector of our economy. The continuous series of agricultural crises, from overproduction in certain sectors in the 1980s to the current, unfortunately well-founded fears of a loss of food sovereignty, are fuelling concerns for society as a whole. The new agrarian revolution that will entail a reappraisal or even the complete undoing of the recent legacy of intensive post-war practices. To do this, we also need to understand how it works – specialisation by region, land concentration, heavy mechanisation, increased inputs (synthetic fertilisers and pesticides), etc. – and what partly caused it: agricultural underproduction and food rationing in the decade following the end of World War II. Let’s keep in mind that this episode is very recent in our history, and a change in today’s production methods would require a change in attitudes over a short period of time. The reappraisal of the agricultural world will not happen without farmers, and contrary to what is so often said or written, most of them are trying to find solutions. But this quest is made all the more difficult when we remember that their median income is among the lowest of the working population, combined with an abnormally and sadly very high suicide rate. We need to understand before making hasty judgements. Then we need to help or even collaborate. Help begins with our food choices and incentives for organic farming, the costs of which will eventually fall as it develops. Unfortunately this development has been slowed down by post-Covid inflation. The question of the final price of our food must be asked differently. It is an eminently complex political issue, but for certain categories of products, we have been accustomed to excessively low prices, negotiated in a very uneven balance of power by the purchasing offices of the major supermarkets where two-thirds of the population do their food shopping. While the issue of the cost of living must obviously be taken into account, the answer cannot be to produce at a loss or with very little added value for the agricultural sector. This slippery slope is, for example, what is being proposed by Mercosur. In this free trade agreement, Brazilian ovoproducts, as they will be labelled for export, are obviously cheaper than eggs produced in France. This is just one example, but are we aware of the reality behind this production? A poultry “farm” in Brazil can house almost 300,000 hens under gigantic sheds who will never see the light of day… Just like cultural goods, food - an “agricultural” good? - cannot be a consumer good like any other. (…) •
