This is a great overview of the many problems with our current precarious food stuation and the ways in which policy shapes our palates! I found some of the examples lacking in detail, and much of the book was old news for me. But the bibliography and many great links to more information are well worth the price of the book. An outstanding resource and introduction to the topic of food sovereignity. ( )

Wide-ranging, engaging, systems-perspective analysis of the global markets in food, their control by a relatively small number of corporate giants, and the effect of that control on both farmers and eaters. For someone who's been trying to wrap my brain around how globalization works, this was very helpful; little connection-explosions kept going off in my brain while I read.

Patel's main objective is for farmers and eaters reclaiming local "food sovereignty" -- farmers having access to their own local markets, and farmers and eaters being able to determine their local food and farming policies. Food soveriegnty is contrasted to the current system of externally-imposed constraints and illusory choice: farmers and consumers being required to choose from a diminished range of possibilities, even while their selections being triumphantly bandied by propagandists as "free choice." I especially appreciated his highlighting of activist farming organizations, such as Via Campesina and Brazil's Landless Workers' Movement, and his acknowledgment of the limited usefulness of activism via consumerism is refreshing. Patel also explicitly discusses issues of class, sex, race, and colonialism as they intersect with food justice, which made me very happy to see.

Additionally, Patel keeps Stuffed and Starved from being dry and heavy. He works in Monty Python references and lots of gossippy factoids about the genesis of TV Brand dinners or why the British National Grid pays so much attention to major television events. There's plenty of interesting dinner-party conversation hooks here, if you were so inclined.

I strongly recommend this book to anyone who's interested in Michael Pollan's work, or who is interested in issues of obesity, starvation, free trade, and other issues of food justice. Patel also maintains a related website -- stuffedandstarved.org -- with updated news, educational articles, resources, and action items.

Extensive history of the politics of food. ( )

An essential read for anyone who cares what they eat and where it comes from. ( )

http://www.stuffedandstarved.org/drup... ( )