Constructing Quality: Emerging Food Networks in the Rural Transition

Abstract

In this paper some of the main reasons for a renewed examination of the relationships between globalisation, the state, and rural development are analysed. It is suggested that there is a need for conceptual development that will allow a study of transnational and regional ‘food networks’ and an analysis of how these networks are embedded in social and political processes and practices. The approach is deliberately integrative and broad based, with existing tensions in current literature identified.