ABSTRACT
Rapid growth in demand for, and sales of, certified fair trade products has stimulated considerable debate over whether fair trade commodity chains risk co-option by the mainstream food sector. Alternative trading networks that link producer groups, traders, dedicated 'world' shops, and consumers. It is increasingly common for participating groups to seek certification as Fair Trade Organisations by the International Fair Trade Association (IFAT). It is possible to argue that there is something fundamentally wrong with offering up for sale the rights of some rights such as freedom from poverty and access to education as items of personal consumption for others. The chapter refers the 'co-option thesis', the core components of which can be summarised to include the commodification and consumption of justice, the logical contradiction of trying to work 'in and against the market', obscuring relations of production, codification and de-radicalisation, exclusion and polarisation, subsumption of control, and erosion of standards.
