Introduction

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book demonstrates that the most visible figures within the strategic action field of local food increasingly realize that they have to confront the powerful incumbent system of industrial food production if further progress is to be made. It analyzes the recently emergent sharing economy through a cultural lens. The authors seek to understand the extent to which new forms of platform-based economic exchange might be the seedbed of nascent post-consumer lifeways that are more egalitarian, communal, and environmentally sustainable. The book discusses sharing economy and Marlyne Sahakian, draws on insights originally developed by Karl Polanyi to amplify the distinction between commodified modes of collaboration and forms of exchange that enhance social cohesion. It examines a related case pertaining to the "eat-local" movement. The book focuses on reform of the financial sector which will invariably be important for any transition beyond consumer society.