ABSTRACT
If food sovereignty is to be the banner for a broader struggle, then the campaign for the sovereignty of food producers will need to be embedded in struggles for:
. the social function of property, which is about the collective obligation to organize the means of production, including land, seeds and capital, in ways that benefit society and nature as a whole;
. the social function of food and livelihood – or the ‘right to be free of want’, which is how, in a landmark legal case, the judicial system in the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul interpreted the right of landless squatters to remain on their land (Houtzager 2005);
. the struggle to increase value and distribute according to need, which is embodied in the vision of food sovereignty to build agroindustry in rural communities to increase economies of scale, create forward and backward linkages and generate added value, all under the control of those who labour;
. the social function of political representation, which requires democratizing access to representation through building ties to sympathetic political forces.
