Security for Whom? Changing Discourses on Food in Europe in Times of a Global Food Crisis

Over past months, food security has become a familiar phrase in the European mass media – something unprecedented in recent decades. The reason for this renewed interest in food security is related to a sequence of events that has deeply altered public discourse on food, agriculture and – in a more general way – on the role of the state. Four specific crises – occurring in quick succession and thereby suggesting to the general public that they are strongly linked – are at the root of this change: the environmental crisis, the oil crisis, the food crisis and, more recently, the financial crisis.