Solidarity and Differentiation: Coalition-Building among Progressive Agrarian Movements in Germany

This project focuses on coalition-building processes between organisations in progressive agrarian movements and groups representing seasonal workers in Germany. It examines how movement members navigate various forms of differentiation in their discursive and organizational practices. Fieldwork with Arbeitsgemeinschaft bäuerliche Landwirtschaft (AbL, part of the food sovereignty movement) and Netzwerk Solidarische Landwirtschaft (SoLaWi, part of the movement for community supported agriculture) will provide an empirical account of coalition-building processes. To do so, the project employs a research design that draws on theoretical and methodological approaches from critical agrarian studies and social movement studies. Political ethnography is combined with discourse analysis to study how political alignment and organisational structures are produced, contested and maintained and how this shapes coalition success. This deepens the understanding of coalition-building processes and develops relevant insights into progressive agrarian movements in Germany, at a time when media and academia largely focus on the threats of right-wing (agrarian) populism

Funded by: BOF
Time Period: 2025-2029
People involved: Svenja Hitzemann