The Fine Line Between Decent and Indecent Work in Italy and the US: Agricultural Work at the Intersection of the Community, Supply Chains and the State

Considering the importance and centrality of agricultural supply chains in the global economy and the related structures of vulnerability that are intrinsic in how food is produced, where food represents both a need and an important source of profit, and therefore of inequalities, agriculture can be viewed as one of the organizational fields most characterized by episodes of labour exploitation. In more detail, labour in agriculture is characterized by an interconnection of different domains, that is immigration, housing, transportation, and health, as well as a lack of labour protections to mention some of the different areas of intersection. Thus, agriculture compared to other industries represents the area of the economy where alternative and creative forms of labour organizing appear to be more necessary and required. On this subject, community unionism represents one important response. Nevertheless, despite the peculiarity of agricultural labour, research at the intersection of agricultural labour and community unionism is still underdeveloped, especially with a comparative approach aimed to highlight systematically the common trends at the global level. This doctoral research aims to advance this literature on community unionism by proposing a conceptualization of community unionism in agriculture that is empirically grounded on a comparative research about community unionism in Italy and the US. From a theoretical perspective, I draw on critical sensemaking, the related concept of sensegiving, and Freire’s critical pedagogy theory. This choice is motivated by the adoption of Freire’s popular education by many workers’ organizations, and by the intention to propose a framework that, through Freire’s reflection on oppression, is a critical reconstruction of alternative organizing in agriculture as a set of sensemaking and sensegiving processes aimed to reshape agricultural contexts. Therefore, this research expands existing literature regarding community unionism, by proposing a conceptualization of exploitation and community unionism in agriculture. This conceptualization is based on three contexts of power and agency at which challenges to decent work – and therefore responses to them - happen, i.e., community, supply chains, and the state.