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This is to certify that the
thesis entitled

VISIONS FOR DETROIT FOOD SYSTEM
IMPROVEMENTICITIZEN, ACTIVIST, AND PROFESSIONAL
PERSPECTIVES

presented by

Charlotte Litjens

has been accepted towards fulfillment
of the requirements for the

Master of degree in I Community, Agriculture,
Science Recreation, and Resources

 

 

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August 7, 2009

 

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VISIONS FOR DETROIT FOOD SYSTEM IMPROVEMENT:
CITIZEN, ACTIVIST, AND PROFESSIONAL PERSPECTIVES
By

Charlotte Litjens

A THESIS
Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of
MASTER OF SCIENCE

Community, Agriculture, Recreation and Resources Studies

2009

ABSTRACT

VISIONS FOR DETROIT FOOD SYSTEM IMPROVEMENT:
CITIZEN, ACTIVIST, AND PROFESSIONAL PERSPECTIVES

By

Charlotte Litjens

Food and agriculture projects are receiving attention as a strategy for urban revitalization
and redevelopment through local food system improvement. The localization involved
there-in can reveal tensions between visions and perspectives held by citizens, activists,
and professionals in the areas of economic development, public health, or environmental
stewardship. This paper discusses these often-competing Visions present in change
initiatives in the urban food system of Detroit, Michigan, where a central urban area is
left largely under-served by full-service grocery retail. Factors motivating actors to
pursue change in their local food system along with the factors mediating that change
were gathered in thirteen interviews and four focus groups. Problems with the urban food
system, visions for the future, and desired strategies were explored. Data was analyzed
inductively. Overall findings reveal concerns for social equity, parity in food
environment, and community vitality; and challenges regarding access to information
regarding food quality and production, and opportunity for participation. Food system
entrepreneurship and participation in the local economy were interpreted as a form of
activism toward racial justice. Tensions were revealed between consumer and activist
identities, race and environmental values, education and empowerment, and participation
and funding as they relate to social change. Most are united behind the vision of making

the city a more sovereign leader in sustainability, equality, and economic productivity.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to thank everyone who supported me during the writing of this thesis. First
and foremost, I am grateful for my parents and three sisters, without whose genuine
interest and tireless support of many forms 1 am doubtful I would have either entered or
finished this program. I was also extremely lucky to have been graced with a forgiving
and good-humored graduate committee. AS a student of an inter-disciplinary program I
often attempted to make claims based on what could fairly be considered a “sea of
knowledge ankle-deep,” and thanks to their patience and open-mindedness, I was able to
include a wide array of disciplinary perspectives in my literature review. Dr. Wynne
Wright was especially proficient in reigning me in from various trajectories and keeping
me focused with both theory and data analysis. Dr. Katherine Alaimo’s experience in
qualitative research was invaluable for data collection and analysis, and her careful
critique of the writing and figures in this finished thesis are appreciated.
I have much to thank my advisor Mike Hamm for, including giving me a strict 2-year
timeline so that I finished on time, during which I was given many great opportunities
and experiences as his graduate assistant. I greatly appreciate the thoughtful, genuine
attention he gave to not only this research project to but my concerns, qualms, and plans
as a graduate student and an activist, despite a consistently packed professional schedule.
Most notably though, I am thankful for the enjoyable atmosphere that he maintains
alongside a dedication to quality research and meaningful outreach.
Kathryn Colasanti, my co-researcher, was supportive in countless ways, and I am grateful

for all of her help as we worked beside each other for the past two years. I am also

iii

indebted to fellow graduate students Maggie Fitzpatrick and Kate Nault, whose help
before the defense of this thesis was invaluable.

I must also thank the Kellogg Foundation and the Fair Food Foundation, whose funding
made this project possible. I enjoyed working with these organizations and was honored
to serve their research needs. Last but not least, Sarah Treuhafi of PolicyLink deserves
acknowledgment for co-designing and developing the research protocol for their mirror

project in Oakland, CA. Working alongside PolicyLink was also an honor and a pleasure.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF TABLES ................................................................................... vii
1. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................... 1
Theoretical Framework and Context ................................................................. 3
Collective Action and Resistance ........................................................... 3
Individual Resistance ................................................................. 4

Social Movements ..................................................................... 6

Urban Social Movements ............................................................ 6

Resource Mobilization ............................................................... 9

Framing, Ideology and Culture ............. ' ..................................... ll

Established Frames .................................................................................... 15
Eating local .................................................................................... l 5

Urban Justice and Community Development ............................................ 17
Sustainability .................................................................................. 20
Experts and Construction of Reality ................................................................ 22
Sustainability .................................................................................. 23

Public health ................................................................................... 24

Social justice ................................................................................... 24
Detroit’s Local Context ................................................................................ 25
Rationale for this study ................................................................................ 27
2. METHODOLOGY .................................................................................. 3O
Rationale for Qualitative Research ................................................................... 30
Design .................................................................................................... 31
In-depth interviews ............................................................................ 32

Focus Groups .................................................................................. 34
Purposeful Sampling and Participants .................................................... 37
Informed consent process ................................................................... 40
Analytical Approach .................................................................................... 41
Content Analysis ................................................................................ 41

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION I .......................................................... 44
Findings ........................................................................................... 44
What are major factors in eating/shopping habits of residents? .................. 45

Food consumption and preparation ......................................... 45

Grocery retail ................................................................... 47

Access ............................................................................. 48

Summary ........................................................................... 50

What are current strategies, areas of need and opportunities for improvement?..51

Food production ..................................................................... 52

Nutrition education ................................................................ 56

Production as an educational tool ................................................ 57

Improving retail ..................................................................... 58

Summary ............................................................................ 61

V

What are major factors for leaders of food system change? ......................... 64

Financial resources ............................................................... 64

Outside funding ..................................................................... 66

Organizing and community-building ............................................ 67

Summary ............................................................................ 71

Discussion ............................................................................................. 72
4. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION II ............................................................. 74
Findings ................................................................................................ 74
Diagnostic frames ........................................................................... 74

Diet and food quality .............................................................. 74

Distrust in the Industrial Food System ......................................... 77

Food access and retail ............................................................ 80

Prognostic frames ............................................................................ 81
Education ............................................................................ 81

Improving retail and access ...................................................... 83

Economic development and participation ...................................... 85

Motivational Frames ........................................................................ 88
Motivating around “what works” ................................................ 92

Master frames ................................................................................ 95

Public health ........................................................................ 95

Economic development, community-building, and equality ................. 95
Environmental sustainability ..................................................... 97

Summary ...................................................................................... 98
Discussion .................................................................................... 99

5. CONCLUSIONS ................................................................................. 100
6. REFERENCES .................................................................................... 105
APPENDIX A: Interview questions ............................................................... 105
APPENDIX B: Focus group questions ........................................................... 108
APPENDIX C: Consent forms ..................................................................... 115
APPENDIX D: Coding guide ....................................................................... 121
APPENDIX E: Case display example ............................................................. 129

vi

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1: Sampling Information .................................................................... 40
Table 2: Focus group themes ....................................................................... 51
Table 3: Focus group themes ....................................................................... 62
Table 4: Interview themes ........................................................................... 64

Vii

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

The impetus for community-based food system change in Detroit takes place in the
midst Of a broader surge in both popular fascination and grave concern over food, eating,
and agriculture. While chef celebrity-hood reaches unprecedented heights, proponents for
the environment, human health, and social welfare have joined progressive farmers in a
call for reform of the modern American food system. Popular media has gone so far as to
elevate the status of alternative food activity such as the White House organic garden to a
“revolution” (Martin 2009) Driven primarily by public health and economic crises, there
are a number of ways that problems with the food system are framed. People from a
variety of perspectives have engaged around the way food is produced, distributed,
processed, prepared, and accessed in America. For critics of the commodification and
industrialization that characterizes the modern food and agriculture system; effects of
environmental degradation, health consequences, and social inequity experienced by both
producers and consumers are cited. For environmentalists, distance between producers
and consumers-is increasingly seen to create an atmosphere of anthropocentric,
ecologically reckless consumer behavior, where American shoppers have come to expect
variety despite seasonality, and depend on cheap and abundant food at the expense of
ecological and farm-level economic viability. This View is emphasized by the growth in
popularity of “local” food systems. At the same time, other proponents of food system

change might emphasize complacency with poor quality food and resultant health

consequences. Within this growing drive for changing the American food system, the
diagnosis of problems and remedies prescribed are various.

Beyond public health, environmental, and economic concerns; concepts of food
justice, food sovereignty, and food democracy have been injected into the discussion by
both activists and academics to promote the welfare of those who suffer the greatest
consequences of the current arrangement. While they are diverse, one common thread Of
these notions is the ideology opposing corporate power and a globalized food system,
promoting a relocation of power to communities to allow and encourage greater citizen
participation in the way food is produced and eaten.

Within this movement toward re-localization and democratization, the urban food
environment has gained attention. The disparity in access to a healthy, satisfactory diet
ofien afflicting urbanites of economically struggling de-industrialized zones has been
legitimated as a major problem by the public health field. In Detroit, such problems with
the food system have been accentuated by extreme conditions, leading to an aggrieved
populous and increasing resident organization around changing the food system.
Stakeholders Of local movements such as this Often participate for various reasons,
coming to the table with various motivations, beliefs, and backgrounds (Wright et a1.
2007)

This study concerning how social change is worked toward for Detroit’s food
system has two main purposes. The first is to understand what problems are being
experienced directly, what strategies are being used to improve the food system in
Detroit, and what are the implications for intervention? The second purpose is to explore

the impetus behind these interventions and desires for change; examining the social

process of the collective framing of problems and solutions by citizens, activists, and
professionals in Detroit, exploring which dimensions of change are contested and which
dimensions are shared between various actors. In order to elicit both structural and social
concerns around the food system, qualitative methods of focus groups with citizens and

interviews with professional and activist leaders were used.

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK AND CONTEXT

Theory of social movements provides a framework for discussing how this process
occurs, as well as the ways in which power, culture, and resources have been shown to
mediate social change. The literature is used to develop the two main themes: first, the
problems with the food system and approaches to structural change. Second is the
dialectical negotiation of how frames are either adopted or Opposed in the process of
collective action. TO do this, the way social resistance to the dominant order takes place
is first discussed, followed by the relevant domains from social movement theory. The
dominant frames and framers of urban food system problems and solutions are then
considered, and finally, introduction of Detroit’s historical and structural context as it sets

the stage for this research.

COLLECTIVE ACTION AND RESISTANCE

This section introduces theory concerning social resistance and social movements.
First, the impact of individuals on social change is discussed, followed by an introductory
definition of social movements. Next the resource mobilization social movements theory

is discussed relative to considerations of structural change. Finally, consideration of the

discursive process Of framing problems and solutions is explored with reference to the

framing, ideology, and cultural social movements literature.

Individu_al Resistm

The body of academic work around community-based food systems is paired with a
growth in governmental, private philanthropic, non—profit, and community-based
ventures as well as popular dialogue. While there is a large body of work on hegemony,
resistance, and agency, this study takes resistance to mean a re—gaining of control from
dominant groups and established forms of development, or hegemonic forces. However,
resistance and power are often shown to be more embedded and multi-dimensional than
straightforward opposition to a monolithic and dominant order, and should be examined
in the context of institutional constraints, processes of knowledge and power, and
material affordances (Long 2008; Johnston 2008 a). From this view, power is normalized
both from the top-down and bottom-up, and individuals can participate in community-
based food projects through smaller actions such as purchasing decisions, critical
thinking, and civic participation in community gardens and food banks. Social movement
theorist J .C. Scott illustrated that when people perceive that they have little power for
changing oppressive conditions, deep ideological resistance can be represented by
symbolic or “ordinary,” day-to-day actions (Scott 1985).

Though activism in the food system has historically been focused on farmers, a
shift in focus toward consumers has emerged, marked by both a concern for food security
in low income urban populations, and popular adoption of the idea that the food system

can be changed through ethical consumption. Consumers are key actors in the global food

system, and shopping can provide an entry point to political engagement (Johnston
2008a). However, there is debate around the extent to which market opportunities provide
opportunities to exercise citizenship. Critics of consumerism challenge the idea that the
desires for personal happiness can be met through commodity choice, and the idea of
food citizenship, or interacting with food and agriculture in ways beyond purchasing food
is being promoted by many advocates.

While there are many different conceptions of social justice, for most it represents a
condition where capabilities are distributed evenly and freely. This means not only equity
for all in material distribution, but also capability for self-sufficiency, dignity and
meaningful existence (Hinrichs and Allen 2008). Johnston (2008 b) explores the
ideological enmity between these two ideals: where consumerism is rooted in self-
interest, citizenship embodies a responsibility to act in the interest of the social and
ecological commons, such that social justice might be worked toward. She contends that
in typical contemporary market spaces, it is difficult to achieve a balance between
consumerism and citizenship; and in growth-oriented corporate settings such as big-box
health-food retail, reconciliation is impossible because when profit and consumer choice
is prioritized, goals of citizenship are unattainable (Johnston 2008b). These theories
suggest that markets may simply be inappropriate venues for social justice projects.
However, localization schemes often emphasize consumers choosing ethically, and the
discussion of access to a healthy diet takes place within the market, such that capacity to
act is framed by the identity as a consumer. This framing of citizens as shoppers may
have an effect on the success of mobilization over issues concerning social justice in the

food system, in contrast to civic-ally focused agri-food ventures.

Social movements

Social movements theory is part of the study of social change. While it is Obviously
important to examine collective resistance for this research, attention to the large expanse
of literature in this area is beyond the scope of the project. A brief summary of general
social movements theory will provide orientation for the discussion of the theoretical
subset areas of urban social movements, resource-mobilization, ideological framing, and
cultural power that are specifically relevant to this research.

While concern over food is an exigent topic of popular social conscience and
academic discourse, there is disagreement among sociologists and activists about whether
it is a true social movement. The direction toward politically motivated spending is at
least considered to carry potential to become a powerful social movement, or “social-
movement-based” (Bonnano and Constance 2008; Allen 2004). Social movements have
many definitions, but common properties include collective challenge, solidarity, and
sustained interaction (Tarrow 1994). Social movements can be either oppositional,
directly challenging institutions such as government or markets, or alternative, integrating
into them. Within this dichotomy, there is tension between ideological vision and
feasibility, as well as incremental versus radical change. One view is that alternative
projects may not carry enough force to challenge institutionalized inequity. Many smaller
community food projects focused on health education and skills provision are seen by
some to fall short of making lasting change in structural problems of the food system
(Dowler and Caraher 2003). However, there are many actors and collectives that find the

greatest potential in working within the system. There is consensus that social

movements are in reality more complex than this division, as they are in continuous
formation that builds on successes, failures, and changing contexts (Fainstein and

Fainstein 1985).

Urban social—movements

While hardship is insufficient to instigate mobilization of social movements,
economic forces can help support new ways of thinking that are essential for founding
social movements (Gramsci 1971). Social movements in the urban American north have
been spurred by dramatic shifts in economic and political structure in the past century. In
the 1950s, capitalization of southern agriculture caused migration of Afi'ican Americans
to the north, and de-industrialization of the 608’ and 705 left large populations of lower
class racial minorities, catalyzing the rise of urban social movements (F ainstein and
Fainstein 1985). The 1980’s saw an economic downturn, with political-economic
restructuring in the interest of profitability relative to social welfare. Although there was
a moment where it was unknown if popular resistance would prevent such restructuring,
the Reagan era was characterized by lowered wages, exported jobs, redistribution of
wealth toward the upper class, and generally tough times for the working class and poor
(Harvey 2005) making it difficult to organize. Disappearance of social services,
affordable housing, institutions, and resources along with population shifts characterized
by “white flight” made for a cycle Of urban decline beginning in the 1980’s. In both
contrast and concurrence to this ghettoization, the re-development and gentrification of

working-class neighborhoods into upper-class work and retail space instigated a backlash

that was the beginning of modern urban social movements in several American cities
(F ainstein and Fainstein 1985).

By definition, urban social movements (USMS) have local political, economic, or
any other types of power structure as their target for change, often supported by certain
cultural and ideological conditions. An example of such conditions lies behind the black
power and civil rights movements, where dimensions of geographical space and ideology
helped organize a movement targeting issues of race, class, and ghettoization (Fainstein
and F ainstein 1985). Specific urban conditions, and not just broad economic conditions,
mediate ability for USMS to rise. This includes the political opportunity, the unity of
urban elites, and the presence of oppositional consciousness for a critical mass (F ainstein
and Fainstein 1985). The waning Of USMS since the 19703 is attributed to the use of
economic conditions to reduce political power of oppressed classes by dominant political
actors, as well as a lack of a counter-ideology to these powers in control of resources, the
political process, and economic restructuring resulting in racial segregation and
workforce changes (Fainstein and Fainstein 1985). However, as modern economic
conditions spur widening critique of neoliberal economic development in general, the
idea of increased democratic participation in urban development processes as posed by
Harvey and others in the 1970’s has returned. This resurgence is evidenced by, for
example, the growing presence of the “Right to the City” coalition in most major US
cities, whose mission for urban social justice rests on the idea that the use of physical

space is a manifestation of power (Goodman 2009).

Resource mobilization

Resource mobilization theorists focus on how skills, commitment, trust, land, and
financial resources are necessary for success of social movements (McCarthy and Zald
1977). This theory envisions social movement participants as rational strategists geared
toward achieving specific goals and interests, through aggregating and organizing
resources.

The question of financial resource importance in social change is a contentious one
within the realm of urban grassroots development. As attention to food at both the
research and community project level has increased, private and public funding in this
area has grown accordingly. In urban settings, the partnership between community
groups and their funders is considered by some as a new “regime” which takes up where
government leaves off. There is a concern that elite outside funders have professionalized
and privatized authentic community development, creating a power hierarchy with little
government oversight (Martin 2004). Where including broad community interests
requires financial resources, there is the problem that wealth, by definition, accumulates
for those benefiting from the status quo; thus it is often not in the interest of private
partnerships to undertake projects that seek genuine change (Allen 2004; Silver 1998;
Johnston 2008). The general paradoxical relationship between poverty, social problems,
and capacity for organization (Silver 1998) is a persistent problem. Most professional
leaders come from privileged positions, and do not experience social injustice directly,
and those oppressed can face obstacles to participating in movements. Class divisions are

reproduced by even the most egalitarian of arrangements between funders and

community members (Silver 1998). There can be problems with tokenism as well, where
the input of oppressed populations is used for legitimation but is limited or not
meaningful (Allen 2004).

In addition, there is concern that organizations are pressured to re-invent
themselves to accommodate funding interests, and that practitioners do not advocate
radical changes in the food system to avoid alienating funders (Dowler and Caraher 2003;
Martin 2004). The concept of co-optation is often used to represent such a dilution of a
potentially energetic force for advocacy by elite power, which is able to bend instead of
breaking in the face of protest. Powerful actors and institutions may employ strategies to
bring movement leaders and participants into the established system, “taking protest
issues as their own but treating them in a superficial way (Silver 1998).” The sustainable
agriculture movement has illustrated this process as its political acceptance has meant
reducing food system problems to a set of technological and scientific practices, fiee of
the underlying values of the movement (Campbell 2001; Allen 2004).

Private foundations can have a stabilizing effect on activism as resource
mobilization theorists assert, but within communities there can be consequences (Silver
1998). One such effect is a professionalization Of organizations: while formalized
organization is enabled and credibility and capacity are boosted, advocates can become
distanced from the constituencies that are actually experiencing the problems targeted.
Furthermore, the deep conviction underlying a movement may become buried under
organizational and legitimation projects. In addition, outside funding can encourage
development of separate organizations leading to competition and diffiision of efforts

(Martin 2004). This tension between conviction and credibility is an established

10

dimension of movement politics, as movements must Often negotiate between the
possibility of co-optation and radical fervor. In this, a certain reflexivity is required for
many leaders whose work involves compromises and politics of the middle that preserves
strategic opportunity for legitimacy, alliance and partnership. There is “tension,
uncertainty, and creativity between principled ambitions and quest for practical relevance
(Campbell 2001).”
Framing, Ideology, and Culture

The study of ideologies and framing emphasizes the cognition behind social
movements, while also exploring the process of social meaning-making and situation
definition as guided by underlying principles (Snow et al. 1986). Ideology and framing
theory is important for understanding construction of collective identity, motives,
mobilization, and political culture (Oliver and Johnston 2005). Frames are strategically
used for momentum-building in movements through increasing recruitment, promotion,
and funding. Consensus in ideology is especially important in particular for movements
that don’t organize along class lines, and must find common grounds for organization,
such as the environmental movement (Silver 1998). Furthermore, some social movements
scholars contend that grievances must be analytically constructed and articulated before
collective action can take place. This type of “intellectual work” thus forms a pre-textual
foundation for social movements (Shurman and Munro 2006).

Frames are dynamic and flexible depending on social context, and there is a
difference between the structure of frames, related ideologies, and the process of framing
(Oliver and Johnston 2005). Focusing on process instead of structure reveals the socially

constructed nature of frames and ideologies as signifying and legitimating processes for

11

the way meaning is ascribed to events and conditions. Social movements theorists Snow
and Benford (I986) devised categories for framing in the various stages of social change.
First, diagnostic framing assigns blame to the source of the motivating grievance. Here
consensus is typically problematic, in that agreement on the exact cause of the problem is
unlikely. Because mobilization does not occur based on merely diagnostic framing,
consensus here is not necessary for a prognosis, or devised plan of action. Successful
prognostic framing rests on belief that the outcome will be effective and that action is
urgent and of moral imperative. However, because cultivating this type of optimism is
dependent on how clear and acceptable potential solutions are, prognostic framing is not
sufficient for mobilization without motivational framing that makes action seem feasible,
effective and worthwhile (Snow et al. 1986). Success in motivating action depends upon
the relevance to life-world and alignment with belief systems or frames subscribed to by
targeted recruits. In this respect, culture, common sense, and local “folk” meanings come
into play, and local historical and cultural factors affect what is seen as feasible (Lyson
2004; Bagdonis, Hinrichs et al. 2009).

Frame analytic approaches can be used to provide understanding of social
movements (Benford and Snow 2000). Wright and Reid (forthcoming) explore
construction and content of frames used in discourse around biofuels, exploring how
frames use larger political and economic context and symbols of mainstream culture to
gain power socially. In a study of farm to school initiatives, Bagdonis et. al found the
importance of “champions” in framing and agenda-setting, as they bring both personal
commitments and organizational agendas to social movements (Bagdonis et al. 2009).

Additionally, Wright et. al (2007) showed how professional stakeholders participating in

12

collaboration on a community-based food system project held various “interpretive
frames,” or those that align with personal beliefs but represent an outside organizational
or collective ideology (Wright et al. 2007).

Construction of public reality can be seen as a battle between ideologies. Social
movement actors and members of dominant groups can both create flames, and as
framing is a type of knowledge construction, power negotiations are inherent. Dominant
actors are those who have authority over the creation of “common sense,” through the
media, political organization, or other means. Because those in power often have
privilege of information and measurement tools for problems and crises, they are able to
name the problem, thus creating dominant frames.

Collective action frames often go against hegemonic frames that are seen as most
legitimate and make up the common sense (Coles 1998). In an illustration of framing by
political power during wartime, Coles (1998) showed how hegemonic ideologies can be
brought into question by counter-movements, and must be re-legitimated (Coles 1998).

The process of framing and counter-framing ofien relies heavily on mainstream
cultural norms (Wright and Reid Forthcoming). Ideology is dynamic, nuanced, and
embedded in culture, and resistance to hegemony can be seen as a power struggle
between actors for cultural leadership (Johnston 2008; Coles 1998). Framers of
movements are part of the creation of culture. Culture contributes heavily to the
formation and efficacy of social movements in that it shapes how ideas are built upon and
how visions for change manifest (Swidler 1995). Knowledge and skills are situated
within culture, and thus culture and power are inextricably linked. Therefore, formation

of ideology and conception of one’s own power takes place depending on one’s social

13

surroundings. The strength of this effect varies based on how deeply ingrained culture is
for subjects, and how it is socially communicated (Swidler 1995).

Social movements can seek change through cultural innovation, reconstructing
values, personal identities and cultural symbols; contributing to the emergence of
alternative life-styles. This is important in that many of the concerns for re-shaping the
food system through community-based projects involve a shift in culture and behavior.
Cultural codings are one of the most powerful ways to create change. Such cultural
change is often prescribed for the problems of the food system, especially at the
consumption level. For example, Johnston (2008) argues that we must create positive,
pleasurable alternatives to consumer spending to make change in the food system, as the
quest for pleasure and beauty is a human desire. We must create a believable and
palatable vision for “a way of living that is not primarily tied to identity construction
through commodity purchase” (p. 103). Furthermore, some scholars posit that the popular
exploration of the pleasures, trends, and consumption of food needn’t be diametrically
opposed to academic and advocate concern for injustices of the food system, and that a
bridging of the pleasure and protest is in order. By broadening the discussion beyond
rational and economic considerations of the food system through engagement of the
cultural and sensual dimensions of food along with values of social justice and
environmental stewardship, a more relevant discourse can be created (Delind 2006;
Johnston 2008).

However, none of this is to suggest that mobilizing ideas are first conceived by
movement leaders and then simply applied to a blank-Slate public. Framing efforts and

mobilization are a dialectical process built on the use of pre-existing discourses and

14

“common sense” of dominant culture (Coles 1998). Building on Marx’s work, Gramsci
(1971) brought to light the understanding that the consciousness necessary for
mobilization of the oppressed could only come from a self-goveming, self-educating
group. In this View, the way subaltem classes fight oppression is through the rise of
organic intellectuals and their transmission of ideas to a new, more self-confident
proletarian culture. Similarly, McAdam (1983) introduces the idea of cognitive liberation:
when conditions change, individuals can experience a change in mindset that, when
aligned with fi'ames that problematize the same conditions, can provide a basis for action.
This can de—legitimize the system in power, and develop a sense of efficacy for affecting

social change.

ESTABLISHED FRAMES

This section begins by using the symbol of the “local,” or community-based food
system to bring together the variety of ideologies that underpin the drive toward a more
equitable and sustainable food system. After considering the rise of the “local” concept,
introductions to each of the major motivating principles, or master frames that comprise it
are provided: public health, sustainability, and social justice, as they relate to the urban
food system.
Eating “Local”

In 2007, the New Oxford American Dictionary selected the word “Locavore” as its
word of the year, meaning “a person who attempts to eat only foods grown locally
(Oxford University Press USA 2007).” This highly publicized choice legitimated the

widening adoption of campaigns advocating the revitalization of locally based food

15

economies in order to reduce energy use, invigorate local economies, and decrease
distance between producer and consumer. Advocates of “local” are often politically
motivated to regain local control and re-connect actors in the food system, thereby
enhancing civic values. Arising from political-economic critique of resource distribution,
the concept of “reclaiming the commons” calls for re-orienting socio-economic
development toward equity and sustainability and away from a solely market-driven
doctrine. From this perspective it is contended that in an era of neo-liberal development,
equitable and sustainable use of common resources is thwarted by commodification of all
goods and services, an over-emphasis on individual responsibility, and over-dependence
on the market for life-goods. As part of strategies for development based on self-
sufficiency that are on the rise globally, food sovereignty projects challenge this
established political and economic power through revitalizing localized production and
consumption (McMichael 2003).

Domestically, the concept of civic agriculture, as introduced by Tom Lyson
(2004), suggests that re-claiming the commons does not necessitate discarding market
logic altogether, but re-embedding markets in social structures to ensure better equality
and sustainability, while creating an economy of care (Winter, 2003) through democratic
control of the food system. This idea converges with the most recent revival of urban
agriculture and community gardening, as strategies for increased civic interaction and
community improvement. While community gardens in cities have emerged and re-
emerged at several points throughout history, the most recent versions arise at a time
when changing the food and agriculture system at the local level is receiving increasing

academic and popular attention.

16

However, localization is a contentious issue. The assumption that local food
systems are inherently more ecologically friendly and equitable has been challenged, and
critical vigilance in these areas called for (Bellows and Hamm 2001; Winter 2003;
Hinrichs, 2003; Allen 2004). Furthermore, Lyson’s (2004) vision of civic agriculture
based on localization does not directly challenge the mainstream food system. It is
alternative rather than oppositional, and activist and academic ideologies vary as to the
urgency of reforming the fundamentals of the modem conventional economic paradigm.
In addition, localization Of the food system has been shown to reveal tensions between
traditional routes of economic development, public health, environmental stewardship,
and the visions and perspectives of citizens. Small communities are not immune to power
imbalances, and “geographical proximity does not reduce social and economic distancing
(Allen 2004, p 172).” Thus, the emergence of “local” as a frame for action has been a
process of social construction built on existing ideologies that by nature of the concept,
depends heavily on local context.

Urmn Justice 3nd Community Development

Historically, the city has been the focus of many a utopian vision. As concern over
environmental impact and population growth mounts, discourse around building more
sustainable equitable urban communities takes on greater importance. Globalization has
led to a loss Of resources in most industrial cities, where governance has deteriorated,
leading to grassroots and non-profit organization and provision of services where the city
has left off. According to geographer David Harvey (1993), a loss of faith in governance
has created a mass adoption of local citizen action as a means for improving conditions in

the city.

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A conventional economic development frame views food system problems as a lack
of capital flow and participation in markets, to be remedied through supporting local
development, motivated by the right to a high quality of life. However, mainstream
technocratic modes of economic development dominate most visions and the built
environment in the city. The power involved in imposing a vision on urban Space is
discussed by scholars of urban political economy. This tradition of urban analysis focuses
on the reproduction of inequality in cities. David Harvey’s I973 foundational work,
Social Justice and the City called for creating a revolutionary geographical theory to deal
with the problem of the ghetto, bridging the study of the built environment with theories
of culture and power and providing a foundation for the idea that the built environment
reflects power negotiation between dominant and subordinated classes. He uses the
relationship between economic process and space to show how development merely
shifts racial and class lines outside the boundaries of development (Harvey 1973). Where
social justice is equated to democratic opportunity, neoliberal objectives of capital
accumulation are manifested through large-scale economic development projects and
gentrification that are limiting to socio-economic well-being (Fainstein 1997; Florida
2002)

Though this literature traditionally focuses on land-use and housing, it aligns with
community-based food system work in that it advocates for local control and
participation of all classes of citizens in decisions over development of land and
economy. Authors such as Zukin (1997) have begun considering cultural strategies for
the re-development of cities, where development is embedded in non-market, or perhaps

post-consumer values, such as the creation of an arts economy in New York. While this

18

method is often used as a last resort, when there is little perceived potential for a return of
industry (such as is the case in Detroit), these cultural institutions have the power to grow
in economic value and thus mainstream legitimation. Cultural forms of economic
development, public spaces, and historic preservation are means with which power can be
asserted against capitalist control and mainstream economic development, with the power
to change community image and thus economic promise. It is worth exploring how these
projects democratize and challenge hegemonic urban visions (Zukin 1997), especially
through the practice of using vacant land for urban agriculture in cities to target food
insecurity.

Another field concerned with strategic urban improvement is the community-
building field, which attempts to strengthen structures to provide opportunity and
resources through community-level processes. Community-building, community-
development, and community-organizing are all modes Of empowerment for oppressed
urban populations. However, there is contention about how, as community-building gains
power and legitimacy as a strategy for promoting equity, it requires professionalization of
services and a catering to outside interests in the process. Fraser et. al (2003) offer a
political-economic critique of community development, arguing that modern efforts
toward community-building are characterized by outside stakeholder initiation and
implementation, and produce a set of effects more useful for “professional community
builders” than those targeted, i.e., the poor. Specifically, the production of a particular
spatial Vision of the city most useful for private ventures of real-estate development. This
focus of scale, space, and place gives community building power and legitimacy in the

economic development world (Fraser et al. 2003). However, in cities where markets for

19

real-estate and industrial development are slowing, community-based land development
may have a different set of concerns. Where the food system is concerned, the struggle
of legitimation for community groups takes place both around land development as well
as access to other resources such as capital.
Sustainability

An environmental sustainability fiame views conventional agriculture as
problematic for ecosystem health and human sustenance, which can be fixed through
reforming methods, motivated by ecological ethics and beliefs about the future. This call
for making agriculture more sustainable is partly driven by environmental consequences
of large scale, resource intense farming including concerns about detrimental effects of
soil erosion, pesticide use, petroleum-based inputs, nitrogen loss, monocultures, and
genetic engineering (Hurt 2002). In addition, problems with scale have arisen where the
smallest and largest producers have best access to markets, through direct marketing and
commercial chains respectively, leaving the mid-sized farms economically vulnerable
despite their comparative advantage of highly differentiated production (Kirschenmann et
al. 2004). Methods of sustainable production, shifting towards smaller organic
production, as well as localization of the food system have been explored as solutions by
both academic researchers and the public, encouraged by a growing consumer desire for
such an embedded quality (sustainability) in food. A focus on production using small
plots in urban settings has also begun to take place in some arenas, forging conceptual
connections with the urban planning and community development fields. It should be
noted that the term sustainability is beginning to encompass the social interactions

between man and nature in addition to the more traditional concern for ecosystem

20

integrity and natural resources (Lawn 2006), and thus this thesis set out to explore a local
construction of the term.
Public Health

The public health frame sees food system problems as rooted in poor nutritional
practices due to lack of access, knowledge, or skills. While consolidation in agriculture
and food retail has made food more abundant and affordable, diet—related illness has
become a core concern in the public health community (Kamphuis and Giskes 2006;
Morland, Diez—Roux et al. 2006). This is due to increasingly alarming health disparities
between sectors of the population and a growing understanding of the connection with
disparity in access to a healthy diet. Urban poverty has been connected to both food
access and diet-related illness (Eisenhower 2001; Powell, Slater et al. 2007). A
relationship between neighborhoods with high type II diabetes rates and environmental
barriers to accessing healthy foods have also been identified (Horowitz, Colson et al.
2004; Gallagher 2007). Finally, supermarket access has been associated with healthier
dietary behaviors including fruit and vegetable intake, and rates of obesity (Rose and
Richards 2004; Powell, Auld et a1. 2007). The public health frame sees improving access
and knowledge as the appropriate methods improving the food system, driven by rights-

based ethics.

2]

Experts and Construction of Reality

If we wish to examine the challenges and contradictions present in the making of
everyday common sense about food production and consumption, it is important to
consider the way discourse and Visioning is shaped by both hegemonic and progressive
actors in American cities. A constructionist framework views agency as the ability to
construct “realities” as objective forces (Bonnano and Constance 2008). This “common
sense” or objective reality is at once maintained and challenged by the masses. As with
the concept of cognitive liberation, “organic” intellectuals can lead to popular uptake of
ideas or frames (Gramsci, 1971). In addition, in Western society in general, powerful
expert institutions and individuals control production of knowledge and construction of
social reality. Overcoming this is an important part of resistance (Long 2008). As
discussed by Yankelovich (1991), closing the “expert-public gap” is a major challenge
for American society; most experts have become so through collection Of technical,
objective knowledge, whereas public opinion is more typically structured around values.
Thinkers such as Yankelovich assert that this is detrimental to democratic development;
Richard Norgaard (1994) discusses how facts and values have been largely kept separate
in Western societies through positivism and monism, leading to a technocracy that can
cater to powerfiJl interests by limiting democratic decision-making.

However, in the framing process, the presence Of values has motivational potential,
adding urgency and necessity for action. Wright and Reid (forthcoming) found that in the
framing process over biofuels, morality was played on heavily by dominant frames in

order to resonate with American mainstream culture, by making claims for the public

22

good. In the movement toward community-based food systems, master frames Of
community development, sustainability, and public health contain a mixture of inherent
value claims and technical variables. Since academic experts have a significant control
over the shaping of social agendas beyond research, this affects how major frames are

created.

Sustainability

There is widening global adoption of the goals of “sustainable development,”
including its use as a dominant frame in the work toward community-based food systems.
While the concept arises from environmental concerns, the literature is beginning to
include the psychological, social and cultural dimensions for well-being (Lawn 2006).
However, for the most part, sustainable development in practice is often reduced to the
measurable changes in technology and social capital. It has been argued that since these
components are embedded in an ultimately social interaction between nature and humans,
it is essential to incorporate the study of social processes and societal change in to the
sustainability discussion. According to Tovey (2002), incorporating concepts of social
movements into the study of sustainable development can reveal the power relations that
determine resource use and overall human and environmental well-being.

Recognizing the discursive power and pluralistic possibility of the term
“sustainability,” Kloppenburg et. al (2000) explored the meaning-making of “ordinary,
competent people” involved in community-based food efforts. They contend that
conceptual framings are based on academics and policy analysts, which leaves out the

variety of understandings and how they are put into action at the community level. They

23

found that participants included social concepts such as participatory, culturally

nourishing, and just/ethical along with ecological considerations (Kloppenburg et al.

1996)

Public Health

In addition, the discursive power of nutritional information as presented by
consumer culture and politically controlled by industry can be seen as thwarting healthful
behavior. The condemnation of certain food components, such as fat, and a pre-
occupation with micro-nutrients and their function can obscure a focus on foods as a

whole; unravelling food traditions and the social importance and enjoyment of food

(Gussow and Akabas 1993; Scrinis 2008).

Social Justice

Individuals can resist mainstream economic ideology, and a consumer society
where individual consumer sovereignty and freedom of choice are valued over the
collective good, citizenship, and values such as environmental responsibility. This is part
Of “common sense” where individuals meet needs while serving the greater good through
self-interest.

Social justice and sustainability are relativistic terms that derive specific meaning
from context and dialectical, discursive processes. These are often expressions of power
where definition has been constructed by powerful elites (Harvey 1993).

Many thinkers in the community food security movement have moved beyond

ideological conflicts, turning pragmatically instead to the democratic process within the

24

movement. Hassanein (2003) writes that experts cannot be left to make decisions
regarding sustainability because it inherently involves values conflicts. Additionally,
solutions progressing the agenda of sustainability must be worked toward iteratively as
they concern uncertainty of the future (Hassanein 2003). Sustainability, like other
ideologies that guide social change, must be socially defined, so that collective
understandings evolve as conditions change. Therefore, a democratic community-based
food and agriculture system will involve reflexivity and changing goals as frames are

constructed actively.

DETROIT’S LOCAL CONTEXT

As a beacon of de-industrialization, Detroit has a well-established nonprofit sector
characterized by community and economic development initiatives. Past work has
emphasized how residential racial segregation disproportionately places African
Americans in more-impoverished neighborhoods in Detroit and consequently reduces
access to supermarkets (Zenk et al. 2005); however, continued redlining since then has
made it so that almost no one within Detroit’s city limits has immediate access to full-
service major-chain grocery retail.

The 1980’s and 90’s marked a mass exodus of middle class whites from the city’s
core, and a rise in the percentage of blacks making up the population, 20% of which lived
below the poverty level in 1980. The city seems to be a “shadow of itself,” (Thompson
1999, p 163) as the decaying urban center is surrounded by wealthy communities. While
Detroit followed the national trend of de-industrialization in the 703 and 803, historians

posit that it was hit harder than other cities due to earlier exposure to economic blight and

25

more acute racial tensions, resulting in a downward spiral Of urban decay. The first great
migration after WW1 and the second after WWII represented a desire to participate more
fully in economic and civic life. This challenged established white society, with battles
over political power and resources between blacks and whites intensifying after the mid-
forties. However, the defining moment was a hard-won mayoral victory for blacks, and
whites abandoned the city when they realized their hold over liberal politics had been
taken away (Thompson 1999).

Today, racial tension is an explicit element of the public identity of Detroit.
Redlining in retail and other services and general dis-investment also characterize the
city, continuing to drive out most members of the middle class. This includes a complete
lack of major-chain grocery stores, documented in a 2007 report that entitled “Examining
the Impact of Food Deserts on Public Health in Detroit (Gallagher 2007)” which sparked
attention to this issue among both advocates for access to healthy food and residents of
Detroit. Stark lines of division and ingrained struggles for power are evident; evidenced
by a tradition of pirating of water and gas as well as a city bus system that doesn’t
connect to the regional bus system (Vogel in Park, 2005). Where, like many cities,
Detroit’s fiscal capabilities were reduced by the crumbling manufacturing base decades
ago, a new structure of grassroots and professional non-profit as well as private actors
have built a social improvement network that is well known for its strength and size.
Recently, alternative agrifood projects in Detroit have received an explosion of both
social and financial acknowledgment as part of this structure.

While Detroit’s alternative agrifood network shares general motivations and

characteristics with those already documented, it also has distinct characteristics that

26

invite empirical analysis. For example, Detroit’s extent of de-industrialization and job
loss is unmatched, as the former home of the auto industry. This is connected to both a
racial narrative unlike any other city, and an abundance of vacant land and declining
property value that affect all citizens. Estimations on vacant land range from 40,000 to
100,000 lots, providing a unique amount of urban space for a community gardening
tradition that has played a large part in the city’s identity historically. The most recent
revival began in the mid 1990’s, as part of an explicit vision for the city’s post-industrial
future, and continues to thrive, gaining attention from popular press and warranting
attention from none other than Oprah Winfrey, whose April 2007 magazine likened

Detroit as the “Emerald City (Owens 2008).”

RATIONALE FOR THIS STUDY

While there has been a growth in non-academic discourse on the best practices and
efficacy of community-based food system projects as well as normative academic
considerations that bridge the research-activist divide, the bulk of the existing academic
work is focused on problems with the industrial food system. There has also been a call
for more empirical research that explores the dimensions of projects aiming to improve
upon or create an alternative to the existing food system. Analysis of efforts and their
effectiveness are seen as important to move the mission of the movements forward,
exposing Obstacles and opportunities (Kloppenburg, Hendrickson et al. 1996; Allen
2004). In addition, since academia and social theorizing can be criticized for being
narrow in purpose, it is important to connect to empirical examples enabling

identification of hegemony and empowerment. Furthermore, the process of academic

27

definition holds a certain discursive power. It has been recognized that conceptual
framing of the alternative food system direction of work has been largely produced by
academics and specialists, without input from the producers, consumers and those in
between, who are “on the ground.” Allen, as well as Kloppenburg (Allen 2004);
Kloppenburg et. al (2000) found in conversations with “ordinary people” that meanings
of sustainability are varied and differ from academic meanings.

Aside from structural constraints, it is important to understand the self-
understanding, motivations, and ideologies of actors and collectives. Because the framing
process for diagnosing and acting on problems is often embedded in local cultural, social,
and structural factors, empirical case studies are essential.

The intent of this research was to elucidate the rich and nuanced meanings around
local change, to supplement more concise, standardized and generalized definitions of
problems and conditions that prevail within academic and professional communities. For
example, the concept of community food security has been defined institutionally and
academically as “a condition in which all community residents obtain a safe, culturally
acceptable, nutritionally adequate diet through a sustainable food system that maximizes
community self-reliance and social justice” (Hamm and Bellows 2002a). While this
frame has indeed been useful, there has also been a call for more locally distinct
definitions that rise from the grassroots, to include a diversity of perspectives that creates
a more realistic portrayal of community food security (Hamm and Bellows 2002 B). This
might provide insight into the experience Of food insecurity, and allow for indigenous
definition of the Vision Of what food security achieved would look and feel like in a

specific place, to supplement and enrich traditional missions of public health, economic

28

vitality, and sustainability. While buzz-concepts like food security, sustainability, and
community-building abound within national networks, institutions, and local schools,
neighborhoods, and churches alike, they can take on specific meaning that is tied to
characteristics of place when applied to a local scenario. Detroit’s case is unique in that
acute economic need, abundant land and labor, and a healthy level of frustrated citizens
have given concepts like urban agriculture significance as hope for a new economic,
social, and physical urban identity. Thus, the purpose of this research is to explore social
construction of problems, solutions, and visions for change, the subjective perspectives of
actors, and the structure of practices that work toward a socially just and environmentally
sound urban food system. To that end, I will a) serve an applied interest, by identifying
and describing the structure of the movement toward community-based food system
development in Detroit, through investigating experienced problems, formal activities
and initiatives; and b) serve a theoretical interest, by analyzing the process Of social
change in a way that creates an opportunity for its participants and other community
members to define their vision for the food system and the city, definitions of justice,

motivating ideologies, and beliefs about effectiveness.

29

CHAPTER TWO
METHODOLOGY
The overarching purpose of this study was to understand experiences of residents,

and the motivations and pursuits of those intent on improving Detroit’s local food system.
Through engaging residents, it explores the dynamics of how meaning is assigned and
power negotiated in both day-to-day activities and organized acts of purpose. It was
intended for subjects to enrich, refine and potentially redefine frames used in defining
food systems problems such as food insecurity through explaining their own direct
experiences with the food system while also reacting to and reflecting on strategies for
improving conditions. Qualitative methodology was selected as the best way to achieve
this goal for several reasons. This section will explain the particular modes of participant

selection, data collection, and analysis used in this study.

RATIONALE FOR QUALITATIVE RESEARCH

Qualitative research has gained popularity in recent years due to a growing belief
that human-social phenomena requires attention to the meaning and purpose that is
attached to behavior. This requires the study of context, richness, and complexity in lieu
of the control and generalizability afforded by quantitative research. Qualitative research
allows for capturing the complexity of the human condition more closely by examining
context (Guba and Lincoln 1994). The exploratory nature of this study necessitated
qualitative methodology, in that qualitative methods do not require that a hypothesis be
stated before research begins, allowing for open exploration that is not constricted by the

researcher’s locus of the phenomena within a pre-conceived conceptual framework

30

(Patton 2002). In addition, qualitative research provides a format that allows for
understanding the social construction of concepts (Patton 2002), aligning with the study’s
goal of gathering perspectives from a wide variety of disciplinary and social orientations
around place-specific food system improvement. Exploring the indigenous, local
definitions and frames required the use of methods that would allow for exploring
complex, place-specific definitions and the way emic, or insider perspectives, contribute
to theory (Guba and Lincoln 1994).

Aside from its pragmatic basis, there are also normative motivations in the
inclusion of perspectives in constructing visions for sustainability, economic
development, and social equality, because constructions of oppressed or “at risk”
populations deserve equal attention to those of higher status such as academics (Guba and
Lincoln 1994). For these reasons, the purposes of voice inclusion and realistic, place-
specific, and collective construction of meaning aligned well with the applications of

qualitative research methods.

DESIGN

Several factors impacted the design of this study. The research purposes were first
developed based on the researcher’s personal motivations and goals, while also fitting the
purposes of funding provided by the WK. Kellogg Foundation (WKKF) and the Fair
Food Foundation. This project will help develop food system activity within WKKF’S
Food and Fitness Initiative as well as form the basis for a report to the Fair Food
Foundation. The detailed research questions were developed in conjunction with an

Oakland, Califomia-based NGO (PolicyLink) conducting parallel research in that city.

31

In order to gather local resident perspectives as well as those of professional
leaders involved in food systems change, two types of qualitative data collections were
used: focus groups and key-informant interviews. Two pilot focus groups offered an
opportunity for the researcher to become oriented with focus group facilitation and a
general conception of food system issues from a non-expert perspective. Formal data
collections were begun with the “easier” cases; namely those with which the researcher
was already acquainted or the parties already had relationships with the university, such
that researcher skill could be developed.

An emergent design method was utilized. The research provided an opportunity
for a scholarly engagement with issues of voice, empowerment, and the appropriate place
for a researcher in activist projects. This made a flexible, emergent design important,
where theory was built during and after the research process rather than before. The role
of the researcher in this type of process is to maintain empathic neutrality, becoming
immersed in the issues presented, attempting to understand each perspective while
remaining open to new perspectives and being mindful about situation dynamics and the
ever-changing construction of concepts (Patton 2002).

In-depth interviews

The in-depth, Open-ended individual interview is designed as a guided
conversation between two people for the purpose Of qualitative data collection.
Assuming that “the perspective of Others is meaningful, knowable, and able to be made
explicit (Patton 2002, p. 341),” this method allowed exploration of professional

orientations and individual subjectivity for this study. Interviews enabled the researcher

32

to gain insight into a variety of perspectives, motivations, and professional activities of
leaders in Detroit’s movement toward food system change.

In order for the interviews to produce detailed, organized, and clear information,
preparation and skilled execution were required. Main questions, follow-up questions,
and probes were prepared in advance of the interview, in order to elicit relevant
narratives and explanations, and maintain continuous conversation flow (Rubin and
Rubin 2005). This script was followed loosely as themes and issues emerge, for the
researcher to steer the conversation reflexively and achieve balance between in depth
elaboration, clarification, and breadth of topics.

For this research, subject orientation to food system issues varied widely such that
the interviews necessitated reflexivity. The interview guide was designed to open with
easy questions about the main activities and goals of the subject’s organization,
transitioning into questions about professional orientations and organizational missions as
they relate to sustainability, economic vitality, and social equality. The bulk of the
questioning was dedicated to feasible and appropriate strategies for creating a more
socially equitable and sustainable food system, as well as the challenges and
opportunities respective to community-based food systems. As the dynamics of this
improvement work are embedded in political, economic, social, and technical context, the
guide was designed to also probe for detail in these arenas. The interview instrument can
be found in Appendix A.

Interviews were conducted by the researcher, with assistance from colleagues in a

few instances. They took place primarily at the offices or workspaces of the interviewees,

33

with two conducted in coffee shops, and usually lasted between one and two hours. All
interviews were audio-taped and subsequently transcribed.
Focus groups

Focus groups are discussions between 5-12 people that allow for Open-ended,
exploratory questioning around a particular subject or set of issues. This provides a
variety of perspectives for the researcher to collect in one setting (Patton 2002). In
addition, the presence of multiple voices allows for a multiplying effect, where subjects
can react to one another’s responses, providing opportunity for more concepts and
explanations to arise than in a one-on-one interview. When a conversation is stimulated,
perceptions, attitudes and in-depth narrative on the subject are brought out by the nature
of open discussion (Knodel 1993). In addition, focus groups provide an alternative to the
atmosphere of interrogation that might be experienced during the individual interview,
and participants might be encouraged to visit sensitive topics if others in the group are
doing so.

For these reasons, this method was determined most conducive for exploring and
including the various perspectives and nuances surrounding resident attitudes and
aspirations as they relate to the Detroit Food System. The initial protocol was designed to
explore four main topics that comprise urban food systems improvement:

. Food experiences, activities, and needs

. Problems with the neighborhood food environment

. Motivations around sustainability and social equality
. Visions and desired strategies for the food system

The protocol was tested with two pilot focus groups conducted at a neighborhood center

in Lansing, MI: one group of seniors and one group of young mothers. These sessions

34

allowed for both facilitation practice and informed development of questions for the
interview instrument. Within the main topics, personal motivations around health,
sustainability, and social equality were included in the protocol. This required a careful
approach, as “why” questions can make focus group participants feel interrogated,
responding with seemingly rational or politically correct responses instead of explaining
their true personal motivations (Kruger 1994). For example, when asked directly about
concepts of sustainability and social justice, little response was given, but when specific
local scenarios embodying the concepts was used to begin discussion, participants had
more to say about how these concepts motivate them, and a conversation was better
supported. Thus, specific local examples of food deserts and food production scenarios
were introduced by the moderator in order to evoke narratives connecting personal
behavior to motivation and ideals.

The progression of questioning suggested in the focus group literature was followed,
using opening, introductory, transition, key, and ending questions (Kruger 1994). The
conversation began with opening questions about shopping habits and household food
needs and desires, providing an entry point to ease into more abstract subjects of food
quality, equity, sustainability, and community vitality with introductory and transition
questions. The key questions asked participants to define the most important changes for
the Detroit food system, allowing each participant to answer one at a time. The ending
questions were about visions for the future and plausible strategies to get there. In each
session, a summary was read back to participants so that they could confirm its accuracy
and clear up any misconceptions on the part of the researcher. The complete questioning

protocol can be found in Appendix B.

35

As focus group sessions were conducted, opportunities were provided for the
researcher to become sensitized to Detroit’s specific issues, and to become aware of what
concepts were important, interesting, and worthwhile to participants and which were not.
Thus, the protocol was an evolving work used reflexively depending on each group, with
a protocol changing as the researcher’s understanding of community dynamics
developed. For example, in the second focus group held with East Side residents, racial
tensions between neighborhood grocery store owners and customers emerged as a major
theme. Thus, to understand whether this was a problem beyond the East Side of Detroit,
probes about race and shopping were included in the protocol for the remainder of the
sessions.

All focus groups were conducted by the researcher, with assistance from one
colleague in most instances, and lasted an hour on average, with only one going longer
than 90 minutes. The sessions took place in as culturally appropriate a community setting
as possible, where participants were used to gathering, such as community centers or the
high school library. All sessions were audio recorded, and in one instance, video-
recorded. However, during one session, the recording device used ran out of batteries
unbeknownst to the facilitator, cutting off the last 20 minutes or so of recorded
conversation and necessitating reliance on facilitator notes. All focus groups were later
transcribed.

Focus groups present data recording and transcribing challenges. In any group
discussion setting it is difficult to keep everyone from talking at once, obscuring
recordings and making transcription challenging. For this reason, there were a few

“holes” in the data; however, many of these could be interpreted with facilitator notes.

36

Purposeful sampling and participants

The sampling for this research emphasized the use of information-rich cases
versus general sampling, where participants were selected for traits instead of as
statistical representation of the greater Detroit population. Such a strategy is known as
critical case sampling, where cases are chosen based on relevance to the study topic,
when a representative sample is not feasible (Patton 2002). The sampling in this study
was both convenient and strategic, in that connections between the university and the
community were used to locate participants. Stake-holders in the WK. Kellogg
Foundation’s Detroit Food and Fitness Collaborative as well as other known funding
projects in the city were contacted about locating participants, and in this way snowball
sampling was used. Within this available set, participants were selected based on
particular characteristics and availability for interview. A web-based scan of community-
based food system activity along with informal discussions with university contacts
identified interview subjects and organizations to host focus groups, while providing
insight into Detroit’s issues and demographics. From the set of contacts provided, focus
groups and interview participants were selected in order to provide maximum variety of
perspectives allowable by the scope of the project. So while the sample did not achieve
racial, geographic, class, or age representation of the Detroit population, we were able to
talk with representatives from minority and low-resource groups, higher-resource activist
groups, senior citizens, and teens.

For samples of this nature, break and control characteristics can be used to select
a variety of cases relevant to the study topic while keeping a common thread Of traits

between groups so that some conclusions can be drawn about the entire study sample
37

(Knodel 1993). The break characteristics were age, race/ethnicity, geographical location,
and formal involvement in activist organizations. The intent in this sampling was for
some of the groups to have an activist stance on food systems change, and others not.
Two groups of participants in the most visible programs for urban agriculture and food
system activism were chosen, as well as two groups of those who were not formally
involved, as well as one group of students who had not chosen to participate but were
exposed through classroom experiences. Different levels of engagement in alternative
food practices, different levels of access to resources, and different socioeconomic status
were selected to draw on a range of attitudes about changing the food system.

The control characteristic held in common across all of the focus groups was that
all participants were residents of Detroit. It was assumed that any group of Detroit
residents would be able to give feedback on the lack of full-service grocery stores and
land vacancy since they are explicit concerns for most of the city’s population. However,
one obvious imbalance in the representation is the omission of the Latin American
population in Southwest Detroit. While attempts were made to develop such a group,
time constraints and inability to identify a local focus group convener made it impossible.
This is significant because of the marked difference between greater Detroit and,
according to participants, the thriving grocery retail environment of this primarily
hispanic area.

For the interviews, participants were selected based on their place within the
network of leaders and professionals working toward food systems change in Detroit.
Again, an evenly representative sample was not achievable within the scope of this thesis,

however, through an exhaustive scan of food systems improvement activities, participants

38

were selected and a variety of professional orientations were sought. A broad spectrum
was selected, but it was not representative of the entire span of food system sectors. For
example, the distribution and processing sectors were left out, because there were not any
known representatives actively trying to improve the food system in areas of
sustainability, social equity, or economic vitality within these sectors. The purpose of the
sampling strategy was to capture voices of both the leaders of the movement for creating
a more sustainable, socially equitable, and economically viable food system, as well as
those of the greater public. The list of participating individual and group characteristics

can be seen below in table 1.

39

Table I .' Sample Information

 

Focus Groups (n=80)

 

Pilot 1, Lansing: Seniors, mixed race

 

Pilot 2, Lansing: Young Mothers, mixed race

 

Detroit, various neighborhoods: Urban Gardeners and activists, mixed race

 

East Side Detroit: Seniors, mostly African American

 

F emdale/Detroit: Urban gardeners and activists, African American

 

Osbom/Detroit: Hmong —American community members

 

Detroit, various neighborhoods: urban High School agricultural program participants

 

Interviews (n=15)

 

Food Bank Director

 

Food Bank Director

 

Emergency food provision representative

 

MSU extension representative

 

Urban production program representative

 

Urban production organization representative

 

Urban production and food security activist

 

Farmers market representative

 

Retailer’s association representative

 

Planning professional

 

Urban public health researchers

 

Detroit Public Schools representative

 

High school agriculture program representative

 

Economic Development professional

 

 

 

Economic Development professional

 

Informed Consent Process

The project was approved through the University Committee on Research Involving
Human Subjects at Michigan State (UCRIHS). This involved two distinct stages: Phase I,
where Focus group and interview participants were over the age of 18 (IRB #X08-460),
and Phase II, where one set of focus group participants were under age 18 and required

parental and subject consent (IRB#X08-484).

4O

All participants received a consent form including contact information of both the
research and the MSU Internal Review Board to which they could direct any further

questions or concerns. All three consent forms used can be found in Appendix C.

ANALYTICAL APPROACH

As discussed earlier, qualitative research can produce a complex and holistic
picture of social or individual processes, attitudes, knowledge, and behavior, where a
phenomenon is greater than the sum of its parts (Patton 2002). This is achieved through
abstracting a cohesive thematic framework from voluminous and detailed textual data,
and composing an abbreviated summary of the most important motifs and how they relate
to one another. For this study, the number and variety of participating subjects made
determining which themes should be highlighted and which voices should be heard a
complex process, where evolution of purpose took place through using the research
questions, results, and theoretical frameworks as a guideline for organizing and
articulating conclusions. A systematic summarization procedure helped to organize
'pattems across participants and research questions so that the strength of themes was
clear.
Content Analysis

In addition to audio-recording and transcribing each data collection into text, field
notes were recorded and case-summary forms were created by the researcher within 1-2
days in order to organize subjects and main themes, as well as new questions and general

considerations for research design that were introduced.

41

For this research, creating an organizational framework began with an Open coding
process: transcripts were reviewed and a list Of all themes and topics raised by subjects
compiled. The codes were applied to pieces of relevant data using ATLAS TI qualitative
analysis software. Categories for organization were based on perspectives of subjects. In
addition, axial coding was used to arrange codes by corresponding research question.
However, during the focus groups and interviews, themes were not always raised in an
organized manner; hence multiple coding styles were required to organize data. For this
study, thematic codes were developed from both the inductive open coding process and
the researcher’s conceptual framework and purpose. All codes were defined and
organized by research question in a coding guide (see Appendix D).

A concept map was then developed as a hierarchical and heuristic device; linking
the pre and post analysis theoretical frameworks. This served as a mid-analysis deductive
scheme, where the themes raised by subjects were organized within my classifications, or
hypothesis, of how concepts relate. This device visually presented a holistic view of the
codes for this researcher as theoretical deduction was underway.

In order to check reliability, a colleague coded the transcript of one interview using
the coding scheme. Differences in use of the codes, their definitions, and boundaries were
discussed. A few weeks later, the process was repeated with the transcript of a focus
group, and the match between codes was 80%, enough to legitimize the coding scheme.
In addition, I reviewed each coded transcript at two different points in time to check the
original coding and ensure it aligned with the emerging conceptual framework.

To make use Of codes and organize data around themes, compilations of data were

created for each research question, using the computer analysis software to recall all data

42

for all corresponding codes. These compilations were then summarized and organized
using case displays (Miles and Huberman 1994). A display was created for each research
question, with summarized responses listed by corresponding code for each data
collection. This was done separately for focus groups and interviews, since coding
schemes were overlapping but not identical for the two data collection types. This process
was also useful for eliminating superfluous codes. Its primary utility was in viewing
patterns across the data so that the most important and recurrent themes could be
highlighted in the description and explanation of data. An example of one case display
for the focus group respondents is shown in Appendix E.

The final stage of analysis involved moving from describing to explaining, or
moving through “a series of analysis episodes that condense more and more data into a
more and more coherent understanding of what, how, and why (Miles and Huberman, p
91, 1994).” This involved explaining the information in the displays, highlighting the
dominant themes, and illustrating the way they were connected. In explaining these major
themes, we sought to delineate which were clear, which were strongly supported, and
which were merely suggestive patterns. The volume of data necessitated a determination
of the strongest ideas across all perspectives. These themes were listed and ranked for the
focus groups and the interviews, and a summary was created. A third heuristic device was
created at this point, in order to Show the final explanatory framework (included in the
findings section). Deductive theoretical propositions were then made around how
sustainability, social equity, and economic viability are socially constructed and worked

toward within this segment of the population in Detroit.

43

CHAPTER 3

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION I

The findings of this study are presented and discussed in two chapters, in order to
explore the data’s implications for two distinct research questions. The first purpose of
this study was exploring the question, “what are problems experienced and strategies
being used to improve the food system in Detroit?” In the following section, the
experiences, activities, and desired strategies for Detroit food system improvement are
presented based on the major topical areas introduced by participants. Framing and

meaning-making will be addressed in the second results section.

FINDINGS

Within this section, responses from both interview and focus group participants
are used to illustrate structural food system issues in Detroit. While citizen perspectives
solicited in focus groups were most useful in raising issues from the consumer
perspective, some of these participants were also engaged in activist and leadership roles
around nutrition education, public policy, and urban production activities. For this reason,

results from both citizens and leaders are presented together for each research question.

The first group of questions was used in focus groups to explore the dimensions
of purchasing, preparing, and eating food. This allowed for discussion about the state of
retail, desires for improvement, and whether there is demand for healthy or sustainably

produced food.

44

What are major factors in eating/shgpping habits of residents? Are options satisfactory?
What is considered quality food?

Food consumption and preparation

Within the focus groups, eating was discussed as a political, social and cultural activity.
Groups more active in community-based food projects were interested in more alternative
cuisines, specialty diets, and high quality food. Cooking and eating traditions and habits
are embedded within family conditions, and Often centered around special occasions such
as Sunday dinners or holidays and social and church life. Cooking, eating, and shopping

are also seen by some as part of entertainment and social life.

...I’d say when I’m visiting my mother we probably spend about seventy percent
of the time in the kitchen cooking together, like that’s what we do. We hang out
and we cook together. My mother pulls out recipes, she’s like, “What should we
make?” And, you know, we go to the store together, go to the farmers market
together and get stuff. And the first question in my family when you sit down to
dinner is to ask what do you want for the next meal? “So, what do you want for
breakfast tomorrow?” [Laughter] SO whatever happens food is such an important
aspect of what my family’s about, you know, and we do, we eat foods that - all
my family’s from Arkansas - and we do eat foods that probably traditionally are
not great for you but, you know, all things in moderation. You know, you don’t
have fried chicken, gravy and mustard greens and black eyed peas every day, you
know? My mom makes it once a year and it tastes that much more important
when you have it once a year and it’s like you’re not this, not just sharing a meal,
you’re sharing your history, so in that regard.

The seniors group discussed traditional American and some specifically southern foods,
with a big preference for meat as the main course. However, health concerns appear to

take precedence over food traditions and acquired tastes.

For Hmong-American participants, the biggest concern around food was a clash
with the American food culture they had experienced. This was most evident in

differences both between conventional production practices and what is seen as an

45

unhealthy retail environment in the Osborn neighborhood. The youth group stressed the
importance of both easy to prepare foods for daily consumption as well as traditional

southern fare such as turkey and dressing that is more intensive to prepare.

Preparing (and in some cases preserving) quality food was a priority for most
groups, except for some seniors who, living alone, did find it useful to do so. It is evident
that cooking is embedded in family situations, special occasions, and social and church
life. Traditional recipes are very important for family and cultural identity, but are used in
moderation or modified due to health concerns. Youth participants showed a mixture of
cooking knowledge and motivation. Some felt it was not feasible to expand their
knowledge beyond from-the-box cooking, whereas others took pride in the extent of their

cooking skills, learned in a family setting, Often by necessity:

I was like, forced to learn how to cook. Because, my daddy, he’s been gone- he
would call me in there, like, ‘watch me do this,’ and I’d have to watch em, and
help him, so at the end of the day when he wasn’t there, I could cook that for
myself. And I knew what to do, because, he was cookin in front of me. And I had
to watch because they don’t buy a whole lotta out-the-box and out-the-can stuff,
they buy like regular stuff, we gotta cut it up, cook it, do this, do that. So, I
learned how to cook when I was like 13, that’s when he really started getting on
my cause I just knew how to cook eggs and grilled cheese. That was it. And, he
thought then, I’m old enough to be cookin for myself. So I learned how to cook.”

I love to cook. I’ve been cookin since I was 12. I know how to cook, like mostly
everything. And, I grew up cookin, and I always had my grandma, and I learned
from my mom when I stayed with my mom, but I’m 20 years Old and l have my
own household, and I have 2 kids, I have a family. SO I said I want to be a mother
one day, I want to be a wife one day, so I started takin notes on these things. And
now, my turkey be good, my dressin’ be good, cause I learned. I just know.

46

However, there was concern over a cultural loss of cooking skills, as well as preferences
for packaged, processed foods. In educational experiences, participants noted fear of
fresh or home-prepared foods. One focus group member reported:
.. .One day I decided to make fresh salsa and I also bought the salsa in the bottle,
in the jar, and the kids were like “something is wrong with your salsa!” You

know... the jar, I mean, that’s what they were accustomed to, and they really
didn’t want to eat my salsa ‘cause it was fresh.

Grocery Retail

Most participants felt it was important to set aside time to obtain quality food, but
desired greater ease in doing so. For residents of all status it is felt the food environment
in the city is inequitable. Shoppers with limited transportation discussed lower-quality
stores, and many seniors spend much time making travel arrangements to Obtain quality

foods. One participant discussed a time-consuming strategy involving multiple locations:

I don’t drive so like when I do go out to Kroger’s or Natural Food Patch or
some place like that I’m taking the bus and those places are cheaper than
University Foods which is close to me but then there’s the tradeoff
between like slightly higher prices at University for a twenty minute walk
versus cheaper food at Natural Food Patch or Kroger’s for, you know, a
half hour, forty-five minute bus trip, so it’s also a trade Off in terms of
transportation and it’s a tradeoff, like what can I afford this week, what do
I really have time for?

Some residents felt that Detroit does offer retail with quality food, though it may
take time and money to hunt them down, citing “a few shining stars” whose ownership is
responsive to the customer base. The more activist groups wrestled between two major
priorities: going the distance for organic/specialty foods and fresh, quality, in-season
produce; and supporting local merchants. Many shoppers like to support gardeners in the

community through shopping at Eastern Market, and hold the social experience of

47

shopping and relationships with growers and vendors as an important priority. Desire for
close, convenient, one-stop shopping with high variety and quality does not mesh with
values for supporting local, small and locally owned stores. Especially for seniors,
services along with various physical and social features of a store made a big difference,

such as carryout people, baggers, service doors, and perceived safety.

Access

Access to a healthy diet was a unanimous concern for participants. When asked
“What is the biggest problem with the Detroit food system?” all interview participants
but one replied, “access.” Poor quality retail was commonly raised as a concern in the
focus groups. Participants cited low quality inventory tied to poor quality presentation, a
lack of professionalism and general lack of trust. Poor experiences discussed included
moldy purchases and high-prices. Complaints about price gouging, gimmicks and
trickery were common, including trying to pass Off spoiled meat and hiding defective
product under nicer product, lack of cleanliness, presence of cockroaches, and foul odors.
For most focus group participants, this lack of access to quality food was situated within
racial tensions between retail owners and neighborhood residents. In many African
American neighborhoods, stores are owned by Chaldean (or Iraqi American) men who
are assumed to live outside the city. One participant stated:

They use the black people. And they definitely use the ones that have the Bridge

Card.... because of all the black people in the neighborhood and there’s no place

else for us to go but Parkway, because you need food. But you need it, but you

don’t need what Parkway is putting out. They’re cheating you. They’re - you not

getting the best, and you still gotta watch about the hamburger. You still get
ground round and you wind up with that skillet full of grease from the hamburger.

48

Respect was also seen as an important factor for most respondents. A resident spoke

about suburban stores in contrast to neighborhood Chaldean-owned stores:

The last time I was out there, which was about three days ago, a gentleman came
over and said, “How are you doing sir?” Where am I at? Is this the Hilton?
“Here’s our sales paper” - you know? My son-in-law and I... we were looking at
the steaks and actually the butcher came out and said, “May I help you?” you’re

not going to find that in a neighborhood. They act like they’re too busy to push a

button... It’s the overall attitude of the neighborhood stores, that really and truly

makes it bad.
One elderly focus group participant added, “They don’t respect African Americans and
they don’t respect women either.”

Racial conflict is also apparent between Hmong residents and African American
store owners. Members of the Hmong-American community in Osborn felt that Hmong
residents make up a bottom tier of a social urban hierarchy, lacking both culturally-
appropriate services and respect from the greater black community. They suggested that
they are too much a minority to create significant demand for the improvement upon the

inventory of liquor-sales based stores dominating their food environment. This problem is

exacerbated by a continued exodus of the population:

Well the thing is, you know, they used to have a lot Of Hmong stores in Detroit
here, but as the Hmong people get a little bit more in middle class, a lot of them
moved to the white neighborhood and the stores moved to the white neighborhood
too. So it’s like, you know, so it’s kind of like, you know, the people that are
stuck that don’t have money to move with the generation, is the first generation.

Inner city exodus has resulted in a sparse infrastructure for meeting human needs, making
transportation issues more of a problem:
So, you know, you would have to put that, even if you put that store smack dab in

the middle of the neighborhood, some of the residents would have to walk half an
hour to get to that store, you know, because there’s such large tracks of empty

49

land, so that store would have to be, well, you know, it would have to have a
certain amount of people; it also would have to sell cheap enough stuff...

The limited grocery options for those without transportation are seen as an injustice. Each
group mentioned transportation as a concern for either themselves or others in the city.
One elder member of the Hmong-American community group stated, “It’s a problem. He
said it might take an afternoon to get to the store and back.” The lack of access to healthy
foods also raises concern over exposure and knowledge about foods:
Every year we get new kids in that have a bunch of questions to ask and one of
the questions is where does your food come from, and I always have some of the
kids say the gas stations.
You can’t get no produce. And the children, it’s just, they don’t even know what
produce is. I was picking a pea pod this morning and none of the children knew
what a pea pod was. Never heard of it.
Summary
Eating and cooking were embedded in family and social conditions, however, the two
activist groups more involved in urban agriculture and the high school students were
more concerned about fixing unhealthy food culture, and barriers to a healthy diet.
Quality of food is related to production practices, freshness, and preparation. There is
common concern about pesticides and other chemicals, especially in meat production.
While not everyone experienced barriers to healthy food directly, most were concerned
about conditions and distribution of grocery retail within the city. Racial barriers were
also a concern for all participants except for the student group. Table 2 summarizes

themes that emerged in each of the categories Of eating/cooking, food quality, and

shopping.

50

Table 2: Focus group themes

 

Emergent focus group themes by category: food environment & eating practices

 

Eating and cooking

Food quality

Shopping

 

 

 

Seniors Family, Health Freshness, production Racial tension,
concerns practices, no organic lack of respect,
poor quality,
transportation
Urban Social- new production practices, Racial tension,
gardeners/activists traditions, health yes organic lack of respect,
poor quality
Urban social- new production practices, Racial tension,
gardeners/activists traditions, health yes organic poor quality

and selection

 

Hmong-American

cultural traditions

production practices,

Racial tension,

 

 

 

traditions, health

 

 

residents no organic poor quality,
transportation
HS students social and family mixed on organic poor quality

and selection

 

What are the current strategieLand areas of need and opportunities for improvement?

Food production

Several Of the focus group participants were engaged in gardening activities: some were

part of grassroots organizations, others did it on their own, and the youth were involved

as a part of a high school curriculum. Several interviewees and focus group participants

commented on the recent boom in self-provisioning through gardening throughout the

city. One practitioner commented that her program was experiencing unprecedented

growth:

51

 

I think we hit some sort of tipping point, and I don’t know, I don’t really know
how to predict when that big curve will end, and get back to normal...But it’s
totally word of mouth, it is not “I heard it on WWJ,” and, you know, it’s some
really, really, very cool community-based organizations who have unbelievable
potential to grow the movement and be around for a really long time.”

In addition, participants in the high school agribusiness course learned skills in
harvesting, marketing, selling, and accounting through selling at Eastern Market, and said
that they felt prepared to use those skills. A few had applied to culinary and agricultural
programs, and expressed a desire to garden or farm on their own after graduation.

For some focus group participants, gardening activity was connected to fostering
a new food culture that encourages healthy eating. Others discussed their exposure to new
food cultures, spices, seasonings, and recipes. .It was evident that gardening activities
increase consumption of fresh produce.

I definitely cook more; also in the summer, like when I eat stuff out of my
own garden or out of neighborhood, our community gardens, I definitely
cook more during those times when we’re getting, you know, pulling stuff
out of the garden.

Other participants linked gardening activities to household-economic needs:

I have a family with six kids and a limited income and there’s no way I
can afford Whole Food stores, you know, I couldn’t feed my family on
that so I go to Aldi and I try to have as big a garden as I can every year
and 1 freeze a lot of my own stuff, which I organically grow. SO I feed my
family from pretty much the beginning of June to the end of September, I
can feed them out of my own garden. And then in the winter, we have
maybe two or three meals a week out Of the freezer, but for the rest of

them it’s cheap and it’s clean and, you know, they only have one brand,
you can scootch through there in fifteen minutes.

One of the organizers interviewed agreed that their programs were instrumental in

exposing participants to new tastes:

52

We have this great program that welcomes people that are coming from
any point of view or any skill level, and helps them grow to where they
want to be...And over time, it doesn’t happen overnight, but over time
they’re growing the forty-one fruits and vegetables that we offer in the
program as a resource, you know, like maybe one year they’ll try kale, and
the next year they’ll try arugula, and the next year they’ll try Jerusalem
artichokes, it’s like a progression...

Better access to gardening resources was desired by some of the groups not
already involved in these organizations, and some were aware of all activities and
resources available. There was also some confirsion around availability of vacant land in

the city.

1: I know in my neighborhood we made the discovery a couple years ago, every
lot, with the exception of maybe two, belonged to somebody. The city still sends
people out to cut. They still cut the lots, they still take care of ‘em, but these lots
belong to people. And you certainly can’t just farm on ‘em, you know, you can’t
grow a garden on ‘em. And -
2: You can grow a garden on it. If that lot is next to you and they don’t cut it, they
don’t do anything to it, you start having it cut because I’m a witness, I’ve got a
garden on a lot. And a beautiful garden, about nineteen rows. I got a field. I keep
the whole thing growing. And I raise my garden.
The Hmong-American group was especially concerned about land and resources, as food
production is an important part of their lives. The elders of the Hmong community were

particularly interested in assistance with starting food businesses and entrance into

markets, along with plowing assistance.

Some of the groups raised issues around the effectiveness and extent of existing
garden resource services provided through non-profits, as well as the intent and racial and
cultural inclusiveness of these programs. There was a desire to see programs like the

now- defunct govemmentally administered “Farm-a-Lot” program return.

53

. . .There should be an agency that would actually come out there and turn that
soil over or would be willing to actually help you with it. You know, you have so
many different agencies... but you never hear them talk about actually doing
anything.

The economic condition of the city is seen to drive a general sense of strife in the
city, seen to create and low morale for residents and to complicate solutions. In the
Hmong community, racial tensions stand in the way of the practice of self-provisioning
through community gardening:

In the black community people will climb your fence, they will come into your

garden and maybe sometimes steal your food or, you know. Because, everybody’s

having a hard time in this community, it’s not just us; the black community’s
having a hard time working and a hard time - everybody’s trying to find food and
everybody’s trying to survive, you know? And you know, it’s hard to survive,
living in the ghetto here. So basically, you know, we’re trying - everybody’s

trying to move up and over to the next level to the suburbs. So that’s basically
what we’re trying to explain to you.

A member of the youth group also raised concern about boundaries and harvesting from

shared neighborhood space:

I used to think about [gardening] around the vacant lots and stuff like that, but I
be seein some farms that people just be pickin. Like my boyfriend’s grandma, she
just goin to peoples gardens and stuff and just pickin corn and stuff... and just
crazy stuff. Take tomatoes out and put em in her dress...”
Other barriers to self-provisioning through urban production were general concerns about
neighborhood safety, and whether soil and air quality might affect urban production.
Some participants indicated that there may be a cultural heritage of gardening in Detroit.

It is believed that older generations carry knowledge from southern agricultural family

histories, and there are also those who participated in Detroit’s “Victory Garden” days.

54

Along with those whose purpose is to provide gardening resources, many

organizations such as food banks and economic development agencies have moved into

supporting roles for both urban production and retail improvement. One group sees the

provision and coordination of resources for urban gardeners as a vehicle for community

development:

I think also that for residents currently living in the city, to participate in gardens
with their neighborhoods is also, I think it improves the quality of life for those
citizens already living in the city ‘cause there’s a platform for their community
involvement and in terms of if other issues come around that come out of
knowing your neighbor and the safety in your neighborhood, and there’s these
social networks that are especially important I think in neighborhoods like ours in
Detroit, I think that in terms of people already living here it has that kind of, more
resounding qualities, are a lot of what’s important.”

Several interviewees spoke to the effectiveness of the strategies being used.

There are organizations in Detroit- I mean, several of them have really raised
their capacity to do this work. I think there are some good things going on right
now. You know, organizing neighborhoods around urban agriculture, increasing
the capacity Of households and neighborhood groups I think is a very good
strategy

The director of one program chalks their success up to the fact that people are motivated

by the idea of growing their own food, and that networks of trust between neighbors and

friends are based on word of mouth promotion, allowing for sustainable growth and

program strength.

The political environment for policy change is a challenge seen by many in the

area of urban agriculture. However, it is noted that political knowledge, awareness, and

participation in Detroit is strong, and it is beginning to reach leadership:

I think some of that is being done, through the local urban agriculture movement-
we’re pressing the issue, we’re putting the issue on the table. It’s like last night

55

we had a session here with one of the council people. And I was pleasantly
surprised to hear him mentioning food security. SO it’s now in the consciousness
of some of the leadership. SO the ball is beginning to roll. But it’s as a result of
our group, and other groups, and the Detroit Agriculture Network doing the work
that they do, and bringing this to them, and showing that this is a possibility.
Because if you don’t know it exists, it’s not even in your drinking.

Nutrition Education
Several focus group participants as well as interviewees were engaged in educational

efforts. Many spoke to the success of hands-on approaches:

before I do the cooking demonstrations, I do a survey to find out how many of
them eat vegetables and fruit, and where it comes from. So by the end of the
cooking demonstration, they enjoy that vegetable. Their parents are there- some
of the parents are there, and they’re like, “I can’t believe my child just ate that.”
Because they never prepared it for them, because that child said, “I don’t like it.”
But if you get that child to eat at cooking demonstrations, because the more of the
senses you use, the more they’ll like it. If they get the hands on experience with
planting the seeds, watching it grow, 90% of the time, they will eat it, regardless
of what it is.

Leading by example is seen as an important route through which cultural trends and
norms are passed. It is seen that youth are important, receptive targets for education. One
participant discussed her experiences, stating, "My kids, we planted some seeds at the
beginning of spring, they say, 'Where’s my tomato plant at?’ They take ownership, of

what is theirs."

It is also believed that for educational efforts, it is important to give subjects
ownership and leadership to keep them engaged. Even the “toughest” kids can be targeted
this way.

SO we established a leadership thing at the same time. It’s not just about food... So

that they can be prideful. I don’t want tO overemphasize the pride thing, but it’s
that kind of thing that makes a difference, and, then establishing the foods they

56

eat, and how it effects their lives, and for them to become a better person. With a
voice.

Production as an educational tool
One interviewee discussed the benefits of using food production as a teaching tool for
reaching children of all levels, stating, “And a lot of kids that I can’t reach, bookwise,
boy do they shine outside.”

In addition, female students who have been underprivileged are seen to gain
empowering experiences through feats such as beekeeping and heavy equipment use,

learning through engaging with the physical world:

There’s another issue that farming is a good lesson for. In agriculture, you can do
everything right. You can plow your soil, you can plant your seeds, you can weed
and water, everything, and then a hailstorm can come and wipe it out. And so, you
don’t blame the victim. You pick up, you try again, you get help from other
people. And so it’s a really good lesson for our students because, ya know,
everybody looks at them like they’re failures ...but a lot of this stuff is out of their
control...And so...this is really good to teach kids, to say, ya know, if you fail,
don’t get down on yourself- stuff happens, don’t worry about it. It wasn’t
necessarily your fault. Or if it was, can you change it the next time? If you’re
planting your corn too early and it frosted, well, next time learn, and fix that. And
that’s what farmers do, they learn and communicate, and they do research and
science in an indirect way.

In their focus group, youth participating in this program were thankful for lessons learned
about responsibility and self-improvement through caring for the animals and producing
food. One student spoke about work and self-reliance:
I’m not like- I ain’t got time for that, or I’m too cute, my hands too perfect- I’m
not like that- I’m down with whatever to get my grade. And that’s gonna teach me

a lot outta life, not to be SO needy, and you know what I mean, it don’t hurt to get
your hands dirty.

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The students in this program contended that the program requires patience, and
dedication to the animals and plants in their care, stating that “ we have way more
responsibility...” And, “Yeah, it teaches you a lot of responsibility, because we gotta be
out here every day.”

Participants also acknowledged exposure to new vegetables: “I [knew], uh,

mustards, collards. But curly kale, dinosaur kale, it was like ‘what?”’

Improving Retail

There was substantial discussion over neighborhood retail inventory and creating demand
for healthy food. By some, the issue of demand or supply was simply seen as a
communication problem, where the perception of demand by business owners is not in

line with reality. According to one focus group participant:

I think they’d be able to survive, and they’d flourish and especially since there’s
so much excess capacity, you know, excess demand for that kind of thing in our
local neighborhoods, I think the question is that the, is local residence showing
demand, demanding it from those local stores and local stores being educated
about how to provide those types of foods in real life and realizing there’s all this
excess demand...

However, economic development practitioners working with retailers maintain
that they struggle to find profitability in supplying a high variety of fresh foods. There are
challenges to retail ownership such as crime, low population density, and low levels of
financial support for independent retailers. One economic development professional
interviewed felt that certain things must be addressed with existing retailers before
improvements can be made:

So if the retail piece can work from like a business perspective like they make

payroll and they can pay their taxes and they employ people and it is a nice
experience like if the store is clean, well kept, and attractive, they have the

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shopping carts, and it is a nice parking lot, all that kind of stuff, then I think that
you can figure out how to improve the selection in the store. You can figure out
how to get more locally grown stuff in there...

Another interviewee discussed the experience of assisting store owners with improving
inventory:

Blueberries are probably the healthiest thing for you heart-wise, so we have to
sample to them, they were so reluctant and resistant to get it because they thought
they were going to have to throw it all away because no one was going to buy it.
But we said, ‘its an educational process, and what we are trying to do is introduce
the consumer to this product and Show them a good way to eat it, with like yogurt
or a smoothie or something like that.’ When you tell the retailer this, he was
interested in trying it. But there was no way he was going to put it in his store if it
wasn’t going to move off the shelves. Introducing the grocer to try new stuff and
getting the consumer to try the stuff when the grocer puts it out for them,
awareness and education on both ends, from the grocer’s standpoint and the
consumer’s standpoint.

According to this perspective, to improve store inventory, there also needs to be more

communication between the supplier, distributor, and retailer.

And there is a lot of valuable information that the distributors and wholesalers
can provide the retailers and we are constantly bugging the wholesalers and
distributors to provide that information to the retailer...

In addition, retailers need information about the assistance for things like facade
improvements and tax benefits that are available. Financing is a challenge. Two

interviewees commented on this:

Financial assistance, that’ 3 what they need. They are calling me all the time for
opportunities. Communication, people don’t know about things that are
available... More than a few, quite a bit of people that have said that the financing
is a major issue in getting a new business started there. It is really difficult for the
African American retailer.

Nobody focuses on helping grocery stores improve and expand and try to finance
an expansion is like a pain because these guys are at one percent margins. They

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are mostly family owned businesses, the ones in the city. It is hard to get
conventional bank financing without putting up a lot of your own personal
collateral, particularly if you don’t own your building. If you don’t own your
building you have nothing because your inventory is worthless for the most part,
something with your equipment it is depreciating all the time. If you don’t own
the actual real estate then you don’t have any collateral...

Despite these difficulties, there were some good examples of successful grocery retail

operations in the city.
the Market Creek Plaza... they had funding from a family foundation that really
jump-started that effort. And a grocery store alone couldn’t have done that
without that kind of support, that really enabled the community then to mobilize,
and they really pushed issues around jobs and economic development...They’ve
done a whole physical development around the store, so there’s you know, shops
that sell locally made arts and crafts, and cultural music and dance- so it’s really
become a community gathering place. And in conversations we’ve had with folks,
there’s a lot of resonance with that.

In addition, some of the existing stores are seen to be responding to community
complaints:
But some of the stores are really doing some innovative things. I think some of
the managers at some of the local stores are working very hard to provide jobs for
local youth, and to really work on community relations. So I think there are some
models for how that could get developed. And extended.
In particular, in Mexicantown in South West Detroit, grocery retail is doing well. Many
stores are making improvements, responding to “friendly competition,” and many
residents from other neighborhoods do their shopping there. One economic development
practitioner explained the experience of the Mexicantown grocery owner as different than
in the rest of the city:

It’s more culturally relevant. I mean, look at Mexico. There are street vendors
everywhere. So it is cultural, I think. Some of them come with cash, and they

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immigrate for the opportunity. But others of them, I think pool their resources.
The other thing is that, I think, since the community is contained, they know that
they’ve got a customer base. And so it’s a lot easier to attract your market,
because your market doesn’t leave.

While promoting local entrepreneurship deveIOpment is a strategy promoted by many
community members, one economic development practitioner suggested that providing

training for new grocery entrepreneurs may be more complicated than many advocates

realize:
When we talk to grocers about it they are like that is great but that is going to take
years. It is not like we can train them for six months and they are going to be
ready to go. If they have never worked in a grocery store you can expect this is

going to be a three or four year process and then you have to make sure that they
have enough money, capital, to get the store going.

She added that:
“80% of jobs in America are grown from existing companies. And it is kind of the
same theory with the retail piece. If we can try to lift up the grocers who really
want to make a difference and have been struggling to figure out how to provide a
better selection or whatever, we are going to get, it is a lot less effort and a bigger
bang for your buck than all the time attracting something new. But at the same
time there is room for new as well. And we can help create a competitive
environment that will force others to recognize that they need to make
improvements.

Summary

The current strategies of citizens, activists, and professionals as well as the challenges

and Opportunities they face in building a community based food system for Detroit varied

widely. The two focus groups that were organized around urban agriculture activity were

more focused on changing what they believed to be an unhealthy and unfair food culture

and system infrastructure. Other groups were unsure about the accessibility of land and

resources urban production, and were more focused on inequalities both experienced

61

directly and by others. Racial conflict was acknowledged by each of the groups except
for the high school students, and was most pronounced in regard to Chaldean
neighborhood store owners. Educational efforts by focus group participants were focused
on hands-on activities instilling leadership, responsibility, and self-respect. The youth
engaged in these activities felt that they were effective in these areas as well as in
exposing them to a wider variety of fruits and vegetables. Table 3 organizes the current

strategies, and perceived needs & Opportunities Of focus group respondents by category.

Table 3 .° Focus group themes

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Emergent focus group themes by category: engagement in food system initiatives
Production Education Retail
Improvement
Seniors engaged; need more i Consumer/stor
resources, land access; _ e dialogue
security
Urban engaged; policy support cooking and improve
gardeners production existing
Urban engaged; land, capital access cooking and access to
gardeners production capital
Hmong- engaged; need more
American resources, safety & security _ _
residents
HS students engaged; within and outside agribusiness training;
of school; security Need more on _
cooking skills,
production for youth

 

 

 

 

 

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Professional perspectives most explicitly relevant to the areas of production, education,
and retail improvement were from representatives of urban production, economic
development, retailing, and educational organizations. All participants recognized that the
diet-related health disparities and the retail infrastructure were problematic. As far as
production, leaders saw the benefits as many and were engaged in providing
opportunities and support. Views on education varied, but all agreed that in order to
improve access to a healthy diet, demand should be increased by educating consumers.
While some leaders and citizens emphasized the poor state of retail, the economic
development practitioners and retailing representatives discussed the challenges retailers
face. Table 4 summarizes the current strategies, and needs/opportunities as perceived by

interview respondents.

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Table 4: Interview themes

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Emergent interview themes by category: engagement in food system initiatives
Production Education Retail
Improvement
Urban production neighborhood based Nutrition ed. through -
organizing, resources exposure
Economic supportive - need resources
development
Retailers association Promotes Michigan grown necessary to increase need resources,
products demand for healthy food communication,
eduction
Farmers market provides resources for future hub for educational provides
growers activities, demos alternative
Educator educational tool experiential, self-esteem -

 

 

 

 

 

 

What are major factors for leaders of food system change?
Financial Resources

It was a shared goal for almost all Of the interviewees as well as focus group participants
to strengthen the economy through re-localization of the food system. One theme was

that resources should be allocated to support community-based ventures.

And what really came through clearly in our stuff, was that we need to strengthen
this in a way that provides economic opportunities for people who live in Detroit
as well as access to food. And there were a lot of great ideas about ways to do
that. Including working with urban gardeners, the urban agriculture initiatives,
trying to find outlets for their food and produce within local comer stores, or other
markets in the city. There’s a lot of enthusiasm for that.

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Access to capital was seen as important for all types of agri-food entrepreneurs. One
interviewee involved in providing resources for growers and processors suggested a

move away from grant funding and toward lending:

Whether it’s for a number of schemes from microloans to, you know, zero interest
loans to smaller grants. I guess I would argue for the more sustainability of the
system that we wean ourselves away from pure grants and probably think more in
terms of zero interest loans... That has the potential to self-fund itself.

In addition, several interviewees cited a need for financing that is more flexible to

support beginning grocery retailers:

So, we have a couple of African American retailers who have had difficulty
making the transition. One guy Opened up a store, well he has four walls sitting
there and no inventory, and a big loan’s coming due, and he doesn’t have money
to get the inventory in to get the people in to keep it moving. We had another
retailer who just put in, say, one months worth of inventory and- he was hoping
that when that sold he could purchase the next. You can’t do that at a store. That
stuff has to keep circulating, so you can’t wait until the food is gone to order the
next. So, that is a financial issue. I think banks should be sensitive to that kind of
stuff, like provide low cost financing, don’t have a balloon payment so close,
these kind of things so these retailers can be successful in the businesses.

Aside from supporting grocery retailers, land use was also discussed as an area needing
attention. A farmers market director interviewed spoke in terms of working through

housing development in order to incentivize and promote urban agriculture:

I think looking at subdivision review practices and the award of affordable
housing finance tools to see if there’s ways to instigate more urban agriculture
through, again, we’re providing tax credits and grants to people that in turn are
going to use them to build affordable housing. Why not, in the award of those
grants, tie it to true affordability which includes lowering people’s cost of food.
SO, you know, changing some of the rules and regulations Of various incentive
programs that already exist to add urban gardening as not only an allowable use
but a use that actually is encouraged. Most of these major grant programs have

65

point systems that give you points for meeting need standard, it gives you points
for providing handicapped. . .perhaps a computer room or fitness room - well, why
not the same sort of approach to a community garden?
There is also need within the non-profit sector for financial resources. One urban
agriculture practitioner described the difficulty of meeting a surge in community interest
with resources, seeing a challenge in allowing for Slow, sustainable grth in the
program:
We really - we don’t follow the funds, and in fact we work to be as productive as
possible with as little as possible, and I think in that regard, that will ensure that
we’re around for a really long time because we don’t, you know, we might hurt a

little bit if I don’t get any more than three thousand dollars that I have in the bank
to, you know, get through the rest of the year, but we won’t stop.

She added that for capacity building, “I think non-cash support is very important on the
onset. And once people develop the capacity and the wherewithal and the direction, then
cash support is necessary.” Several other interviewees agreed that new efforts should be
substantive and community-based, rather than fast and well-funded, suggesting that
success in connecting urban production and entrepreneurship in low-resource

communities takes time and patience to deveIOp relationships and capacity.

Outside funding
A common theme for interviewees was the effect of outside funding on initiatives in
Detroit. Two of the community-based organization leaders mentioned concerns about

outside funding.

I’ve seen money be a very positive thing and a very negative thing at
times...what I have seen is people abandoning that, you know, legacy of self-
sufficiency and kind of following the money into some Of the craziest notions and
ideas that you have ever heard of, that are not based in reality, have no sense of

66

timing and planning, that completely disregard capacity and sustainability, and the
more and more resources available... there’s very few funders who really kind of
have their finger on the pulse of something and can really understand when
resources are needed and when - I think resources should be earned. If I want to
ask for this, I should be wrung through the wringer, you know, I should say -
someone should ask me, you know, ‘What’s your previous capacity? How are
you gonna get from your previous capacity to your new capacity, you know,
what’s your growth plan? I want to see all your gardens, I want to see your
records, you know?’ It should be a partnership, that kind Of rigorous relationship

Others were concerned that outside funding can lead to top-down projects or top-heavy
processes that do not include community voice and don’t create lasting change. This was

especially a concern for a leader concerned with racial empowerment.

Many of us have had experience with grants, and grants can undermine the
initiative within a group. So we’re very concerned about having a group that is
self-determined, and is not grant—dependent... we have this real strong sentiment
in our group towards, we have to do things ourselves, ya know, stand on our own
two feet, and that’s part of what we do. Now if we can supplement that with
grants, that’s fine. Uh, but we’re very concerned about independence, about
making decisions on our own, and not being manipulated by anybody.

The leader of an organization that is involved in funding also spoke to the effect of funder

co-optation:

Well, I think there’s a tendency to over-plan stuff, and I think that you have to be
careful that grassroots stuff doesn’t get co-Opted by the agencies that want to fund
them. And I think, that includes us- you know, we co-opt and change stuff just by
the nature of our funding, and you know, I try to be very careful and sensitive to
that and not stifle innovation, but it’s hard. Because you’ve got funders, you’ve
gotta do reports, and da da da. And so, I’m really trying to look at other ways to
be creative and look at innovation without stifling it.

The leader of the group concerned with racial empowerment was also concerned about
outside funders or funded initiatives engaging with African American community

members for the purpose of tokenism, in order to validate their work.

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There’s an effort that in the publicity materials, they make sure to have black
people, black faces are prominent, what have you. So it creates the impression
that it’s a much more, uh, diverse group than it really is... I don’t think the intent
is negative, I think it’s just the way the system is structured, white people as a
whole have more resources than black people as a whole... and so, it creates this
power relationship where you still have white people in the black community,
calling the shots and doling out the resources- and that’s just not acceptable.

Organizing and Community-building
The professionalization and organization of grassroots projects that comes along

with funding was also discussed.

It is very, very hard to navigate through the professionalization of community
services of, you know, just the kind of non-profit rigmarole that exists, you know?
...There’s a lot of people who don’t live here, who don’t own property here, who
don’t own a home here, who haven’t Spent more than two minutes here, coming in
saying “This is what’s best for the city, and I know best,” and that’s really
disheartening sometimes. And, you know, and then there’s the problems that
money creates sometimes, which I’ve talked about. We, our work is so good, as
long as I have the time to ask for it, I don’t really worry about if funds will be
available, because I just, I just believe that what we’re doing is the right thing, and
that what we need will come to us.

One economic development practitioner described her organization’s new way of

Operating as “getting on the ground.”

I mean, we’ve always been- we’re probably at 20,000 feet, with funders and
others up here at 40,000 feet, and we’ve moved into doing this sustainable
community development work, and it means that we, in some instances, are gonna
have to get closer on the ground, and. SO I really want to support some of this
stuff that’s really grass roots. I mean, there’s not really the traditional agency that
we would fund, like in the past.

She described geographical focusing at the neighborhood level as the best means in

which to do this, so that smaller organizations, “who have been there forever and know

68

how to get stuff done” can be partnered with funders and developers. This goes along
with a sentiment toward returning to community organizing instead of community

development.

...Community organizing has gone away. People stopped funding it, institutions-
the community development movement grew out of community organizing.
Okay, community residents weren’t happy with the conditions in their
neighborhoods. They organized, they formed civic action groups, and then they
formed community development corporations, and then we got sophisticated, and
trained real estate professionals, and community organizing has gone by the
wayside. And to make any of this work, really, community organizing has to be a
key part. And I’m trying to convince people that it’s the missing piece that we all
got away from. And why people got away from it is because nobody was funding
it. ‘No we don’t have time for you to get people rallied, we need you to build
something!’ You know, (laughs), or fix something, or eradicate poverty (laughs).
And so I think community gardening and all that is only going to be successful
with community organizing. You know, it’s unsafe if the community’s not
organized and prepared to defend itself. And I think that that’s a critical lesson for
all of this work. We’ve lost the community organizing component. And that’s
why I’m very intrigued by all this grassroots stuff that is bubbling up, because it’s
moving towards the way community development was before we got smart and
sophisticated. To respond to funders like me... (laughs)

When asked about Detroit’s needs for revitalization through food system development,
several interviewees responded with similar ideas about community organizing and
grassroots development.
I think, in Detroit’s case, we’ve got to continue to build it, I think, from the
ground up. I think most of the organizations that we’re talking about partnering
with are on the street doing stuff, you know, at the program level. We don’t need

more layers; I think we need those not-for-profit groups to maintain their
entrepreneurial kind of fervor.

Specifically in terms of urban agriculture, one of the practitioners spoke of the need to
emphasize community organizing over access to food or the prioritization of a healthy

diet.

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The national urban agriculture community should look at using urban food
production to build community vs. produce food. The successes of this group has
been less about meeting physical needs than social needs, and that focusing on the
social needs helps meet the physical needs... Using urban food production not as
sort of a, exclusively as a hobby or as a means to producing food but really as a
way to bring people together. If you don’t plan your gardens around bringing
people together, they won’t. And if you don’t plan your garden around really
having something to harvest at all times and, you know, and a diversified crop,
you’re not going to get that. So I think, you know, we’re doing, our organization
is all about the people. It’s not really about the food; the food is a by—product, but
as a result of it being about the people, we probably produce more food than
anybody that’s about the food, if that makes sense.

Those who have engaged in agri-food initiatives emphasized the need for long-range
partnership and community involvement. In describing a venture in a low-resource, high-
crime neighborhood, one interviewee described the failure of an EBT-accepting farmers
market due to the laundering of food stamps in the community.

So all those things remain hidden until you reach a level of trust. So for
organizations that want to be effective in communities like [this], they have to
budget for that. The first three years, or two years, or five years, are going to
really be about relationship building. And anything you do is really just an Object
lesson, until you reach a level of trust where you can get to the point of doing
something effective. It’s - I think that’s why a lot of work in low-income
communities doesn’t get funded. A lot of the grants that we see have a one-year
timeline or a tlrree-year timeline, and the work I’m doing [here], I’ve made a life
commitment to that project.

Another leader spoke of a project that had to be put on hold because of neighborhood

dynamics:

I think that uh, there was some resistance because we did not really consult with
them in the beginning, and we just showed up one morning and started plowing
up this vacant lot, um, and that wasn’t very respectful. I think in some ways we’re
seen as outsiders coming into the city.

One interviewee felt that based on her experiences the community could be further
engaged in large multi-disciplinary initiatives and funding processes. She stated that these

70

types Of things are more complex than who is at the table, but also how decisions are

made.

what do you mean by ‘partnership,’ and who are the partners, and how do you
focus on issues around equitable relationships? I mean, we’ve been around a lot of
tables where there’s supposedly partnerships, but there’s 2-3 people doing the
facilitating, calling all the shots, you know, making all the decisions, using all the
money... Um, and that’s a different kind of model than a more participatory,
equitable focus on partnerships...l think to deal with these food systems issues,
people need to be invested in the process, and that investment’s not gonna come
unless there’s some shared decision-making, and shared access to resources.

The work of one interviewee team included long-range projects around food access, and
had seen success in dissemination of information into neighborhoods leading to policy
influence. These community-based participatory researchers discussed the success of
their program that engages community members, emphasizing the effectiveness of health
messages when they come from within the community.

The village health workers, they came up with the priority Of diabetes Of a major
health issue that affected a lot of people in the neighborhood. And the more we
talked about it, ya know, the more they said: look, we all know what we’re
supposed to eat. It’s really hard to get access to those things. If you look at the
map, it’s actually...compounded on the East Side by the fact that people don’t
have cars, and so it’s very difficult to reach the sources that are outside the city.
Um, and they came up with the idea of doing mini-markets, in churches and
community-based organizations.

Such work is seen as essential for the purpose of credibility and effectiveness.

I think it’s really critical that leadership for some of this change comes fiom
within the community. It’s gotta be identifying peOple within the community who
are credible, and people look to. Because, I mean, i can’t waltz into East Side
Detroit and say, you’ve gotta eat more veggies. I mean, it’s just like, ‘Who are
you?’ And so, I think the leadership has gotta be built from within the community,
and developed, and supported.

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Summary

A theme of concern emerged around not only where resources are directed, but also how
this is done. Finance is an agreed upon need for strengthening the local economy through
a community based food system, especially in the area of retail. Public health in the city
is connected to the resource and training needs of grocery retail. Several leaders
expressed concern with the effects of outside funding, and a professionalization of
community building that has essentially replaced organizing community members with
organizing resources and enhancing the built environment. In addition, there was concern
about an illusion of empowerment of the urban African American population, where their
activist concerns are adOpted in a process of tokenism. In general, it is believed that while
resources are necessary for economic participation, that citizens should be given

leadership in educating and organizing the community.

DISCUSSION

Research participants affirmed the assertions of public health literature in their
responses about the affect of supermarket access on no only health and vegetable intake,
but also the culture surrounding food knowledge and preparation skills (Rose and
Richards 2004; Powell, Auld et al. 2007). Because of Detroit’s extreme political history
and contemporary segregation around race and class lines. Residents experience power
imbalances in everyday interactions with the food system, and some strive to express
ideological resistance through symbolic day-to—day actions, as discussed by Scott (1985).
Some spoke as victims of injustice, while others acknowledged food system problems but
spoke as change-agents. Perception of power and capacity to act varied, and some but not

all individuals could be considered participants Of social movements.

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Participation in community-based food projects prevents bottom up power
normalization for many. In addition, resistance to the mainstream food system provides
inroads for political participation through decisions such as focusing shopping on
attributes such as black-owned, local, or organic. However, the attempt at civic
participation through Shopping ethically presents tensions, as discussed by Johnston
(2008b). Detroiters struggle with the tension between self-interested consumer desires
such as price or variety and supporting particular causes, such as downtown retail

revitalization.

Participants were also cognizant of racial/political/class history in Detroit, and
how it relates to parity in access and the built environment in general. A remaining
undercurrent from black power/civil rights movements in Detroit gives community food
security efforts in the city strength, and orients them toward racial justice. Just as most
urban social movements have been organized around race, class, urban divestment, and
disparity in quality of life community food initiatives in Detroit are clearly in response to

dire economic conditions (Fainstein and Fainstein 1985).

Contention around resource mobilization and social change is prevalent in Detroit.
As discussed by Martin, authentic community development initiatives are seen to have
been galvanized into a more professional operation removed from the problems they were
created to address (Martin 2004). There is also distrust in funders among activists, who
believe that radical change will not be sought by those who will benefit from maintaining
the status quo (Allen 2004; Silver 1998; Johnston 2008; Dowler and Caraher 2003;

Martin 2004), and who cite racial tokenism. However, the reflexivity of leadership

73

required to manage the tensions between principals and practical change (Campbell

2001) was discussed by several interviewees.

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CHAPTER FOUR

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION II

The responses from citizens, activists, and professional practitioners vary greatly
depending on perspective, experience, and background. This section will attend to the
process in which research participants frame problems, solutions, and strategies for
action, in order to fulfill the second purpose of this study, “what is the social process of
framing problems, solutions, and motivations to act between citizens, activists, and

professionals in Detroit?”

FINDINGS
Diagnostic Frames

Diet and food quality

Within focus groups, a low-fat diet with high vegetable and fruit intake was suggested as
healthy. The activist groups felt that traditional ways of eating in their community were
unhealthy and connected to illness, and family health concerns motivated dietary change:

I find in my own personal family that tradition is hard to break, because I’m a
gardener and I try to expose a different way of eating and they’re like, you know
what, save your little salad, put it over there, give me some of the macaroni
cheese, those ham hocks, you know, my collard greens, and they’re the ones that
have the blood pressure and the sugar and I don’t have those things...my dad had a
stroke, aneurisms, and my brother has high blood pressure and my mother has
high blood pressure but I changed my eating habits and it’s just tradition is hard to
break.

Ideas about food quality varied, but most agreed on the quality of garden-fresh

provisions. One youth participant proclaimed, “The strawberries are SO good...They’re

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real sweet. It’s good, it’s better, this tastes better- like the strawberries off [the school

garden] taste better than the store’s. They’re real sweet.”

However, participants have mixed ideas about organic that are situated within
social concerns. One senior believes, “They don’t give us real organic food, they give us
food called organic.” One member of the Hmong-American group explained a culturally

situated distrust in American production methods in general, stating:

Cause, you know, in Laos most of the vegetables are naturally grown, and in
America we mass-produce vegetables and we use chemicals to kill insects and
stuff like that...So, you know, just because the company says, Oh, this is organic,
they’re still gonna have some chemicals.

Participants cited a range of reasons for diet-related health disparities. Some were
concerned about economic constraints, some about awareness and knowledge, some
about food knowledge as a form Of self-reliance, and some about skills for preparation.

One professional in emergency food distribution recounted:

Most people don’t know what to do with a zucchini, or most people we know
don’t know what to with one. ...One of my first experiences was with a woman
who had boiled grapefruit for hours and it never got it soft enough to feed her
children and she was mad. And you know what are you supposed to say?

However, two of the focus groups were more concerned about access than education. The
suggestion that public health consequences are resultant of personal choice and can be

combated through nutrition education was seen as shortsighted by several participants:

I think it is very inconsiderate to teach young people that they should eat fruits
and vegetables and fresh things and not McDonalds- and then they’re in a food

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dessert, so where do they go? Even if they want to eat vegetables, or they don’t
want to eat McDonalds-

At the mention Of nutrition education, a few participants Of the seniors group seemed to
want to steer the conversation back to the topic food access, about which they were

outraged:

I don’t think it’s a matter of what you supposed to be eating, I don’t think that. I
mean, they get on TV and they say “you can’t eat this, you can’t eat that, you
can’t eat that.” It’s left up to the individual person, but my thing is buying the
fresh food, we shouldn’t have to buy something that’s not ripe. It’s just like they
got chicken, that I bought a bag of chicken wings ...when I unfroze them they
were full of feathers and they was blue. And I took ‘em back.... And so I’m not
understanding what you mean because I think that everyone in here knows the
quality of food.

One participant suggested the importance of overall satisfaction Of the Shopping,
preparing, and eating experience over nutritional benefits:

I wouldn’t have proper nutrition if I’m sitting there cutting up - maybe it’s just
me; I’m still pissed about this bell pepper. Okay, because I’m trying to figure out
why I need to pay a dollar and forty-nine cent for a bell pepper. And if I know
that I’m sitting here cutting up this dollar forty-nine bell pepper to go on my food,
guess what, it done already done piss me Off...it’s not going to do me much good.

This was connected to the belief that quality of food had an equal role to dietary choice in

health consequences:

NO, you know what, it’s more than obesity. In the urban area, the poorest areas
where the least money to spend on food, why are the children so fat? You ever
notice that? The children are incredibly big in the urban areas. And most of
them, you talk to most Of their parents, it’s not that they’re cooking so bad as it is
the food they’re eating, and it’s not just fast food, ‘cause a lot of these kids can’t
afford fast food. It is something else going on, just like Shirley said about the
chicken wings, you go out in the store, chicken wings are that big. That’s a
turkey wing, that’s not a chicken.

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Concerns about food quality as linked to production practices were consistent
across all the focus groups. It is believed that the quality production of yesteryear has
been lost, and distrust was elucidated particularly around animal production and meat

quality, specifically over grth hormones and other methods of industrial production.

Distrust in industrial food system

Groups expressed a holistic View of the food system, including unfair and
untrustworthy distribution practices, retail structure, production practices, as well as
preparation and processing. There was a general distrust in the industrial mode of

production, food corporations, and the way they present information.

And if you have local farms that are being utilized without all the pesticides, just
so much, I mean, when farming went and became a business, when the farmers,
when all the little farms were being forced out for the big conglomerate farmers,
farming became dangerous because it came about, instead of about quality, it
became about quantity.

Organic and other labeling claims are not trusted, as food corporations are seen as only

promoting “gimmicks” for marketing purposes.

Or like the labeling of food, when they first started the labeling of food and they
were telling you the serving Size and the fat content and all the, you know, the
vitamin, nutrient - and a few weeks ago they just told you, well most of those
serving sizes were lies. The content wasn’t the full content, the caloric factor,
they didn’t give you the full facts on it; so who do you - you know, it’s as if we’ve
suddenly become a country that - who do we trust? Who do we trust? I mean, if
you don’t have enough money to do your own investigation or your own, pay for
your research to make sure it’s sure, you’re not going to get the truth. You’re
going to get the lie that’s being sold today. And then next week it’ll be a new lie.
Or when they get caught, it’s another lie. You know, oops,we didn’t know. SO
we’re doing something else today.

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Access to information for making healthy choices was also emphasized both for
participants themselves and also those for whom they were advocating, as it can be hard
to navigate health information.

And that’s the other reason why they’re getting bigger, because of the lies being
told. And then it seems like to me if you’re using salt, say salt. Don’t use words
this long, sodium nitrate. You know, and worried when you got to take it to an
English teacher and figure out what it is, you know. It’s those things where it just
makes common sense but the companies will not do that.

These concerns are connected with the idea that problems of diet and health disparities
are symptoms of an imbalance of economic power. One participant of the seniors focus
group put it this way:
So it’s something more to it than just the owners of the store, it’s like everybody’s
in cahoots against the poor, ‘cause it’s really not racial, y’all, it really is

economical. It’s more than racial. They don’t care what color your skin is, they
just care, you know... the money.

In most of the focus groups, a general distrust in powerful economic actors was related to
several areas of the food system. One participant stated, “The big companies right now,
they know the ignorance of the public...They want a city of dying people,” and another

added:

Large corporations don’t want us to be self-sustainable. They don’t want us to be
able to feed ourselves. Because they realize that you can buy a used car, used
clothes, used suit, but you can’t buy used food. And so, all of, Monsanto, and all
of those big corporations, are now seeking to control the food industry. Because
you always have to get something to eat.

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Activist leaders agreed with this sentiment, that major grocery chains had abandoned the
city and thus were part of the problem. For this leader, this is tied to a greater problem of

economic dependence:

It’s a very complex problem, and so the solution’s gonna be complex and multi-
faceted. So, yes having large supermarkets in our community is one aspect of
solving this problem, but it’s not the solution. So ultimately, we have to empower
people, and not just make people dependent on corporate entities to eat. And so
we’re trying to change the View that people have about food in general, where it
comes from, who’s responsible for feeding us, you know, because in America,
people in many ways give up their power, not just in the aspect of food, but in
many areas of human life. You know, people think that the doctor is responsible
for their health, and basically [give up] any kind of self-ownership, and feel that,
you know it’s the doctor’s responsibility to keep me healthy. Or in education,
because we have state mandating compulsory education, we send our children
through a system and we feel like it’s the system’s responsibility to educate our
children. And you can look at many different aspects of life in American society-
and this is Americans in general.

Similarly, the elders of the Hmong community expressed concern about the younger

generation losing the cultural characteristic of self-sufficiency through food provision:

It’s about economy, if they {the youth] can get a job and have money, then it
seems like they’re not interested. That’s what the seniors, that’s what they know
and because Of economic reasons they would do that for food.

For one leader interested in promoting racial equality, this is tied to self-sufficiency:

I think as a people, we are in the process of being a more self-sufl'rcient people.
That’s what’s going down. And for hundreds Of years, whether it be welfare,
whether it be whatever, we have had to always rely on the majority culture to do
things for us. And we no longer want that anymore... ya know, this isn’t colonial
Kenya in 1956, where you know, the colonial power comes in and we spend our
money and they take it back to Britain. That’s not acceptable.”

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Loss of economic power is seen as both cultural and structural, as the underprivileged are
seen as having a “false consciousness” as well as a lack of access to entrepreneurial
resources. This is tied to the framing of the diet and public health problems as those of
food culture. This was especially salient for the group of Hmong residents, who found the
food culture of surrounding African Americans as evidenced by the neighborhood stores
to be unhealthy and unsatisfactory. Many of the activist participants described the rest of
the city experiencing public health problems are “uneducated,” or even “lazy” in one
case. This was a contested issue within the groups, as some emphasized the opportunity
for a healthy diet as provided by structure whereas others emphasized personal
knowledge and choice. However, it was agreed that there was a cultural food trend
toward low quality food that extends across class.
I just wanted to say there’s a Trader Joe’s grocery store that opened up in Grosse
Pointe area, but even, you know, you were talking about not knowing how to
prepare foods, even when you walk in there and that’s geared towards, I think,
more of the middle class, everything’s like dinner in a bag there, so that’s maybe
just something cultural that’s happening with time and whatever. Money, and buy,

buy the chicken and the pasta and the salsa. It’s five ninety-nine in the bag, you
know...

Food access and retail
Public health consequences and health disparities were dramatized in most of the groups
(except for the youth). One woman commented on urban meat distribution practices by
saying, “That borders on genocide.” The access problem in general is seen as an issue of
both a regional and racial inequality. One participant noted differences in food quality
between the suburbs and the city:

The grapes aren’t as big, the cherries aren’t as red, and because I work in the

suburbs, I work in Pontiac, SO I’m driving through a number Of suburban
neighborhoods, and I live in the city, I see that difference and it’s strange to me

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that this is the same store, this is Randazzle’s though I mean, what do you all do,
take all the stuff you don’t want in the suburbs and send it to the city? ‘Cause
that’s the way it appears.

Many framed this and other problems within a historical context of white flight.

But originally when they started Randazzle’s, see, Detroit was still a mixed
community, there were still many whites who lived in that particular area of
Detroit and the food was always fresher, always better. It was better to go to
Randazzle’s for your fruits and vegetables than it was your grocery store. But
now, it’s a toss up. And they may change your food there more Often, maybe, but
not in the city. You know, I don’t get that view, that feel from it in the city.”

The issue of de-population was discussed in most of the focus groups and interviews,
related to economic struggle as well as a remaining paradigm for economic growth that is
seen as unrealistic. One economic development professional quipped, “people don’t like

to hear this, but we are a shrinking city.” This is seen to lead to political inertia:

You know, as we talk about land use planning and zoning and urban agriculture
there’s still a hell of a lot Of inertia to overcome from people who think that that’s
sort of somehow beneath the city to be considering those kinds of things... that
there’s a higher, better use than growing chickens and sheep.

Prognostic Frames

Education

The topic Of education was a common but contested theme. Many defined it as a need for
general information, others as exposure and experience, and others as a cultural shift. The
outcomes for education varied as well, as some saw it as a driver for demand for
sustainably produced food, and others for health benefit, and yet others for equity through
quality of life. Most assumed that exposure to food production would be productive in

this area. One professional put the need this way:

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...I think doing the education part at the Market where we sort of have a captive
audience, and people, you know, people can actually combine their - they’re
coming to buy food anyway, and take advantage of that to introduce them to the
idea of growing more of their own, or further the idea that perhaps those six
Cokes that they have a week might affect their blood level, of sugar.

A younger participant of one of the activist groups laid it out this way:

Well people aren’t going to go from junk food to organic overnight, so it’ll have
to be... if we could just get fresh produce- accessibility to fresh produce to the

residents of the city of Detroit, and then we can take it up a notch to organic, but
they gotta get used to fresh, because it’s like canned everything, and it’s like fast

food haven here in Detroit. So, we get them back in the kitchen, that’s right there,
making the first step.

Another more seasoned veteran of community outreach efforts emphasized a more active

exchange between educator and educated:

So I think we have to have creative ways of integrating- it may not be because
they said, “Oh, I want to learn this,”- but you have to have creative ways to infuse
this into the community. And it takes people who really want to help...a lot of
expenses should be directed toward education and communication, different kinds
of communication. ...But each one Of us here has a network of people. And that
network of people is like that web... And that makes a difference, especially in the
black community. Because people receive it, if you put it to them in a way that
they can accept it. And so you are able to reach people, but you do want to use the
communications that they will receive or understand, or want to. And then when
you show them, you give it to them in their hands- let them touch it, let them see
it, and eat it, and then it works. But that’s- we’re talking about something that’s
not here this minute- it does take time to do this. And that’s what we’re building
here. All of us together are building that, to make it possible for people in our
community to be able to receive it.

Others in focus groups emphasized the importance Of leadership, setting examples, and
exposure, stating “All people see in the supermarket, is junk food and packaged food, but

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when they begin to see other examples that changes their consciousness.” For some,

cultural change through these “educational” efforts is seen as an exercise in

empowerment, through teaching self-sufficiency.
And so part Of what we’re trying to do, is give people the sense that ya know, we
do have, we have power, that we have to exercise, we have control over our own
lives. There’s no entity, no governmental entity, no corporate entity, that can just,
you know, [suck] out the power of our own lives. And so that’s, for me, that’s like
a key and essential concept to the food security movement, um, because if we can
plant that seed in people, then they’ll begin to look at their lives in general, in
terms of taking control of their lives, taking back control of their lives from this
kind of apparatus that’s taken control.”

Improving retail and access

The problem of access to a healthy diet seems to be popularly framed as an issue of

equity in distribution—- many focus group participants and professional advocates alike

framed the solution as providing the same quality and service to Afi'ican Americans and

urbanites as whites and suburbanites-- i.e., major chain grocery stores. The seniors group

agreed on this:

1: I’d like to see a major grocery supplier come into the city and supply good,
healthy food... And I think we all agree on that.

2: And I agree too, one hundred percent. That’s what we’re looking for. That’s
what we’re talking about.

The economic development practitioners interviewed were both involved in a formal
collaboration of partners concerned with solving the access problem through retail
attraction and improvement, and explained that both major chain groceries and support
for new and existing independent retailers came out of this process as recommendations.

However, the loss of chain retailers is not mourned by everyone. Opinions Of professional

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leaders varied, with an overall consensus that no one solution would solve the access

problem. However, several activist citizens and leaders expressed conviction in this area:

I think one of the things that really frustrates me is when folks, you know, we’re
lamenting the loss of some large multi-national big box stores as though it were a
great loss for the city, and in my opinion what we should have been lamenting
was the loss of the local butcher and the green grocer and the small local
businesses. From a community organizer’s standpoint, the difference of trying to
get support from a small local business to give back to the community versus a
multi-national corporation is huge. You know, you can walk into Mike’s Butcher
Shop and say, “Hey, do you want to sponsor my kid’s baseball team?” “What,
you come here every week? Yeah, okay, I would be interested.” If you went into
Kroger, they’re like, “Oh, we have to talk with our, you know, coordinator for
this, this, this” - it’s like these people are just sucking the money out of this
community. SO, I mean, good riddance. And I don’t want to see them return,
frankly.

And so you ask yourself the question, why aren’t they [major retailers] here? And
what will bring them here. I think this whole thing’s about food systems. And
we’re talkin about the same doggone people who’ve got this mess the way it is
right now. I think that, you know, it’s gonna be something new created. It has to
be created by the residents who live in the city, who’s under-served. . .

The researchers engaged in community-based participatory projects suggested that the

feeling is mutual amidst their participants:

1: I don’t think folks would say we don’t need supermarkets- it’s not an either/or.
But I think it’s, we don’t need these big-box stores that come in and run everyone
else out of business, don’t provide jobs, bring people in from the suburbs to work
in them, you know, that’s what’s not...

2: Well, I think part of the issue with the big box stores- and I don’t think
anybody’s said this to me directly- there’s a huge turnover in those stores. So they
come in, they’re here for a year or two, and then they go away. And I think part of
the concern is that if in the couple years that they’re there they drive the local
mom and pop stores out of business, then when they leave, there is no diversity in
the food environment, SO they’ve sort Of wiped out what could have been there.
And I will say, very strongly in our community planning process, people really

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wanted to strengthen the local economic base, at the same time that they’re
diversifying the food environment and bringing in local products.

Thus, the prognostic framing for improving retail is both in terms of equity and economic

power, along with the technical lens used by economic development practitioners.

Economic development and participation

The difference between professional, activist, and citizen perspectives were the most
disparate around this subject. One of the economic development practitioners proclaimed

that

All economic development is social justice... you are trying to increase the tax
base and improve the quality Of life for people....so that you can Offer them more

resources and have better neighborhoods, so that everybody has a good quality of
life

However, several leaders saw a need to shift from this traditional View of economic

development. This “pre-occupation with the tax-base” was seen as part of the “problem

thinking” that dominates economic development by others:

We need to change the vision, or the lack of vision of the political leadership so
that they don’t perceive development in terms of concrete and bricks, but they see
development in terms of people, and quality of life.

For several of the activists and citizens, economic development is connected to racial and
class empowerment, and accessibility Of fOOd projects creates an Opportunity for a

reclamation of economic power and a new economic paradigm fostering quality of life.

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But, you know, if people are really serious, it’s going to have to be an economic
shift. And it’s going to have to be given to people who are altruistically involved,
who have a mission to save themselves. Otherwise, it’s going to be the same thing
over and over. We’re going to have the same CEOS and everybody else just
doling out the money, and the same situation is going to take place. And let’s not
fool ourselves. You know, these people who run Whole Foods and Trader Joes
and all these folks, they know what’s going on. They know what’s going on with
food systems. And they know what the population is, and they’ve done the
scrence.

Everybody thinks about economics, but if you think about the ground level,
agriculture and manufacturing is at the ground level. SO if you were provide

people with something to eat as well as a way to get a job also, you are making
the community itself sufficient.

Many focus group participants agreed that something new needed to be created for and
by the community. In these groups, entrance into the food economy is seen as both urgent

and anti-hegemonic action:

We gotta get back to raising something- and canning it, and freezing it, and
drying, so they have something to eat, cause they’re fixin to really put the hurtin
on America. First of all, we don’t even know what’s goin on, because China got
more food than H. And how far is that gonna put us behind? And so we really
gotta take a serious thing in America about food, or somebody’s gonna starve.
One youth explained the benefit of independence and self-reliance received from her
urban-agricultural curriculum:
because what they have in the grocery store, they grow it in the dirt too, but it’s
just more high priced and you can just... they taught us something that we can
grow our own vegetables and then cook it ourselves instead Of just wasting,
basically, wasting money.
However, a variety of perspectives showed that these types of agrifood ventures are
imagined at various scales, and can work at various levels and loci with respect to
dominant economic development paradigms. For example, many imagine urban

agriculture as a temporary use for vacant land that could eventually benefit the city

financially and attract residents leading to real-estate development, whereas others see

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Detroit’s vacant land as an opportunity to create a new paradigm of development. For

example:

...the former grid really doesn’t make much sense if there’s only one house per
block. And right now I’m just, I walk around in these neighborhoods in
amazement about how much grass there is just to mow and it would strike me that
we’re much better grazing it than mowing it, so we’re trying to actually introduce
grazing into this neighborhood, and actually do land use planning that maybe
abandons the grid instead of, if you look at the last page, there’s a whole host of
small, traditional subdivisions of which all of them on that page, I think there’s
maybe one that’s going forward right now. And if we look over the course of
thirty years, that dream list of potential subdivisions ain’t likely to happen. so
what could we do from a land use standpoint, could actually get some of that
converted to more of a conservation-style subdivision design which basically is
founded on a principle that sixty percent of the people living in golf course
communities don’t play golf, they simply want green outside their door. So it
could be golf course, it could be pasture, it could be crop land, it could be park
land. As long as we lay it out, if the economy recovers and it becomes really a
swank neighborhood, then it becomes park land, but in the meantime maybe we
just graze sheep on it and leave it be at that.

This reveals a tension between what some activists titled “band-aid solutions” and radical
change. Those advocating for radical change see an accessible, hands-on way to create a
new economy, however, this does not necessarily fit within an economic development
practitioner’s conceptual fiamework of realistic development. One practitioner Spoke to

the idea Of urban agriculture as an economic driver for Detroit:

I think it depends on the neighborhood I don’t know if anyone has done enough
analysis of where it makes sense from a long-term master plan development
perspective. A big part Of our problem is that vacant land is not contiguous and it
is all over... and so, I think there are a couple things. One is it would be great to
know what the right size farm is beyond single lot neighborhood, feel good,
community gardens, how do you create a farm or a system of farms that are
sustainable and economically viable and maybe there are like two lots at a time
and there are 100 of them. You know, 100 of these things and is there a way to
do that where titration and those kind of costs work out and you get enough
production? I don’t know enough about farming to know how much land you
need for how much production, how much Of it need to be contiguous that kind Of

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thing. I think there is a real need, people want to talk about it, but nobody really
knows. Are you making things up? I don’t know who I would actually trust on
this, maybe [] because he has actually done it and maybe [] knows and I just have
not asked her. I feel like a lot of people talk about it and it would be great to know
yes, you can have, the best thing to do is ten, ten acre sites because that is like the
sweet spot in terms of production and cost and all that kind of stuff...Whatever
that is I just don’t have any information on it. I think that would really help the
decision makers at the city planning development department better understand
how to take in the request that they are getting around urban agriculture, if they
had a framework around which to evaluate those requests. This is again just my
Opinion... they are reacting a little bit ambiguously to requests, that they don’t
want to say no to people because of all the ancillary benefits and I don’t
necessarily know that the people proposing things are doing it in a way that makes
sense from just a pure on fanning perspective depending on what the goal is. If
the goal of farming is to have a little plow land and to go through the exercise of
growing food hoping something survives, then that is one thing. But if the goal is
to actually produce enough to populate the store down the street and then there is
a whole science to that, what you grow and when you grow it, how much land you
need all that kind of stuff...I feel like we need more help that get that so that you
can then say yeah in Northwest Detroit these are the 12 sites and on the East side
these are the sites that we don’t want for commercial development, they are not
going to be residential, they are good to, let’s do it.

Thus, the prognosis for economic development is contested around issues of access to

resources, power, and “realistic” solutions.

Motivational Frames

In general, motivational framing used by interviewees was dependent upon their

organizational and professional roles, missions, and goals as well as the resources

available. Many of these constructed frames were backed by moral imperative around the

right to a healthy diet. For example one participant stated, “And so we really gotta take a

serious thing in America about food, or somebody’s gonna starve.” Along with this,

racial and class equity were used to justify and call for action, as well as environmental

urgency.

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Calls for action took place during several of the focus groups, based on a variety
of motivational frames. One mode of doing this was through emphasizing the
responsibility of community members to act, in that it is the most effective route to

changing culture and shifting power:

I think it’s gonna take a group like [ours], because we’re representative of those
who live inside of the city. What we’re doing, is trying to create a new paradigm
with food in urban areas. So I think it’s gonna take, you know, this group, setting
up models, and this group being replicated...We’re gonna have to be able to grow
it, you know, pack it, sell it, we’re gonna have to do the whole 9 yards, that’s
what’s gonna have to happen. You know, it’s gonna take the people who are most
affected by the problem to solve the problem.

You gonna have to have authentic organizations who authentically organize. And
I’m talking about in a city like the city of Detroit...You got groups in here right
now: this city is 90% African American. The people who control the money for
all of these green projects and whatnot, they’re all Caucasians for the most part. I
would venture to say, probably, 3/4s of them live outside the city. They’re not
going to do anything but the same-old, same-old, and gonna have some black
folk, probably, fronting for them. You gonna have to have authentic organizations
who have some type Of altruism involved in their agenda to change this thing,
otherwise, you gonna have a city full of dying people... You gotta model, you
gotta set up a whole new paradigm, inside the city, and it’s gonna be word-of-
mouth, hands-on.

So it’s coming upon the people at this table, to go out and be ambassadors, for
people to think better, to live better— because the food is killing us....And so, we’re
gonna have to create these new systems, right here at this table.

In addition, focus group participants emphasized the urgency required in fighting

economic and political power:

We’re just not thinking straight- we’re not thinking right. We’ve gotta come
together like this more, with more regular people. Because the big companies,
they’ve got plans. And what their plans are is not good.

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The drug companies are buying up the seed companies to control food. And
people have got to get together.

And I think also, we need to look at the big picture. And I came from a meeting of
people fi'om Chrysler, and they’re all looking at the city, and how they can
improve the city, but they’re not looking at the city in terms of what you already
have. They’re looking into wiping all that slate, which is people that look like us,
because we’re the problem, and they want to create what they want Detroit to
look like, they’re creating it as we speak. SO, you know, and it really does take,
and I agree that we, on the bottom, have to create that whole process, from the
seed, to production, to distribution of food. So that’s gotta come from small
models, and inside of that is the economic piece. All that we’re saying and that’s
what we’re to be creating here- a model of [our organization], and a model over
here. And we all just pool together, ‘cause it’s a bigger force together. You got
that spot over there, and that spot over there, and we need to come together and
draw up a plan for how we’re really gonna distribute this food, inside whatever
partnership that we have. Because it’s not gonna work if you’re over here and I’m
over there, but you, know, while we’re over there individually we’re looking at
how we’re gonna come together collectively. Because that’s where the power
comes from. Because on the other hand, it’s already been created, and we’re not
in that picture.”

Both individual and collective resistance to the mainstream economic development
paradigm are connected to self-empowerment, including actions such as growing,
processing, preserving, preparing, etc. A shift in consciousness is seen as important to
convince people of what is possible in order to mobilize. This requires a rejection of the
mainstream economic development paradigm and a new Visioning:
You know, the economy’s real bad, so why not create your own economy. SO
that’s what I see as the solution.”
One of my favorite sayings is, ‘why let a little thing like reality get in your way.’
SO, I’m not limited by what I see. And so, reality, it’s created. SO, you know,
consciousness can re-shape reality. SO, it has to start with ideas, and a vision- and
the bible, you know I’m not a christian, but the bible says, without a vision, the
people parish. And so, you know, you start with things in your mind, and it
manifests into the physical realm. And so, we need people who are idealists. But

we need people who are idealists who know how take take things from the vision
to the reality.

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'1

.,.

This Visioning also involves a consideration of both personal and collective power to
make change. After a series of complaints about life in the city, the leader of the Hmong

group stated, “But we’re going to stay, though. [Laughter] And fight.”

However, the two economic development practitioners interviewed both
discussed a difficulty in bringing community voices to the table. Speaking about a

grocery attraction strategy, one stated:

One thing that we did not have was really grass roots kinds of folks. Part of the
difficulty was that when you are trying to get the grocers to talk honestly about
what is going on in their stores and want to partner with you, it is hard to

have. . .you know I got a lot Of flack from Acorn about "why aren't we at the
table?" And they came to the table too late, you know it is difficult to involved the
folks who are picketing fiom the store and expect the grocers to feel like they can
really talk about what is going on in their stores and if it is a safe environment - so
it was kind of a conscious decision.

In one of the focus groups, there was discussion about cultural power to change
consciousness regarding food consumption. In regards to the power of the media, this
participant contended that African Americans in particular have the power to change

culture by and for themselves:

,9 6‘

Ok, I heard somebody say “media, advertising,” and “television.” If you have
enough money, you can probably do that...But I look at phenomenons like, baggy
pants, tumed-around baseball caps: they do it on the East coast, they do it on the
West coast. I never saw a television advertisement. When they was carrying the
big boom boxes, it happened all over. It happened everywhere... And plus, our
culture, the African people have always found a way to make a way and get by.
You know, SO, we just do whatever we gotta do to get by. If we gotta buy fi’om a
cheaper store, then we buy from the cheaper store... Black people have always,
people of Afiican descent have always figured out a way to survive. But if they
were educated on making themselves survive and be self-sustained on their own,
it’s not even African American, but the city in general, that would be a lot more,
allow us to be a lot more stronger as a community. When you stand on your own,
people have a lot of respect for you, and you can have some pull at the table. But

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when you’re standing on everybody else, they just move out of the way and you
fall down.

Some of the groups mobilized for specific action within focus group sessions based on
the idea of consumer power. While some feel forced into buying cheap food, these
participants felt they could advocate for these community members by flexing their
consumer power. One group mobilized to set up a meeting to Open up a dialogue with

store owners.

I really believe that this group right here, this focus group, and it’s great that
we’re having this discussion this morning. Perhaps we need to meet with some of
the owners with some of the stores we patronize to see what kind of
improvements they might be willing to make. .. We can’t just throw our hands up
and say, you know, we can’t make a difference. Because one leverage, the
leverage that you have, is that you have money to shop around. And they gotta
sell it. They got a product and they gotta sell it... And they have something we
want. And the only way that we can, I think, really change or at least have a voice
is to have some kind of opinion or have that ear, is to get them to the table just
like we are this morning. Maybe they don’t know that there are some issues and
concerns in the community that they can not address.

Get that group Of people in here and let them know that, you know what, the
people who are spending the money in the stores where you’re selling your goods
are saying that they’re gonna cease to spend their money and they’re gonna get
vans and busses and believe it or not, I think if we talked to enough churches we
probably could get enough of them together to get, maybe not all of the people,
but enough of them to put a dent in their profit because, see, I learned business
here is one thing and one thing only: that’s money. Money talks. The rest of it is
gobblety-gook in their car, they don’t hear you.

Another group was explicitly against this idea:

I’m not really, too much of a negotiator to tell you the truth. I’m more power
politics, and my whole frame of reference, I’m kind of from left of left. .. we’re
just understanding the dynamics that people in power don’t concede power just
because you ask them to. They concede power because they see some threat to
their interest. And so, if you ask me what I think needs to be done, I think we
need to deal with store owners from a position of power, so that when we speak to

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them, they can’t just blow us Off. And there’s other groups too, there’s nicer
groups too that go out and have picnics with them, and meet with the head of the
Chaldean merchants’ association, there’s people, NAACP and groups like that
that like to sit down with them and have tea, have lunch, and all that kind of stuff.
I’m not part of that group, and most people I know are not part of that. And so,
there’s another group of people who do those kind of things.

Motivating around what works

Across the focus groups, another mode of mobilization was around the resources and

groups that were accessible. One group member asked,

Would it behoove maybe the Center or a church to have a van where they take X
amount of people to a specific store so that they way that they can get the quality
food, other than letting you get that on your own? ...why not just have a signup
sheet and have six or seven individuals go to the store at a time, and this way this
would not only provide them the transportation, it would provide them the safety
as well as the opportunity of getting good food.

This conception of accessibility to resources and power to make change was important
for mobilizing around urban agriculture:
We can help solve this problem. Because we have access to grow. And so it’s a
matter of how many people can be educated to understand what’s happening in
their areas, and a matter of giving people the opportunity to become a part of it,
and business plans and surveys- things like that are valuable tools.
Agrifood ventures are seen as a tangible, accessible part of the economy. The leader of
the youth urban agriculture program stated,

I teach this agribusiness and a lot of it is like, this agriculture, this business- so
much of our business now is such a scam, where we’re sellin’ nickels for dimes,
but agriculture is like, you gotta have a product! You gotta have the apple- you
can’t buy and sell futures, you gotta have the product. And so it’s kind of really a

good lesson for that class, and for other classes.

An economic development practitioner spoke of other resources:

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So Detroit has this huge Opportunity with six thousand vacant acres and all sorts
of underutilized workforce and I think it has, as you’ll hear from other folk, 1
think it has some of the best not-for—profit infrastructure people that can actually
train people in how to grow things or raise animals....you got the technology at
Michigan State, you got the people who can train at the not-for-profits, you got
the land, and we got the people that are underutilized, people in terms of work
force, so.

Specifically, Detroit’s land is a good resource because of it’s length of time in vacancy,

making things seem more feasible:

Many of the parcels have been vacant for twenty or more years. So the natural
progress, process Of succession and soil building and plant diversity has taken
hold, in much of the city, so that’s really good. We have a culture, a farming
culture in the city, much of the population that remained are from down south and
the seniors in the city who are aging but they’re here, [50:00] and they’re staying
here, have a lot of history and skills in terms of food production. We have some
of the greatest community connections, I think just because we needed to survive
through all that’s happened to us, and continues to happen to us; we survive
through our connections and through our community, and that community can be,
can be leveraged, you know, and I think that’s happening.

Another resource is Detroit’s self-sufficient population:

We are as self-sufficient as possible and that really is a very Detroit characteristic.
The people who have stayed know that basically we cannot rely on corporate
entities to even sell a seed in the city, we have to go to the suburbs to buy seed;
we don’t have hardware stores that carry compost, we have to go to the suburbs to
buy compost, you know, much of corporate America has abandoned us and so
Detroiters are very much wanting to grow our own.

It seems that people also motivated to engage in resistant behaviors due to ancillary,
personal benefits. As discussed in the first section of findings, participants find benefits
ranging from the political, and aesthetic, social to the personal and economic from

gardening.

95

I think that something else that happens in our garden community here is this
wonderful thing that like a lot of us do have, you know, the family, traditional
family food that we’ve been given, our higher-fat things and you found out you
don’t wanna be eating, but I think it’s a wonderful thing that we have that we’re
starting to pass around or cooking, you know, like instead of, I got a lot of recipes
that are not being passed down, instead of being passed down they’re being
passed around our garden community. That’s one of the really great things that
happens in our community gardens.

For Hmong-American residents, motivation to participate in production is linked to

cultural beliefs. One community member emphasized, “they’re serious farmers, they’re

farmers.” This is related to beliefs about health and aging:

l: he think that if they sit around, most old people will have stroke, so they are
ready to do a job outside. [Laughter] Sit around, have stroke. They don’t want to
do that.

2: They don’t like to sit still, you know, they like to move around twenty-four
hours a day, they don’t sit down.

Use of master fi‘ames

Public health

Among participants engaged in activist or professional work, ideas about diet and
food access appeared to have been influenced by the public health perspective,
emphasizing personal choice and knowledge, along with physical access to a healthy diet.
However, several perspectives expanded on the idea that nutrition education assistance
from outsiders can help inform personal choice, by emphasizing the importance of food
culture, networking, modeling and exposure based within the community. In addition,
many felt it was important to look beyond Simply meeting the need for fresh healthy

foods through major grocery retail, and look at the implications of such a strategy for

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community well-being on the whole. However, most took the view that a variety of

strategies are in order for the complex set of threats to public health and diet in Detroit.

Economic development, community-building, and equality

This was a contested issue within the group sampled. Several focus group
participants took on a powerful stance, asking, “why not create your own economy.” This
was encouraged by both a diagnostic frame of lost self-reliance on the part of
underprivileged Detroiters, as well as the accessible, “on-the-ground” nature of food and
agriculture projects. This is related to issues of racial and regional equality and social

justice. Racial representation is desired by some of the focus group participants.

I wanna see black people represented in every aspect of the food system in
proportion to our percentage of the population. So we need to be... if we’re 80-
90% of the population, we need to be 80-90% of the growers, 80—90% of the
distributors, 80-90% of the retailers to reap the economic benefits of the dollars
that we spend on food, so that we can recycle it and be self sufficient.
However, the fact that traditional modes of economics still hold power over development
came through in several ways. A few of the professional leaders took this as a call for
changing mindsets about meeting human needs through economic development, to
instead focus on land use that encourages quality of life. However, those connected to
economic development resources and political decision-making are still operating under
the mode of proof of economic productivity to validate land use or any other
development such as grocery retail. This means that projects must make economic sense

before they make social sense, which is the opposite of what many activists and leaders

are calling for. Urban agriculture is discussed both as a radical oppositional strategy and a

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strategy that beholds economic value and can thus be legitimated. As a cultural form of
economic development urban agriculture is assigned the power to change community
image and thus economic promise. However, in policy negotiation, advocates for using
vacant land for sustainable agriculture still but up against hegemonic ideas for
development: “development trumps gardens.” While land in de—industrialized regions
such as Detroit is not highly desired, the cultivation of urban land by oppressed residents
reflects a level of resistance and the realization of an alternative or perhaps oppositional
vision for the city(Zukin 1997).

Ideas about equality, justice and fairness were explored in several ways. Some
saw a need for parity with the suburbs or equal access to resources, and others saw it as
providing opportunities for dignity, capacity, and building life skills. When asked about
fairness, one focus group respondent said:

There’s no fairness in this world. What is fairness, I mean, explain to me what

you mean about fairness. We know about Kroger and all that, but what do we do
to get that?

Environmental sustainability

This frame was used by a few interviewees, but raised in only one of the more activist
focus groups groups, around the issue of food miles. In interviews, the concept of urban
sustainability is implicit in the expansion of urban agriculture. One interviewee suggested
that urban agriculture is central to the sustainability movements in Detroit. In addition, it
has become part of Detroit’s identity, or vision, due to opportunities with green space
provided by vacant land. When paired with Detroit’s other needs, this has created a more
locally situated definition of sustainability-- One focus group participant said, “I don’t

know why everyone is talking about sustainability-- what about thrive-ability?”
98

 

 

indicating the desire to create something new in Detroit. When asked about sustainability,

an interviewee stated:

I believe that Detroit could be one of the most realistic cities in the world, you
know, like we don’t necessarily choose to be green or sustainable, we’re dealing
with what we have, you know? So we have got to be creative in how we buy
things and how we produce things and how we, you know, look at change because
it’s not really, there’s not a lot of resources flowing through here and there’s not a
lot of outside interest and wealth, which is actually why I’m here, you know, it’s a
very self-sufficient city and it has a lot of potential to use that self-sufficiency in a
really progressive way to become one of the most sustainable cities in the world,
if we really [35:00] worked hard and kept up the momentum that we currently
have?’

This is related to the ancillary benefits enjoyed by participants in gardening activities.

Part of Detroit’s brand for self-sufficient sustainability means a low-capital, community-

based, localized approach:
I think there’s amongst the corporate leaders there’s still this notion that Detroit,
it’s all about new age, new economy jobs all focused on technology and I think
there’s this belief that high technology’s gonna bail us out of the energy crisis,
that one corporate guy said an energy problem is just a technology problem. I
think he may be right, I just think he’s betting that the secret algae gets here in the
nick of time, and if it misses by a few centuries or decades we’re kind of screwed
in the meantime, so all I know is that there’s a reliance of technology to bail us
out of our energy problem, will deter us from rolling up our sleeves to attack in a
more grunt, you know, low-tech way, via growing the food ourselves.

This idea of self-wrought, equitable and efficient use of resources stands in contrast to

traditional modes of economic development, where technical expertise is relied upon and

technical solutions invested in heavily. This is related to the framing of economic

development, where citizens and activists call for less profitable and more socially

equitable, participatory ventures within the food system.

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Summary

There was a variety of ways that citizens, activists, and professionals framed
problems and solutions and were motivated to act. The citizen groups saw problems with
diet to be related to equality, culture, and empowerment. This was related to distrust in
the industrial food system and perceived racially unbalanced economic power. Most
interviewees saw these problems in technical terms, but agreed with focus group
participants about inequality, education, and empowerment. Within the shared goals for
food system localization, tensions between traditional routes of economic development
and citizen perspectives are present, aligning with concerns within the literature about
food system localization. Professionals did not explicate the “call to arms or rationale for
engaging in arneliorative or corrective action” as much as the focus groups did,
discussing the “how” more than the “why” concerned with motivations. However, visions

for the making the city a leader in urban agriculture were shared.

DISCUSSION

The collective vision for change in Detroit is driven by the common diagnostic frame of
problems with healthy food access, and the availability of vacant land. Within this
collective vision lie several contentions. While many discussed social justice, some desire
equality in material resources, while others believe social justice revolves around more
ideological concerns such as dignity (Hinrichs and Allen 2008). Routes to affecting
lasting, genuine change in the structural problems of the food system and quality of life in
general vary, and there are concerns about how and by whom existing initiatives are
administered. Though there is this contention around power and access to resources

within agri-food initiatives, motivational framing that makes acting appear prudent and

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necessary (Snow et al. 1986) has been successful, through creating a new food culture
and common sense (Lyson 2004; Bagdonis, Hinrichs et al. 2009). Detroiters are
motivated by what works, through models forged by leaders and organic intellectuals
(Gramsci 1971). Cultural leadership and spreading of ideology and motivation for action
is seen as a power struggle by some activists (Johnston 2008; Coles 1998), while those
engaged on a professional or expert basis see things more pragmatically. Either way, as
framers of movements, both pragmatic and radical leaders are consciously creating a new
culture around food and development in Detroit, united by a common vision of what is

feasible.

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CHAPTER 5
CONCLUSIONS

This section brings together the two sections of findings, taking into account their
convergences and disparities. The first section is concerned with resources and structural
concerns, showing what problems are being experienced, what is being done, and what
resources are necessary for making changes. These responses are difficult to remove from
the context of subjectivity as explored in the second section, in that each perspective is
essentially a different frame.

Concerns about resources are embedded in ideas of how community and
economic development does or does not promote social equality. For some citizens,
concerns about retail are evidentiary of ideas about racial justice for some. For others,
equality was considered parity with suburban life. In all cases, the experiences with
structural constraints and opportunities shared in the first section shaped the way

problems and solutions are framed, and the way people are motivated to act.

Food has become important for political, economic, social, cultural and health
reasons. Citizen ideas of this importance of food intersect with dominant frames in some
respects: the activist groups adopted environmental, social, and health frames, whereas
other citizen groups did not. Gardening activities have raised the importance of food and
allowed for social connection around cooking and eating, trading of skills. Rising
popularity. Motivations ranged, but an important factor for participation was accessibility
and personal benefits (enhanced quality of life) received from self-provisioning or
community gardening. People are also motivated by feasibility, the presence of models,

and the availability of resources.

l02

Cooking skills were discussed as important for women respective to familial role,
but others made food a priority for health, aesthetic, and ideological reasons. Self-
reliance is both a practical and ideological matter, and this concept was used both in the

personal and city-wide sense.

The need for getting Detroit’s population to eat differently is agreed upon, as
health is seen as a matter of equality and self-respect. Most ascribe to the Western belief
that a low-fat diet is best, but citizens and some interviewees stressed that this should be
less about personal responsibility and more about structural concems- both in physical
access and in the structures of inequality that lead to the “false consciousness” about food
and diet. Some contended that it is inconsiderate to emphasize nutrition education where
subjects of such education do not have the power to make healthy choices. People are
motivated in this area by ethical concerns. However, there is a certain amount of
consensus that behavior change in this area would best be accomplished by word of
mouth, with leadership from within the community. It is believed by citizens that Afiican
Americans have the cultural power to bring about a “change of consciousness.” It is also
agreed that food and agriculture provides a good point of engagement for not only health
but self esteem and empowerment.

Food quality and health were related to agricultural production practices and, by
some citizens, disingenuousness of industrial powers within the food system.
Localization of and economic participation in the food system as well as self-
provisioning through gardening are seen as acts of self reliance and resistance to

economic power.

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There is contention around whether or not major chain grocery retail should be
invited back into the city. Diversification of retail is generally agreed upon by
interviewees, however, some citizens desire parity with what is offered in the suburbs and
in other cities, and view this as equality. However, others have a different idea of what a
thriving community should be like, with small, locally owned businesses.

Many citizens felt that there was sufficient demand for fresh, healthy food, and
there was also willingness of entrepreneurs, but that development of new locally owned
neighborhood stores is thwarted by a lack of access to resources. Some saw this as racial.
However, economic development practitioners saw this as more of a logistical issue of
training and feasibility. They stressed that shop owners may have more immediate
problems taking precedence over putting locally produced food on the shelves, as well as
the fact that it is difficult to get grocers to take risk in introducing healthier products if
they do not perceive high demand for them. It was agreed upon that grocers need
assistance, and flexible financing should be made available.

Profitability of land use for agriculture was questioned. It was suggested that
citizens and activists touting community-based urban agriculture were not speaking the
same language as public officials and economic development authorities. Several leaders
talked about a new vision for development that goes beyond simply increasing the tax
base, attracting large companies and building infrastructure, with an increased focus on
social development. Economic development professionals were partly on board with this,
but emphasized a need for realistic thinking and fitting into the city’s format for land-use
and economic development. Advocates for using vacant land for sustainable agriculture

percieve hegemonic ideas about development: “development trumps gardens.”

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Nonprofit urban ag organizations emphasized that a lot could be done without
outside funding, through sheer enthusiasm and zeal. These groups raised concern about
outside funders and other interests, contending that self-sufficiency and independence
was one of Detroit’s greatest strengths. Several interviewees called for a return to
community organizing, trust-building, and sustainable growth; and less reliance on
financial inputs and built development.

Urban agriculture was discussed both as a radical oppositional strategy and a
strategy that beholds economic value and can thus be legitimated. As a cultural form of
economic development urban agriculture is assigned the power to change community
image and thus economic promise. There was a shared vision around localization and an
economy that is embedded in social, cultural, and environmental concern. However,
some of the leaders expressed a visions going beyond simple environmental sustainability
and equability in resources, but combining the two in a more effective model for urban
development. This would require the acceptance of urban agriculture as a permanent land
use, instead of an interim use while real estate markets are inactive, so that housing and
agricultural production remain interspersed, and a re-conception of economic
development, where untraditional and perhaps unprofitable ventures are prioritized for
the sake of economic participation.

In conclusion, although all participants in this research cannot be considered
social movement participants, there is broad social momentum behind a unified vision for
the future of the Detroit food system, driven by local economic conditions and a
significant presence of vacant land. This is similar to other urban social movements;

however, actors come into participation not only as concerned resistors to the status quo,

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but as consumers, professionals, social leaders, educators, neighbors, and eaters. In
addition, many of the individuals beholding this common vision are at both ideological
and practical odds when it many of the details of local agri-food projects, especially
around scale, ownership, and inclusion. Within those included in this research, there are
both those who view themselves as victims and those who see themselves as change-
agents; thus, problems are framed in a variety of ways that is discordant at times, and
only some are motivated to act in a capacity outside of consumer decision-making.
Frames diagnosing and prescribing solutions for food system problems vary, creating a
pluralistic vision for a new Detroit food system that is socially constructed through
participation in various new initiatives, and the inclusion of improving the food system in
existing initiatives. Behind this are motivations around improving public health,
environmental well-being, community vitality, and racial justice. If the overarching goal
of restructuring the food system is to make improvements in these areas through
increasing participation and re-distributing power, then to be truly democratic toward that
end we must recognize the pluralistic nature of such a collective vision, maintaining
reflexivity as we diagnose problems, prescribe actions, and participate in changing our

local food systems.

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["1

 

APPENDIX A: INTERVIEW QUESTIONS

Community Voices on Detroit, MI and Oakland, CA food systems Phase II :
Interview Protocol

 

Introduction

Thank them for taking the time to meet with us.
Introduce ourselves
Explain the research

- Purpose is to understand the challenges and opportunities to creating a
sustainable, just food system in Oakland

- Includes a scan of local organizations and activities, interviews with local
groups, and focus groups with residents.

- We are partnering with researchers at Michigan State University who are
doing the same research in Detroit.

- This joint research project is being supported by the Fair Food Foundation, a
newly-formed foundation that seeks to work with local leaders to design a
food system that provides healthy, fresh, and sustainably-grown food to
historically excluded urban communities.

' Explain the order and general categories of the questions we will ask:
- General questions about your organization
- Collaborations with other groups and lessons learned
- The broader food system
- Sustaining your activities
0 Explain that this will be tape recorded (if doing) for accuracy.
0 Explain informed consent form and secure signature, leaving copy of form with
individual

Their Work
I. What is the primary goal of your organization with respect to the food system?
2. What are your specific approaches and activities?

3. What have been your major accomplishments? How do you measure success/gauge
progress?

Their Network and Lesson_s Learned

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What are other key organizations that you work with in Oakland/Detroit on food

system issues? Are there other organizations of whom you are aware that you don’t
interact with very much?

4.

Do you feel that organizations working on food issues in Oakland/Detroit are well
enough linked to one another?
a. Why or why not?
b. Can you provide an example of how it worked well and where there are
gaps?
c. Do you want to work with any of the other organizations, agencies, or
people that you are not yet working with?
d. What would be needed to improve these linkages?

How do food issues intersect with other issues (e. g. economic development,
housing, health care, education, etc.) in Oakland? Are there key groups working in
these areas of whom you are aware that don ’t have any focus on food?

a. How have groups from these areas collaborated with one another?

b. Do you think there should be more collaboration?

c. What would be needed to foster this kind of collaboration?
What lessons can be learned from efforts—your own or others’——that have
succeeded?

What lessons can be learned from efforts—your own or others’—that have not
succeeded?

The Food System

8.

10.

ll.

12.

What do you think are the most pressing problems in the current food system in
Oakland/Detroit? What is working well?

What do you think are the best strategies for addressing these problems? Are there
strategies you or others have employed that you think didn ’t or won’t work?

Do you see a difference between ideal and realistic solutions?

If you could construct a food system for the region that would be fair and sustainable,
what would that look like?

What would be needed to ensure that: farmworkers are paid a living wage and work
in a health-promoting environment; farmers are being paid fairly for their costs of
production and livelihood; distributors and retailers have enough profit to pay
employees and invest in the maintenance of their operation; and the cost of the food is
low enough that consumers will purchase it?

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13. What are the biggest challenges or barriers to making these changes?

14. What types of organizations, activities/strategies, and organizational and/or public
policies would be needed to make these changes happen locally?

a. Which are present in your region, and which are not present but needed?

15. Do terms such as ‘food desert’, ‘food security’, ‘food system’, ‘food justice’ resonate
with your work and how you describe your work to others? Are there better terms to
describe the work?

16. Does your organization work to increase demand for healthy food, such as through
nutrition education, cooking classes, or other efforts?
a. Are other organizations working on these issues?
b. Do you collaborate with them?
c. What do you think makes groups more or less successful at increasing
demand?

Sustainability

17. What are the biggest challenges to sustaining your activities? What type of support
could move you towards sustainability?

18. What kind of ‘start-up’ support is most critical for local food system efforts?

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APPENDIX B: FOCUS GROUP QUESTIONS
Research questions:

1) What are the most important factors in the food environments of residents in Detroit
and Oakland?

What are current ways of procuring food?
What are the major factors in how they access food?
Are there barriers to satisfactory food access?
2) What changes would residents like to see for a more equitable food system?

a) How do they define equitable food access

b) Are there changes that are necessary to obtain healthy, affordable, accessible
diet?

c) Are they or could they be interested in sustainably grown food? What does this
mean to participants?

Protocol:
The following will be present at each of six focus group sessions in Detroit/Oakland:

Schedule:

Moderator and assistant: Greet participants at the door and answer any questions
participants have prior to beginning the. focus group.

Begin the group by:

Introducing themselves

thanking participants for their time

Noting that this will take 1 and 1/2 hours, and that moderators intend to respect
participants’ time.

Moderator: Briefly re-introduce the research study topic:

We would like to thank all of you for sharing your time and knowledge with us
today. Your first-hand experience is very valuable to us, and in participating in
today ’s focus group you will be contributing to Detroit ’s community development.
The reason for this study is to identify what is important to you as residents of
Detroit/Oakland for obtaining a healthy, satisfactory diet, and what changes you
would like to see in your communities around the issue of food. Your input will
inform strategies for change in the Detroit Food System.

110

 

 

Are there any questions before we begin?

(If asked, reveal purpose for the Fair Food F oundation- to better understand
citizen points of view in Detroit/Oakland.)

Moderator: Explain that compensation of $25.00 ($30.00 for Oakland) will take place
before participants leave. The only thing required is that they provide their name and
address.

Moderator: Distribute and explain consent form.

7.1f you choose to participate in this study, you will be asked to share your knowledge
and experiences about food access in Detroit/Oakland, in a group discussion.

8.You are flee to refuse to answer any questions at any time.

9.The focus group session will be audio-recorded, transcribed into text, and analyzed for
the research project.

10. There are no direct benefits or risks to your participation today.

1 1. Every effort will be made to respect your privacy.

Moderator: Ask participants to take a moment to read over the form, and then obtain
informed consent.

Moderator: Read the rules:
Confidentiality responsibility— please don’t let information leave the room.

Please speak clearly and one at a time for the sake of the recording- some
questions we ’11 go one-by-one and some we ’11 all speak at once.

Disagreements allowed- but please be respectfitl and allow everyone time
to talk.

Request that participants limit discussion to relevant information:

We will be asking questions to keep our discussion on track-please know
we are very interested in your perspectives. What we’re most interested in
today is hearing what you have to say on the topic of food access in your
community, while respecting your time.

Assistant: Start tape
Moderator: Begins Ice-breaker:

Please go around the room and after you introduce yourself? name favorite food.

111

Moderator:
Begins questions.

1. Please think about how you decide where you decide to do your grocery shopping.
Going around the table one at a time, what are the 2-3 major places that you get most
of your food from?

Probes: Do you make other, smaller trips? How often and how far do you go?What
determines this?

2. Does anyone have anywhere else that they get their foods, like from a backyard
garden, community garden, or outdoor market?

. Are you satisfied with this?
How easy is it to get the food you need?

What are some of the important things that determine how you obtain your
food?

. Is transportation or distance from your home a factor? How far is
reasonable walking distance?

. How about Price?

. Condition of the store/market?

. What kind of food variety and selection is important to you?

. How about quality?

4. What are things about the food that make up quality?

Probe: how do you define freshness?

5. How often do you cook your own meals? Go out and get prepared food?
Are you satisfied with this?
Are you interested in preparing/cooking food but face obstacles in doing so?

If so, is it a factor of
time
access to cooking facilities

cooking skills
other factors?

- Would anyone like to list their favorite recipe that is easy and affordable to prepare?

112

- Do you have any food habits that have been passed down through family or
friends?

- What about cultural foods- is it easy for you to obtain culturally appropriate foods
where you live?

9. What do you think of as a “healthy ”food?

Do you think that you and your household
currently eat a healthy diet? Why or why not?

Probe: where do you get your health information?

I 0. Let’s go around the table and list one thing that would make it easier to get the food
you need.

I I. Do you think that all neighborhoods in Detroit face the same challenges that you
do here in your neighborhood? Are there imbalances within the city?

12. Have you ever thought about the way you get your food in terms of fairness or
equity?

Definition: Some say that access to healthy, fresh and sustainably-grown food
is a fundamental right that everyone should have.

What do you think of this? What does this mean to you?

I 3. Is how your food is grown or raised important to you ?Are pesticides or growth
hormones a factor in how you make your purchases?

Have you heard the term sustainably grown food? What does this mean to you?

Definition: We can think about sustainability in terms of the way we get our
food by asking, how long can we continue getting our food this way? For
example, how long can California continue producing fruits and vegetables for
the rest of the US, in the face of a water shortage?

What do you think of this? What does this mean to you?

113

I 4. Have you heard of any efforts going on in your community around healthy, fresh,
sustainably grown food?

Probe: (Fill in here with specific efforts in community and/or these general
examples:)

Garden resource programs

Community co-ops

Healthy food in corner stores

Community garden- here and elsewhere

WIC/Project F resh/fd stamps at former ’5 market

nutrition education (extension)

Grocery buses

Community Kitchens

Food enterprise mentoring

What do you think of these efforts? What do they mean to you?

15. If there is vacant land in your neighborhood, do you think using this land for
farms and gardens would be desirable for yourself and other residents? How so?

How possible do you think growing food on vacant land in the city would be?

I 6. If there was better access to healthy, fresh, sustainably-grown food in your

community, do you think community residents would purchase and eat the
food?

- from neighborhood grocery stores
-from neighborhood farmers/gardeners

Moderator: Gives a short oral summary statement of what was covered in the session,
listing the key questions and big ideas that emerged.

Is this an accurate summary? Is there anything important I forgot to include?

114

Let’s go around the room one more time and each list the most important thing that
was said about changing to the opportunities your community has to get good food.
What needs to change to make it easier for you, or more fair?

Moderator: Restates the purpose of the study, leaving 5-10 minutes prior to adjournment
time for final discussion.

The reason for this study is to discover what is most important for you as
residents of Detroit/Oakland for obtaining a healthy, satisfying diet from
appropriate sources. The second part of the study will review work underway in
the community to improve the food system and food access. Our primary goal was
to capture what the most important changes in Detroit ’s/Oakland ’s food system
are for you as residents. Have we missed anything in covering these areas?

Moderator: Thank participants.

We would like to thank you on behalf of MS U, PolicyLink and FFF for
offering us your time and expertise today. Your discussion will greatly
inform this study about improving the food system in your community. We
will be happy to answer any questions you may have now or in the future
about your participation in this study, how this information will be used,
and your rights to confidentiality.

Assistant Moderator and Moderator: Thank participants one last time. Make sure to
answer any last minute questions. Hand each participant $25.00 upon receipt of their
completed receipt.

”5

 

APPENDIX C: CONSENT FORMS

Consent form for adult interview participants:

Research Participant Information and Consent Form:

Community Voices on Detroit, MI Food System

You are being asked to participate in a discussion about food in your community, as part
of a research project. This consent form is to help you understand more about the study,
the possible risks and benefits to participating, and that participation is voluntary.

This research is being done to find out more about access to food in Detroit, MI. We
hope to learn about what changes professionals in Detroit would like to see in the local
food system. If you choose to participate, you will be one of about 20 people
participating in interview discussions about food in Detroit. It is intended that this
information will help inform work leading to better food access in the City.

This discussion will last about 60-90 minutes and you will be asked to share your
knowledge and experiences about food and your life in Detroit. We don’t think there is
any risk to you by participating in this discussion. However, during the time of the
discussion, if you feel threatened in any way by the questions, you are free to either not
answer any further questions or withdraw from the discussion. Your participation at all
times is completely voluntary. It will be tape recorded (voice only).

No information that you provide will be identified as coming from you in any discussions
outside this room or in any written reports.

 

f you have any questions or complaints about the f you have questions or concerns about your role
tudy you may contact: d rights as a research participant, or would like to

register a complaint about this study, you may
harlotte Litjens, 309 Natural Resources Building, contact, anonymously if you wish:

ichigan State University
the Michigan State University’s Human Research

33‘ Lansing, MI 48324 Protection Program at 517-355-2180, Fax 517-432-
4503, or e-mail irb@msu.edu or regular mail at 202

h0ne=(5'7)432’0307 e‘ma'l‘ Mensc@msu'edu Olds Hall, MSU, East Lansing, MI 48824.

 

 

 

Your signature below indicates you agree to voluntarily participate in this study and to be
audio-taped.

 

 

Participant Signature Date Principal Investigator Signature Date

116

Consent form for adult focus group participants:

Research Participant Information and Consent Form: Community Voices on
Detroit, MI Food System

You are being asked to participate in a discussion about food in your community, as part
of a research project. This consent form is to help you understand more about the study,
the possible risks and benefits to participating, and that participation is voluntary.

This research is being done to find out more about access to food in Detroit, MI. We
hope to learn about what changes residents of Detroit would like to see in their food
environments. You have been selected to participate as a resident of Detroit. If you
choose to participate, you will be one of about 100 people participating in focus group
discussions about food in Detroit. It is intended that this information will help inform
work leading to better food access in the City.

This discussion will last about 60-90 minutes and you will be asked to share your
knowledge and experiences about food and your life in Detroit. We don’t think there is
any risk to you by participating in this discussion. However, during the time of the
discussion, if you feel threatened in any way by the questions, you are free to either not
answer any further questions or withdraw from the discussion. Your participation at all
times is completely voluntary. It will be tape recorded (voice only). We ask for students
to please not share information learned in the room with anyone else.

No information that you provide will be identified as coming from you in any discussions
outside this room or in any written reports. You will receive a compensation of cash in
the amount of $25.00 for participation in this discussion. You must provide your name
and address to receive this compensation.

 

 

f you or your daughter have any questions or tyou have questions or concerns about your role
complaints about the study you may contact: d rights as a research participant, or would like to
\Charlotte Litjens, 309 Natural Resources Building, register a complaint about this study, you may
ichigan State University contact, anonymously if you wish:

East Lansing, MI 48824 the Michigan State University’s Human Research

. _ . - Protection Program at 517-355-2180, Fax 517-432-
Phone: (517) 432'0307 e-mall: lltillSCQI/‘jmsuedu 4503, or e-mail irb@msu.edu or regular mail at 202
Olds Hall, MSU, East Lansing, Ml 48824.

 

 

 

 

 

Your signature below indicates you agree to voluntarily participate in this study and to be
audio-taped.

 

 

ll7

 

Participant Signature Date Principal Investigator Signature Date

118

Assent form for student focus group participants under 18:

Research Participant Information and Consent Form: Community Voices on
Detroit, MI Food System

You are being asked to participate in a discussion about food in your community, as part
of a research project. This consent form is to help you understand more about the study,
the possible risks and benefits to participating, and that participation is voluntary.

This research is being done to find out more about access to food in Detroit, MI. We
hope to learn about what changes residents of Detroit would like to see in their food
environments. You have been selected to participate as a resident of Detroit. If you
choose to participate, you will be one of about 100 people participating in focus group
discussions about food in Detroit. It is intended that this information will help inform
work leading to better food access in the City.

This discussion will last about 60-90 minutes and you will be asked to share your
knowledge and experiences about food and your life in Detroit. We don’t think there is
any risk to you by participating in this discussion. However, during the time of the
discussion, if you feel threatened in any way by the questions, you are free to either not
answer any further questions or withdraw from the discussion. Your participation at all
times is completely voluntary. It will be tape recorded (voice only). We ask for students
to please not share information learned in the room with anyone else.

No information that you provide will be identified as coming from you in any discussions
outside this room or in any written reports. You will receive a compensation of cash in
the amount of $25.00 for participation in this discussion. You must provide your name
and address to receive this compensation.

 

 

f you or your daughter have any questions or f you have questions or concerns about your role
omplaints about the study you may contact: d rights as a research participant, or would like to

register a complaint about this study, you may
harlotte Litjens, 309 Natural Resources Building, contact, anonymously ifyou wish:

ichigan State University
the Michigan State University’s Human Research

35‘ Lansing, MI 48824 Protection Program at 517-355-2180, Fax 517-432-
4503, or e-mail irb@msu.edu or regular mail at 202

hone: (517)432-0307 e-mall: lltjensc@msu.edu Olds Hall, MSU, East Lansing, MI 48824.

 

 

 

Your signature below indicates you agree to voluntarily participate in this study and to be
audio-taped.

 

 

Participant Signature Date Principal Investigator Signature Date

ll9

Consent form for parents of students under 18:

Research Participant Information and Consent Form: Community Voices on
Detroit, MI Food System

Your student at Catherine Ferguson Academy is being asked to participate in a discussion
about food in her community, as part of a research project. This consent form is to help
you understand: the study, that participation is voluntary, and the possible risks and
benefits to her participation.

This research is being done to find out more about access to food in Detroit, MI. We
hope to learn about what changes residents of Detroit would like to see in their food
environments. Your daughter has been selected to participate as a resident of Detroit. If
you choose to allow her to participate, she will be one of about 100 people participating
in focus group discussions about food in Detroit. It is intended that this information will
help inform work leading to better food access in the City.

This discussion will last about 60-90 minutes and your daughter will be asked to share
her knowledge and experiences about food and her life in Detroit. We don’t think there
is any risk to her by participating in this discussion. However, during the time of the
discussion, if she feels threatened in any way by the questions, she is free to either not
answer any further questions or withdraw from the discussion. Her participation at all
times is completely voluntary. It will be tape recorded (voice only). We ask that students
not share information learned in the room with anyone else.

No information that she provides will be identified as coming from your daughter in any
discussions outside this room or in any written reports. Your daughter will receive a
compensation of cash in the amount of $25.00 for participation in this discussion. She

 

f you or your daughter have any questions or ti you or your daughter have questions or concerns
omplaints about the study you may contact: bout her role and rights as a research participant, or
would like to register a complaint about this study,
harlotte Litjens, 309 Natural Resources Building, you may contact, anonymously ifyou wish, the
ichigan State University ichigan State University’s Human Research
Protection Program at 517-355-2180, Fax 517-432-
4503, or e-mail irb(a.3msu.edu or regular mail at 202

Phone: (517)432-0307 e-mail: litjensc@msu.edu O'dSHa'L MSU, EaStLansmg» “4148824-

t Lansing, MI 48824

 

 

 

 

 

must provide her name and address to receive this compensation.

120

Your signature below indicates you will allow your daughter to voluntarily participate in
this study and to be audio-taped.

 

 

Participant Signature Date Principal Investigator Signature Date

121

APPENDIX D: CODING GUIDE

 

 

 

 

 

 

Theme Code Definition Rule Example
What are Q] Marks question 1 Use wherever this “We don’t go to
major factors question is being the comer stores
in answered. because they are
eating/shopping bad.”
habits of
residents? Are
options
satisfactory?
Farmer’s Discussion around Use for any mention of “I go to the farmers
markets opinion and usage farmers markets; not to market on the north
of fanner’s be confused with price. side.”
markets, viability.
R: Store Physical The selection within 3 “There were
Quality characteristics- store; the ability to cockroaches in the
Carts aisles, actual fulfil] needs from a store.”
services, freshness, certain store: the idea
var iety that shoppers should be
able to get many
necessary items in one
stop
R: social Social issues, Apply to general “They don’t care

 

 

including
respect/trust and
race

Relationship to
store owners and
staff; language
barriers; race; level
of dedication to
community by store
owners; The
importance of
social reasons in
making shopping
decisions; social
experience of
shopping; social
justice

Quality of customer
service

 

discussion about store
presentation and
attractiveness

 

about us.”

 

122

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

R : price Lack of competition Apply where lack of “They use bridge-

gouging and/or forced choice and lack of effort card carriers
loyalty; local to obtain customer because we have to
monopoly; lack of loyalty are mentioned; go there.”
choice Do not use where food

quality, or variety are
discussed.

R: price The importance of Also applies to “It was 2 dollars
price in making restaurants. for some celery.”
shopping decisions; Don’t use for price 0f
the fairness of organic.
price; affordability;
factors affecting
price

Transportation The importance of Use where “The bus system is
transportation in transportation is not sufficient.”
accessing healthy discussed explicitly; Do
foods; the not use for location of
conditions of public stores in relation to
transportation; homes
methods of
trans citation

convenience the location of 21 Use where need for a “I don’t like the
store, other physical close store with prices there, but
characteristics necessities is It’s close-by.”
making it an easy mentioned; not for what
place to shop. the store actually carries

Food culture Emergent and Use when social “Certain recipes
existing culture situations around food play a big part of
around food prep; are mentioned; do not family holidays.”

‘ food traditions; use for other
food knowledge determinants like
economic or health
reasons

Household Budgetary, time, Apply to discussion of “I can tomatoes

economy and resource eating/preparation and feed my family
constraints and decisions based on time all winter long.”
prioritization and financial Not: “Price is more

 

thereof; food as a
budgetary priority;
preparation habits
dominated by time;
cooking or
preserving food for
economic reasons;
methods of
economizing

 

 

constraints, methods of
economizing, or
prioritization; Do not
apply to mention of
affordability,
convenience, or retail
prices

Don’t use for price of
organic or price at a
certain store.

 

important than how
it’s grown.”

 

123

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What is Q2 Marks question 2 Use wherever this “If the meat
considered question is being doesn’t smell or
quality food? answered. look all purple.”

Food quality Food quality factors Use when specific “chickens grown
at the level of qualities are discussed: that fast can’t be
production Do not use when good for us”
(antibiotics, growth discussing distrust in
hormones, industrial food system
pesticides, and
other production
factors); processing
(ingredients); and
preparation.

Trust in F8 Ideas and beliefs Use for discussing the “They don’t want
about the food system as a whole; Do us to be healthy.”
system; hegemony not use for specific food
ofindustrial FS qualities

organic Beliefs, Use when organic is “Organic doesn’t
perceptions, and mentioned explicitly; mean anything."
opinions about DO not use for more
organic production general env. concerns.
and the “organic”
label; importance of
“organic” in
shopping decisions

What are Q3 Marks question 5 Use wherever this “1 don’t need
nutritional question is being someone to tell me
beliefs? Where answered. what is or isn’t
does nutritional healthy.”
information

come from?

Nutritional Nutritional beliefs Beliefs about food; Apply when

beliefs Interest in scientific nutrition iS

nutritional information; discussed; D0 "0t

intuitive/folk wisdom apply for health

about food consequences of
diet, or food
quality.

Health Concerns about Apply when health “My father has

 

 

health as related to
diet; health
inequity/racial
health inequity;
health education

 

consequences for diet
are discussed; Do not
used for beliefs about
food qualities.

 

diabetes so 1 watch
what I eat.”

 

124

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Access to Availability and Use when access to “We can’t
information accessibility of information is cited as understand the
health and nutrition determinant of eating names of
information; habits; Do not use for ingredients without
purposeful deceit or other determinants. a science degree.”
unavailability of
information
What is current Q4 Marks question 4 Use wherever this “We can tomatoes
level of activity question is being for the winter,
outside the answered. because they taste
mainstream better than store
FS? b09813”
Resistance Citizens organizing Use where capacity for “Change starts at
for change; from change discussed; Do the neighborhood
perspective of not use for specific level.”
citizen-base of strategies.
organized activity;
activities within
Purposeful culture
change
Org role Motivation and role Use for specific projects “We are a food
of org, relevant only, not to be confused distribution
projects (like with Mission warehouse.”
activism but at org
level)
Partnerships Network of change Use when networking “We are working
agents in Food is mentioned; Do not with _ on this
Systems work; the use for specific project."
importance thereof strategies
Consumer The leverage the Use when dollar power “I won’t be treated
Identity customer has in as a consumer is that way because I
where they decide specifically mentioned; have money to
to spend their food not to be confused with spend and 1 can
dollar; the ability to activism take it somewhere
boycott; identity as 6156-”
a player in the food
system primarily
through purchase
What are Q 5 Marks Q5 Use wherever this “We ended up
major factors question is being doing food stuff
for answered. because we
professionals in realized we could
FS? help people
become more self-
sufficient.”

 

125

 

 

 

Lessons

Lessons learned by

Use only for specific

“We learned that if

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

learned organizations to be examples, can be either you give the youth
heeded, examples in F G or interview. some control over
to be highlited. the activity and

responsibility then
you will have their
attention.”

FS Problems What is the biggest Use for specific “We realized that
problem in the motivators for they could use food
Detroit FS? organizational action. entrepreneurship in

a therapeutic way.”

Link to F8 Other areas that Use only for discussion “ We have five
have relevance on of areas outside of F S over-riding
food system, and sustainable
how they are community goals
connected to Food that we try to apply
systems work to all of our work.

So food fits into
that.”
What is the Q6 Marks question 6 Use wherever this “Detroit could be
vision for the question is being an agricultural
city? answered. powerhouse.”

Vision The positive vision Use for broad positive “We need to think
that is held for the Visioning; Do not use about how our city
future of Detroit; for specific strategies or can thrive and be a
the mission of an remedies; not for leader of
individual or professional goals sustainability.”
member of an org
as it relates.

Mission The official mission Use for the formal “The purpose of
of an org, the mission only, not for extension is to
reasons behind personal motivations or offer technical
activities activities. advice to the

public.”
What are Q7 Marks question7 Use wherever this “We want to
motivations question is being promote a more
concerning answered. fair food system.”
social justice?

Fairness The general concept Use wherever fairness, “We want all

 

 

ofjustice and
fairness as a driver
for action;
fundamental rights

 

 

and justice are
mentioned as motivators
for civic action- do not
use for fairness of price
or other
individualistic/consumer
complaints

 

people to have
access to good
food.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Race Race as it affects Use when racial conflict “They don’t
food system or racial discrimination respect Black
improvement. is cited as a determinant people.”
of F S Change/ eating
habits; Do not use for
racial conflict in other
FS sectors.
Regional Geographical Use when discussing “Prices are higher
equality distribution of geographical and qty is lower
resources and differences; not race or inside the city.”
quality of retail; class issues
geographical
differences in crime
and safety, general
economy, and
physical attributes
What are Q7 Marks question 7 Use wherever this “We can’t keep
motivations question is being depending on fossil
concerning answered. fuels to transport
sustainability? our food.”
Env. Beliefs and Use when “It’s important to
perceptions about environmental values think about hOW
Detroit and are explicitly stated; Do the land was
sustainability; not use for interest in affected in raising
Concern for gardening for other our food.”
sustainability, reasons.
environmental
change; the concept
of the city as a
model for green
development and
urban sustainability
What are Q8 Marks question 8 Use wherever this “We need to
motivations question is being strengthen the local
concerning answered. economy.”
economic
vitality?

 

 

 

 

 

127

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Local Economic vitality; Use for discussing local “The local
economy The economic economy and business economy won’t
atmosphere of atmosphere; Do not use support a co—op.”
Detroit and suburbs for discussing
in general- food population issues or
environment; demand or other
changing local challenges
economic
conditions in
relation to
affordability and
accessibility, as
well as opportunity
and for urban/local
production
Demand Demand for Use for discussions of “There are a lot of
produce and other mass economic demand; people who eat like
healthy foods; Do not use for us that would shop
demand for sustain- individual demand at a downtown co-
ably produced 0P”
foods
Access to Ability to become Use when specifically “There aren’t the
capital an entrepreneur; discussing trying to start resources for
importance of a business people from our
financing, training, community to start
and other resources businesses.”
to becoming a
business owner
What strategies Q10 Marks question 10 Use wherever this “We need more
are needed to question is being farmers markets
improve the answered. with EBT access.”
food
environment of
Detroit?
Urban Production of food Use for any discussion “1 don’t trust food
production in the city of of gardening or urban produced here in
Detroit; viability farming; Must be urban the city.”
thereof, resources
for
Education The importance of Use when education is “Education is the

 

 

education (nutrition
education) in
creating and
empowering
informed
consumers, and
creating demand for
healthy food

 

discussed as a need and
strategy; Do not use for
access to information

 

most important
thing.”

 

 

 

 

Exposure

The importance of
introducing new
foods; openness to

Use when exposure is
mentioned as a strategy;
Do not use for

“That’s because he
didn’t grow up
with healthy food.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

moving ahead to
reach org mission.

 

at the organizational
level

 

trying new foods education.

Government Responsibility of Use for discussion of “There should be a

role government to governmental role only; local commission
regulate stores for not for organizing on consumer
cleanliness and otherwise safety”
quality; Inspection
standards; Grading
and labeling
requirements;
efficacy of FDA
and USDA
regulation; Local
policy; consumer
protection/advocacy

Local Business ownership Use when talking about “We need to start a

ownership by locals and/or both the social and local store that is
owners that are economic sides of this by and for the
racially issue, but not when people.”
representative of speaking about racism
the surrounding in general
neighborhoods,
containing capital
flow locally

Discourse Importance of Use when discourse is “We need to sit
negotiations, explicitly mentioned; down and talk with
mediation, or public Do not use for the store owners.”
participation in networking.
making change

What are the Q1 1 Marks question 1 1 Use wherever this “It’s told cold to
major question is being grow year round.”
challenges to answered.

creating a more

equitable,

sustainable

food system in

Detroit?

Challenges Use for any specific Use only for specific, “People are afraid
feature of the city negative features of of food grown in
that provides a Detroit only the city.”
hurdle for reaching
vision.

Org Problems Challenges for Use for any challenges “Food just isn’t on

the priority list”

 

129

 

 

 

What are the
major

strengths for
creating a more
equitable,
sustainable
food system in
Detroit?

 

Strengths
(should
garden
heritage go
here?)

 

Use for any specific
feature of the city,
such as agricultural
heritage or vacant
land, that provides
an opportunity for
reaching vision.

 

Use only for specific,
positive features of
Detroit only Don’t
confuse with vision for

City

 

“The Hmong
people are
farmers... give
them land and they
will farm.”

 

Non-substantive Codes:

 

 

 

 

Comment on Statement about Must use program/org “Farm-a-lot was a
org another name good program.”
organization or
initiative (to
compile and give to
orgs lateQ
Us vs. them Focus group Use only when speaking “They people don’t
participants as leaders and care about what
speaking as leaders, mentioning other they eat.”

 

referring to “the
rest of the city”

 

community members as
participants

 

 

130

 

 

APPENDIX E: CASE DISPLAY EXAMPLE

 

Question 4: What are motivations around local economy?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Themes Local economy Demand
PG 1: Seniors Social problems are result of economic Some residents feel that there is sufficient
conditions in the city. Used the term demand to provide for markets to thrive,
economic racism and that the lack Of retail is racial
FG 2:Urban . . .
gardeners Some make it a pomt to support local stores. On creating demand to support
There are some good examples within the businesses, see it as education of store
cmty, however, Seeing stores in city that did owners as well as shoppers. However,
have quality produce losing money and examples of failures in the past were
depreciating quality. The Quality stores have blamed on lack of demand in the
high prices. Don’t believe neighborhood community. This is related to education
stores can survive against big box stores and creating demand.
PG 3: F S . - Education is necessary to raise demand.
Com tittve nature of the market re s on
network pe . _ p y . Talking about the type of stores desired
members people bemg stuck With only a few options, by activists not being supportable by the
complicating demand. rest of the community. Education vs.
economics is debated. Demand for higher
quality production is evident amidst the
region in general.
F0 4: H'.“°“g Creation of new markets is thwarted by lack See themselves as too small a faction of
community
members of demand, crime, and competition with asian the population to raise sufficient demand,
wholesaler in the area. and competitive nature of market.
Depopulation is exacerbating this issue.
PG 5: Teens

 

 

have seen high demand for food from the
Catherine Ferguson Farm, and locally
grown/organic produce in general. Family
members and others support and thus
learn about different vegetables and

production through this.

 

I31

 

 

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