Food regime transformations and structural rebounding: Brazilian state–agribusiness relations

ABSTRACT

The study analyses how food regime transformations in the late 20th century led to a profound restructuring of state–agribusiness relations in Brazil and the definition of a joint international strategy. The global food regime is conceptualized through the notion of a historical structure, and its process of change analysed within material, institutional and ideational dimensions. Reorganization of the Brazilian agricultural sector has spurred close cooperation between public institutions and private actors in order to influence international spheres of agricultural regulatory formation. The study analyses the public–private engagement within the institutional dimension of the global food regime through the analysis of these actors’ participation in three cases of international decision-making processes. A general process of ‘structural rebounding’ is identified, whereby food regime transformations have engendered a configuration of state–business relations, which eventually propelled an agential strategy that affected the processes of the regime’s reproduction.

KEYWORDS:

• food regimes
• corporate food regime
• historical structure
• Brazil
• agriculture
• agribusiness
• state–business relations
• structure–agency duality

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The author thanks the two anonymous reviewers, as well as Ana Flávia Granja e Barros Platiau and Antônio Carlos Moraes Lessa, for useful advice and guidance with the study.

DISCLOSURE STATEMENT

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 Referring to the increasing economic significance of primary commodities.

2 Gudynas (2009) establishes the notion of ‘progressive neo-extractivism’ encapsulating the trend amongst many otherwise left-leaning Latin American governments to accept and even promote extractive activities as a central pillar within their economic development model.

3 ABCDs refers to Arthur Daniel Midlands, Bungee, Cargill and Louis Dreyfus.

4 The EU and the United States.

5 Interview with a Brazilian negotiator, 27 April 2018.

6 Mali, Chad, Benin and Bukina Faso.

7 Interview conducted with WTO lawyers, 2 May 2018.

8 Refers to the Blair House Agreement between the EU and the United States on export subsidy and domestic subsidy reduction of 1992, which was important in shaping the specific formulation of the AoA.

Additional information

Funding

The study was supported by the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES).