Foundational ontologies and multi-paradigm analysis, applied to the socio-technical transition from mixed farming to intensive pig husbandry (1930–1980)

Abstract

This article adds a new case study to the expanding literature on socio-technical transitions: the shift from mixed farming to intensive pig husbandry in the Netherlands. With regard to this transition, the article addresses a new direction, namely the role of foundational ontologies in explanation. Five ontologies are distinguished, which are based on different assumptions about causal agents and causal mechanisms: rational choice, functionalism, conflict and power struggle, interpretivism, and structuralism. The article demonstrates how these ontologies provide different explanations of same case. It also empirically investigates the strengths and weaknesses of different ontological explanations, and identifies possible complementarities in this case. The article ends with theoretical reflections on the relationships between ontologies and the role of meta-paradigm analysis.

Keywords:

• transitions
• pig farming
• agribusiness
• foundational ontologies
• multi-disciplinarity
• crossovers

Acknowledgements

I gratefully acknowledge financial support from the Dutch Knowledge Network on System Innovation (KSI) and TransForum Agro and Groen (TAG). I also thank Boelie Elzen, Cees Leeuwis, Barbara van Mierlo and Geert Verbong and two anonymous referees for their useful comments on previous versions of this article.

Notes

The notion of ‘global model’ does not refer to geography but to a particular kind of theoretical explanation.

A well-known exception is Allison (1971), who analysed the Cuban missile crisis from three ontological models (rational choice, power struggle and functional division of labour).

Agricultural statistics before 1960 provide no information about specialised pig farmers, because this category did not yet exist.

The use of antibiotics later became controversial, because of another side-effect: some viruses and diseases developed resistance to antibiotics, which created new public health risks (Boyd 2001).

1 guilder = € 0.45.

The Meat Inspection Law also withdrew exemptions for home slaughtering. Subsequently, the number of pigs slaughtered at private homes rapidly declined from 250,760 in 1955 to 37,793 in 1970 (Agricultural Economics Research Institute 1972).

Most of the money went to land consolidation projects, which had less impact on pig farming. Land consolidation entailed land redistribution to create larger patches of land, but also infrastructural projects such as the smoothening of land surfaces, improving canals and drainage ditches, constructing regional roads, piped water and electricity infrastructures.

Initially the Ministry of Agriculture ignored the problems (Frouws 1994). The White Paper on Intensive Animal Husbandry (1974), for instance, trivialised manure problems, emphasising instead the economic successes and technical performance improvements in the sector. In the mid 1970s, the Ministry blocked all regulations proposed by the Environmental Ministry, arguing that agriculture was their domain of responsibility (Frouws 1994). The Agricultural Ministry also frustrated attempts by the independent Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) to collect and analyse quantitative data about the number of pigs, the minerals in their diets, and manure production. Between 1974 and 1982, the Ministry prevented the publication of CBS manure-reports by challenging technical calculations, demanding extreme standards of accuracy, and pointing to uncertainties in calculations (Termeer 1993). The lack of quantitative CBS-data hindered effective policy making. The CBS-report was finally published in 1984 (Frouws 1994).

The corporatist networks were institutionalised in the Foundation for Agriculture (1946) and the Agricultural Board (1954), where the NFA's consulted with the Ministry about agricultural policy.

Between 1890 and 1910, the number of small farms (<5 ha) grew from 76,910 to 109,620 and then remained more or less constant until 1950 (Somers 1991).

In the absence of refrigerators and year-round fresh meat, families usually preserved meat through curing, salting, or vacuum preservation in glass bottles. During winter and early spring, many people therefore relied on preserved meat, the quality of which gradually deteriorated with time.

Despite the ideology, the knowledge system was more complex in reality, with multi-directional flows between farmers, experimental stations and universities.