Abstract

TAMAYO MONTOYA, Paula Andrea  and  MOLINA VALENCIA, Nelson. Collective action and association of heterogeneities in agroecological farmers' markets: Asoproorgánicos (Cali, Colombia). Rev. colomb. soc. [online]. 2018, vol.41, n.2, pp.83-101. ISSN 0120-159X.  https://doi.org/10.15446/rcs.v41n2.70052.

The article analyzes the constitutive heterogeneity of agroecological farmers' markets (mac, according to their acronym in Spanish), considered to be fundamental for the construction of relations among actors and development of collective actions aimed at strengthening the agroecological food practice and achieving the "Zero Hunger" objective set forth in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Multilocal ethnography (Marcus, 2001) serves as the methodological approach to study the micro-social dynamics produced in MACS and on the agroecological production farms associated with them. The site selected for the study was the Asoproorgánicos MAC in the city of Cali, where we gathered qualitative data through interviews and observations registered in field diaries between October 2015 and November 2017. Symmetrical analysis of data (Rodriguez-Giralt, 2009) was used to conceptualize the social, natural, and technological entities that make up MACS, such as buildings characterized by their heterogeneity (Domenech and Tirado, 1998). Four dimensions of heterogeneity are analyzed: a) material heterogeneity, which refers to the association between human and non-human entities; b) spatial heterogeneity, as an effect of different ways of practicing space; c) temporal heterogeneity, shaped on the basis of reversible, irreversible, and narrated times; and d) power heterogeneity, related to the tensions and forces regulating the collective (Mendiola, 2003). We were able to conclude that the study of heterogeneity contributes to broadening the theoretical repertoires of the social sciences, specifically of social psychology, and that it is essential in building relations among multiple actors. Building and maintaining the association of heterogeneities is an action that involves numerous tensions, affects, and unexpected results, given that what is at stake is not a mere variation of homogeneity. The understanding of heterogeneity can strengthen the potential of MACS to achieve social changes through sustainable food practices, thus making possible the courses of action traced by Food Sovereignty Social Movements (MSSA, according to their acronym in Spanish).

Keywords : collective action; heterogeneity; markets; materiality; spatiality.

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