Conceptualizing the Multispecies Triad: Towards a Multispecies Interesectionality

Feminist and multispecies anthropologies have decentered those most visible to appreciate the perspectives of those othered in society—but also to better understand society at large. This article goes beyond decentering the human toward decentering another analytical focus: the species dyad. Building on previous work on gender–species intersectionality and multispecies ethnography, as well as drawing on a set of five ethnographic and multispecies fieldwork studies involving gendered relations between humans, cattle, and horses on three continents, this article offers a conceptualization of the multispecies triad by outlining a multispecies intersectionality theory. This entails acknowledging the intersectionality of five sets of relations: (1) species as a power relation beyond biology; (2) intersecting power relations of humans (such as gender and ethnicity as well as local categories); (3) humans’ organization of nonhumans into intraspecies categories (by for example sex, breed, age as well as local categories); (4) nonhumans’ own intraspecies power relations; and (5) nonhumans’ relations to intraspecies groups of other species (including human subgroups). By situating a multispecies triad in this multispecies intersectionality, the article shows how relations of power intersect within and across species with consequences for individuals and groups of all species involved. Multispecies intersectionality can thus be of interest even to scholars primarily interested in humans

Designing Cattle: The social practice of constructing breeds

This paper explores how cattle breeds are constructed through social practice—which we conceptually develop as “designing” cattle. We show how breed varieties are designed, informed by the social, material and moral embeddedness of cattle breeding associations’ visions of the future and how they draw on science and technology in their breeding strategies. Based on an analysis of the trade magazines of three different breeding associations, we illustrate how breeding associations are working to establish four different varieties of Swedish Mountain Cattle (SMC). We conclude that the concept of designing cattle enables us to unpack how breeds are socially constructed and institutionally stabilized through sociotechnical imaginaries

Women and Cattle

Cattle form an integral part of lives, livelihoods, and landscapes in Botswana. They offer people socio-cultural and politico-economic means through which to participate in society as respected and supported citizens. When asked what it means to have cattle, many of our study respondents stated: “I feel like a person” or “cattle are life.” At the same time, people shape the circumstances and experiences of cattle. Human connections to cattle within subsistence and commercially-oriented realms generate practices of ownership, rearing, and (re)producing of this particular species that influence their value, role, and use. Human-cattle relations emerge and evolve through historically-situated social relations of power based on gender, ethnicity, and class. In turn, these relations present people with different political and economic opportunities associated with cattle production, and present cattle with different opportunities for eating, drinking, moving, and breeding. Ultimately, intersectional human-cattle relations make both humans and cattle who they are in terms of societal positionality, economic opportunities, and political clout. Humans and cattle are “becoming-with” – using Donna Haraway’s concept — in Botswana with implications for humans, cattle, and the broader context

Breeding Beyond Bodies: Making and "Doing" Cattle

Dairy cows provide a spectacular example of what can be achieved with purposeful breeding of nonhuman animals in terms of increasing production and bodily adaptation to particular production systems. This implies that humans can make nonhuman bodies take whatever form they desire. However, the assumption that breeding outcomes are entirely shaped by humans has been criticized. This article contributes to ongoing discussions of breeds as socially constructed and applies a focus on cattle actions. Within a more-than-human biopower framework, cattle actions and ways of “doing” cattle are integral to both the notion and the future of the breed. This ethnography of breeding Swedish Mountain Cattle provides a detailed account of the mutual subjectification of cattle and farmers within an agricultural context, revealing the scope and limits of cattle agency and how “doing” cattle affects individuals and populations

Cowboy masculinities in human-animal relations on a cattle ranch

Cowboyn mielikuvasta on muodostunut äärimmäisen maskuliinisuuden symboli, jota käytetään usein kuvaamaan heteroseksuaalista macho-maskuliinisuuden arkkityyppiä. Tässä artikkelissa käsitellään nykyään Länsi-Kanadassa toimivalla karjatilalla työskenteleviä cowboyta. He ilmaisevat ja arvostavat vaihtoehtoista cowboy-maskuliinisuutta, jota luonnehtivat vastuullisuus, rauhallisuus, tekninen taidokkuus ja sensitiivisyys. Artikkelissa pohditaan karjatilan jokapäiväisiä ihmisten ja eläinten - cowboyden, hevosten ja nautojen - välisiä suhteita. Keskityn tarkastelemaan erityisesti sitä, miten maskuliinisuudet esiintyvät karjatilan arjessa cowboyn ja hevosen tai naudan välisessä vuorovaikutuksessa, ja sitä, miten eläimiä käytetään erilaisten maskuliinisuuksien konstruointiin ja esittämiseen. Tutkimuksen aineisto on kerätty osallistuvan havainnoinnin ja haastattelujen avulla cowboy-ryhmän parissa. Artikkeli pohjautuu posthumanistisiin käsityksiin kokemuksen ruumiillisuudesta ja moninaisista maskuliinisuuksista sekä käsitykseen, jonka mukaan ihmisen ja eläimen suhde ei perustu näiden vastakkainasettelulle. Artikkelissa korostetaankin ei-binaarisia analyyttisiä kehyksiä ja niiden viimeaikaista kehitystä. Artikkelin johtopäätös on, että vaikka sama laji tarjoaakin monia erilaisten maskuliinisuuksien esittämisen mahdollistavia suhteita, cowboyt käyttävät eri eläinten kategorioita eri tavoin vaihtoehtoisten ja täydentävien maskuliinisuuksien konstruoinnissa.The cowboy has come to be a symbol of the ultimate masculine, and his image is often used to describe the archetype of heterosexual macho masculinity. Nevertheless, this paper shows that contemporary cowboys on a working cattle ranch in western Canada display and value alternative cowboy masculinities characterised by responsibility, calmness, technical finesse, and sensitivity. This paper problematises human-animal relations between cowboys, horses and cows that meet on a daily basis on a working cattle ranch. The focus is on how masculinities play a part in the interaction between cowboy and horse/cow in everyday life on the ranch and how animals are used to construct or display different masculinities. Participant observation of a cowboy crew, as well as interviews, were used to collect empirical data for the study. Drawing on posthumanist understandings of embodied experience, non-binary human-animal relations and multiple masculinities, this paper underlines an expansion of non-binary analytical frameworks. The paper concludes that while the same species can offer a range of relations leading to the possibility of displaying different masculinities, different categories of animals are instrumental in different ways in the construction of alternative and additional masculinities among the cowboys.Epitetet ”cowboy” brukas ofta för att beskriva en råbarkad, vårdslös, djärv och macho person, inte minst i relation till behandling av djur. Cowboyen har kommit att bli en symbol för det ultimata maskulina och bilden av honom används ofta för att beskriva arketypen av heterosexuell machomaskulinitet. Likväl visar denna artikel hur samtida cowboys på en boskapsranch i västra Kanada uppvisar och värderar alternativa cowboymaskuliniteter karaktäriserade av ansvarskänsla, lugn, teknisk finess och känslighet. Samtliga av dessa egenskaper är av vikt för relationen mellan människa och djur på ranchen. Artikeln problematiserar människa-djur-relationer mellan cowboys, hästar och kor som möts dagligen på en boskapsranch. Fokus ligger på hur maskuliniteter är en central del i interaktionen mellan cowboy och hästar/kor i vardagslivet på ranchen, och hur djuren används i konstruktionen och uppvisandet av olika maskuliniteter. Utan att förneka vikten av traditionella associationer till cowboybeteende, utforskar denna artikel en mer nyanserad bild av förkroppsligade människa-djur-interaktioner i relation till cowboymaskuliniteter. Metoden för insamlandet av empiriskt material är deltagande observation av ett cowboy crew, och intervjuer av cowboys och annan personal på boskapsranchen. Även om traditionell, macho, heteronormativ maskulinitet är starkt närvarande i vardagsrelationerna mellan cowboys, kor och hästar, och ett aggressivt, våldsamt och dominerande beteende var vanligt förekommande, visar studien att det inte är allt som sker. Idealbilden av kommunikationen mellan cowboy och häst genom en nästintill enbart kroppslig process är ofta karaktäriserad av känslighet och lyhördhet där häst och cowboy så att säga smälter samman och tillsammans upplever kornas rörelser. Bemästrandet av denna kommunikation är en primär källa till stolthet och respekt bland cowboys. Studien tar fasta på posthumanistiska förståelser av kroppsliga upplevelser, icke-binära människa-djur-relationer och multipla maskuliniteter, och understryker en utvidgning av icke-binära analytiska ramverk. Artikeln drar slutsatsen att även om samma djurart kan erbjuda en rad relationer som leder till möjligheten att uppvisa olika maskuliniteter, så är olika kategorier av djur instrumentella på olika sätt, i konstruktionen av alternativa och additiva maskuliniteter bland ranchens cowboys

Women's cattle ownership in Botswana

Cattle are often portrayed as a male affair in Botswana. However, venturing out into the Kalahari countryside to scratch the surface of this state of affairs, another picture emerges. There are in fact many women from different socioeconomic background who own, manage and work with cattle in different ways, and their farming is defined by both the connection to the EU beef market and interlinked local processes of power. Cattle are ever-present in Botswana and play a paramount role in the economy, in politics and in the rural landscape of the country, as well as in many people’s cultural identity, kinship relations and everyday routines. I study women’s involvement in cattle production in Ghanzi District to think about how peoples’ relations to certain livestock species produce, reproduce and challenge established patterns of material and social relations. More specifically I investigate how access and claims to livestock are defined by intersections of gender, ethnicity, race and class within broader contexts associated with the commercialisation of livestock production. The objective of this thesis is to explore how different women are able to benefit from their cattle ownership in terms of their social positions and material welfare in Botswana within the broader political, economic and sociocultural contexts associated with the commercial beef industry. Through ethnographic fieldwork and an intersectional analysis of gendered property relations to grazing land and cattle, I show how women do benefit from both subsistence products and monetary income from cattle sales. An increased need for cash together with the possibility to sell cattle stimulated by Botswana’s beef trade with the EU have motivated women to seek control over cattle. There are women who, encouraged by gender equality messages from the Ministry of Gender Affairs, make use of the government’s loans and grants designed to facilitate entrepreneurship to start up their own cattle operations and make claims to the cattle market. Many of these women, who have control over their cattle also benefit in terms of social status and a number of those women who engage in cattle production in ways seen as new and different speak of more equal gender relations

Adaptive Governance and Resilience Capacity of Farms: The Fit Between Farmers’ Decisions and Agricultural Policies

Greater resilience is needed for farms to deal with shocks and disturbances originating from economic, environmental, social and institutional challenges, with resilience achieved by adequate adaptive governance. This study focuses on the resilience capacity of farms in the context of multi-level adaptive governance. We define adaptive governance as adjustments in decision-making processes at farm level and policy level, through changes in management practices and policies in response to identified challenges and the delivery of desired functions (e.g. private and public goods) to be attained. The aim of the study is twofold. First, we investigate how adaptive governance processes at farm level and policy level influence the resilience capacity of farms in terms of robustness, adaptability and transformability. Second, we investigate the “fit” between the adaptive governance processes at farm level and policy level to enable resilience. We study primary egg and broiler production in Sweden taking into consideration economic, social and environmental challenges. We use semi-structured interviews with 17 farmers to explain the adaptive processes at farm level and an analysis of policy documents from the Common Agricultural Policy program 2014–2020, to explain the intervention actions taken by the Common Agricultural Policy. Results show that neither the farm level nor policy level adaptive processes on their own have the capacity to fully enable farms to be robust, adaptable and transformable. While farm level adaptive processes are mainly directed toward securing the robustness and adaptability of farms, policy level interventions are targeted at enabling adaptability. The farm- and the policy level adaptive processes do not “fit” for attaining robustness and transformability

D2.2 Report on analysis of biographical narratives exploring short- and long-term adaptive behaviour of farmers under various challenges

The Horizon 2020 project Towards Sustainable and Resilient EU Farming Systems (SURE-Farm) defines resilience as maintaining the essential functions of EU farming systems in the face of increasingly complex and volatile economic, social, ecological and institutional risks: Meuwissen (2018) suggests that resilience over time is achieved across the increasingly fundamental attributes of robustness, adaptability and transformability, representing system responses to short, medium and long-term external drivers, respectively. Maxwell (1986) also recognised that external drivers vary significantly in time and space and distinguished four different types of perturbations: noise, shocks, cycles and trends. Analysis of narratives (Rosenthal, 2004; Riessmann, 2008) can be used to enable researchers to gain indepth understanding of the rationale surrounding farmer decision making when faced with drivers of change (e.g. MacDonald et al., 2014), and how farmers manage critical decision points in their farming businesses. This understanding is crucial for developing the tools and policy measures needed to support the sustainability and resilience of European agriculture. We have used personal histories of family farms, and business histories of corporate farms, to identify phases in the separate production, demographic and policy adaptive cycles (and consequences of interactions between them) as they have impacted on the individuals concerned and their business enterprises. Biographical stories were collected from nine to ten narrators (early-, mid- and late-career), in each of five case studies chosen to represent a range of regions and farming systems in Europe. These included large scale family and corporate arable farms in Northeast Bulgaria (BG) and the East of England (UK); dairy farms in Flanders (BE); small-scale perennial crop (hazelnut) farms in central Italy (IT) and high value egg and broiler systems in Southern Sweden (SE). A single question was used to initiate the narrators’ stories, without qualification beforehand, supported only with expressions of interest and encouragement in the first part of the interview, with subsequent exploratory questions devoted to clarifying the internal structure of the narrative. Narratives were transcribed and analysed to identify the drivers and responses to critical decision-making points in the stories. Comparisons across the five regional farming system cases have also been made to generate wider insights into how the narrators responded to different challenges. The drivers leading up to critical decision points in the narratives were grouped according to themes which followed a spectrum ranging from internal (those arising from within the farm system), to external (those acting on the farm system). Internal drivers included health, relationships, intergenerational change, retirement, redundancy. The more intermediate drivers included financial pressures, skills, labour, disasters, land issues, water. External drivers included supply chain factors, markets, technology, policy and regulation. Some drivers and responses were observed to relate to the farmer whilst others related to the farming system. Key findings from cross-narrative analysis distinguished inertia as the predominant response to system challenges, and that incremental changes (or creeping change, as we have termed it) in the system over a long-time frame rather than a definable critical decision point, is widely evident in the narratives. Climate change was not identified as being a driver and was only mentioned at all in two of the 45 narratives. Farmer identity ranged broadly across the narratives with the extremes being represented by those who farmed because it was their vocation, to those who perceived themselves first and foremost as business operators. To an extent, these identities reflected the degree of attachment to land, with the more vocational farmers having a strong attachment to their farmed land (particularly in the Flemish case) and the more business-minded (particularly in Northeast Bulgaria and the East of England) having less attachment. The long-term nature of the hazelnut crop in Central Italy meant that attachment to the land was strong, regardless of farmer identity. Family support, whether perceived as positive or negative by the narrator, was found to influence decision-making, and changing work/life balance expectations, particularly amongst early-career farmers with young families, was also influential. The narratives revealed different approaches to risk alleviation, both within and across case studies. In instances where land availability was not restricted (for example, Northeast Bulgaria, and to some extent, East Anglia), scale enlargement was predominant, but where land was restricted, diversification was the predominant response (for example, in the Flemish narratives). There were strong similarities and distinctive differences across the narrative contexts. Similarities included the dominance of internal drivers, intergenerational change as a major critical decision point, the perception of many external drivers as noise, and more frustration with policy drivers compared with weather events. There were few mentions of insurance by the narrators. The findings indicate that robustness is demonstrated in response to many drivers classified as cycles and shocks, whilst prolonged trends result primarily in adaptation. Transformations were relatively infrequent in the narratives and those identified were not radical in nature. The main policy related conclusions from the study suggest that farming systems are ill-equipped for a rapid move from direct payments to income insurance. They also appear to be unprepared for climate change. Long-term, coherent strategies required for dealing with intergenerational change were not apparent, confirming parallel literature that suggests that legal, social welfare and policy obstacles to farm succession need to be addressed

D5.3 Resilience assessment of current farming systems across the European Union

For improving sustainability and resilience of EU farming system, the current state needs to be assessed, before being able to move on to future scenarios. Assessing sustainability and resilience of farming systems is a multi-faceted research challenge in terms of the scientific domains and scales of integration (farm, household, farming system level) that need to be covered. Hence, in SURE-Farm, multiple approaches are used to evaluate current sustainability and resilience and its underlying structures and drivers. To maintain consistency across the different approaches, all approaches are connected to a resilience framework which was developed for the unique purposes of SURE-Farm. The resilience framework follows five steps: 1) the farming system (resilience of what?), 2) challenges (resilience to what?), 3) functions (resilience for what purpose?), 4) resilience capacities, 5) resilience attributes (what enhances resilience?). The framework was operationalized in 11 case studies across the EU. Applied approaches differ in disciplinary orientation and the farming system process they focus on. Three approaches focus on risk management: 1) a farm survey with a main focus on risk management and risk management strategies, 2) interviews on farmers’ learning capacity and networks of influence, and 3) Focus Groups on risk management. Two approaches address farm demographics: 4) interviews on farm demographics, and 5) AgriPoliS Focus Group workshops on structural change of farming systems from a (farm) demographics perspective. One approach applied so far addresses governance: 6) the Resilience Assessment Tool that evaluates how policies and legislation support resilience of farming systems. Two methods address agricultural production and delivery of public and private goods: 7) the Framework of Participatory Impact Assessment for sustainable and resilient farming systems (FoPIA-SURE-Farm), aiming to integrate multiple perspectives at farming system level, and 8) the Ecosystem Services assessment that evaluates the delivery of public and private goods. In a few case studies, additional methods were applied. Specifically, in the Italian case study, additional statistical approaches were used to increase the support for risk management options (Appendix A and Appendix B). Results of the different methods were compared and synthesized per step of the resilience framework. Synthesized results were used to determine the position of the farming system in the adaptive cycle, i.e. in the exploitation, conservation, release, or reorganization phase. Dependent on the current phase of the farming system, strategies for improving sustainability and resilience were developed. Results were synthesized around the three aspects characterizing the SURE-Farm framework, i.e. (i) it studies resilience at the farming system level, (ii) considers three resilience capacities, and (iii) assesses resilience in the context of the (changing) functions of the system. (i) Many actors are part of the farming system. However, resilience-enhancing strategies are mostly defined at the farm level. In each farming system multiple actors are considered to be part of the system, such as consultants, neighbors, local selling networks and nature organizations. The number of different farming system actors beyond the focal farmers varies between 4 (in French beef and Italian hazelnut systems) and 14 (large-scale arable systems in the UK). These large numbers of actors illustrate the relevance of looking at farming system level rather than at farm level. It also suggests that discussions about resilience and future strategies need to embrace all of these actors. (ii) At system level there is a low perceived capacity to transform. Yet, most systems appear to be at the start of a period in which (incremental) transformation is required. At system level, the capacity to transform is perceived to be relatively low, except in the Romanian mixed farming system. The latter may reflect a combination of ample room to grow and a relatively stable environment (especially when compared to the past 30 to 50 years). The relatively low capacity to transform in the majority of systems is not in line with the suggestion that most systems are at the start of (incremental) transformation, or, at least, reached a situation in which they can no longer grow. Further growth is only deemed possible in the Belgium dairy, Italian hazelnut, Polish fruit and Romanian mixed farming systems. (iii) System functions score well with regard to the delivery of high-quality and safe food but face problems with quality of rural life and protecting biodiversity. Resilience capacities can only be understood in the context of the functions to be delivered by a farming system. We find that across all systems required functions are a mix of private and public goods. With regard to the capacity to deliver private goods, all systems perform well with respect to high-quality and safe food. Viability of farm income is regarded moderate or low in the livestock systems in Belgium (dairy), France (beef) and Sweden (broilers), and the fruit farming system in Poland. Across all functions, attention is especially needed for the delivery of public goods. More specifically the quality of rural life and infrastructure are frequently classified as being important, but currently performing bad. Despite the concerns about the delivery of public goods, many future strategies still focus on improving the delivery of private goods. Suggestions in the area of public goods include among others the implementation of conservation farming in the UK arable system, improved water management in the Italian hazelnut system, and introduction of technologies which reduce the use of herbicides in Polish fruit systems. It is questionable whether these are sufficient to address the need to improve the maintenance of natural resources, biodiversity and attractiveness of rural areas. With regard to the changing of functions over time, we did not find evidence for this in our farming systems