Private Food Strategies and Political Consumerism

A number of policy instruments are used in order to provide consumers healthy products produced in a proper way as regards environmental impacts. The policy instruments are mainly directed to enterprises and companies producing products. Such actors are often addressed in terms of laws or regulations and represent different actors in a production chain. Policy instruments and the way they are used in Product Policy Chains will be discussed theoretically and from empirical examples. The government often uses a vertical policy chain in the communication process with actors in the process.

Consumers, the end users, are often addressed by informational instruments, e.g. pamphlets, campaigns, content declarations or labelling. However, consumers reliance in food products can vary for several reasons. They may dislike the price, the quality, the labelling process and organisation or the food products for ethical reasons. Consumer power can be activated for some or several of these reasons. Two types of consumer power will be discussed and analysed namely the individualised power of consumers, e.g. buying resistance, and secondly the collectivistic power of consumers, relying on an ideology, which can be ethical, e.g. animals rights movements. Consumer power and influence can be performed on a local, national or global level. Consumer strategies in purchasing behaviour and influencing the market will be analysed concerning reliance on products, use of information and labelling. This is a pilot study aimed at formulating a frame of concepts to be used in analysis of consumer power and political consumerism. Statistical databases and a number of in-depth interviews with environmentally concerned consumers, vegans and vegetarians is used as an empirical base.