Transnational Participatory Democracy in Action:

The Case of La Via Campesina

Michael Menser

In a recent essay in a special issue of this journal on global democracy, Daniel

Weinstock argues that there are “two sets of reasons one might have to think that
global democracy would be a good thing.” The first rationale deems global
democracy desirable because it would allow individuals to “exercise political
agency.”1 Institutional design, then, should promote the active participation of
persons in the collective project of governance if not full-blown “self-
government.” The alternate form of justification argues that the project of global
democratization is worthwhile insofar as such processes would enable individuals
of various cultures and locales to efficaciously realize their interests. On this view,
institutional design should promote the protection of private freedoms, effective
mechanisms for political representation, and competent governance, but not
citizen agency as such. Indeed, states Weinstock, schemes seeking the latter are
“unrealistic” given the current global situation which is characterized by markedly
uneven political and economic development. Thus, international institutions too
should function, along with governments, so as to accurately register and respond
to the varying demands of citizens.2
Drawing upon Weinstock’s terminology, I shall call the first framework the
“agency-oriented” view, and the second the “interest-oriented” view. However,
while Weinstock defends an interest-oriented view and takes deliberative democ-
racy as his principal polemical target, I will argue against both interest-oriented
and deliberative models and instead defend an agency-oriented model of partici-
patory democracy. Weinstock, like most others in contemporary political theory,
argues against models that demand broad participation because they are “unreal-
istic” given the inclinations and capacities of present populations and the demands
and possibilities of the present interstate system. While interest-oriented views
often criticize deliberative democracy for being impracticable, deliberative demo-
crats make similar charges against participatory models. And one key tenet that
interest and deliberative models share is a strong commitment to the state as a
crucial source of political legitimacy and center for political action whatever its
modality: social democratic welfare state or neoliberal security state.
I shall argue for a version of the agency view that I call “maximal democracy”
or maxD. MaxD builds upon participatory democratic traditions within demo-
cratic theory and recent work by Carol Gould and identifies the social realm,
broadly construed, as the primary locus of democratization. My conception is also

JOURNAL of SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY, Vol. 39 No. 1, Spring 2008, 20–41.

© 2008 Blackwell Publishing, Inc.
 Transnational Participatory Democracy 21

informed by actors outside the framework of democratic theory––and much of

Anglo-American political philosophy––since it draws upon analyses of the norms
and practices of movements and organizations comprising the Global Justice
Movement (GJM),3 especially those identifying as postsocialist, anarchist, anti-
capitalist and/or indigenous.4 In particular, I articulate this conception of democ-
racy by drawing upon case studies of a transnational association of peasants called
La Via Campesina (“the way of the peasant”; LVC). LVC is composed of more
than 130 organizations in more than sixty countries and represents tens of millions
of small farmers, fishermen and women, and landless and agricultural workers in
what it describes as the fight against neoliberal globalization that “places eco-
nomic interests over and above social and environmental conditions.”5 I shall
argue that LVC and its members show that participatory democracy in a transna-
tional context is not “unrealistic.” On the contrary, it is viable and spreading. This
model of participatory democracy (PD) also forwards a unique conceptual frame-
work for linking together social and environmental issues by way of understand-
ing democracy not just as reason-giving, deliberation, and/or representation but as
self-determination and socio-ecologically sustainable production. The essay pro-
ceeds as follows: a discussion of participatory democracy and democratic theory,
the explication and justification of my own view of maximal democracy, a brief
explication of the Global Justice Movement, a longer analysis of the transnational
structure of LVC and its maximally democratic program for Food Sovereignty and
agroecology. The essay concludes with a summary of problems and possibilities
with respect to both LVC and maximal democracy.

The State of Democratic Theory and the Arguments Against Participation

Weinstock is not alone in his skepticism toward the viability of agency-oriented

models in general and participatory democratic models in particular. With a few
exceptions, agency-oriented PD has not been popular in democratic theory.6 The
reasoning for the distaste often goes like this: PD requires small homogeneous
communities defined by regular face-to-face interaction.7 State formation and
related processes of urbanization, industrialization, and colonialism have rendered
most states too complex, not to mention too large, to permit a broad population to
participate in governance functions, much less self-government. And since World
War II, the rise of “big science” and the welfare state have further reduced the
political powers of the populace because most citizens are said to lack the special-
ized knowledges required for operating the omnicompetent state: hence the reduc-
tion of community-based governance and social service delivery and the growth of
bureaucracies of all sorts throughout much of the twentieth century.8 With the
spread of globalization in its myriad modalities (economic, cultural, political,
technological, religious), PD has become even less desirable/possible since, as the
story goes, the small communities required have become even more scarce. Indeed,
the continued onset of globalization spawns two new reasons for the impracticality
of PD: large states have become more heterogeneous (due to immigration) and
22 Michael Menser

communities of all sizes more interconnected (due to trade, communications

technologies and so on). And, limits on the democratization of international
organizations have grown as the global population has mushroomed.9
An influential catalogue of these sorts of difficulties as they intensify and
proliferate at the global level can be found in Robert Dahl’s and Iris Young’s
recent work. Dahl’s response to this array of difficulties is to call for the construc-
tion of “bureaucratic bargaining systems.” In these interest-representing organi-
zations, authority is delegated to experts who possess the knowledge in relevant
areas (e.g. agriculture, environment) to efficaciously respond to the needs of
oftentimes uninformed constituencies.10 To cite another, and again influential,
account, Iris Young too warns against the dangers of participatory democracy
within states and its impracticability at the international level. Even though she
explicitly criticizes interest-oriented views, she, like Dahl, stresses the importance
of state-based mechanisms of representation (at the national and international
levels) to actively protect human rights and mitigate severe inequalities, especially
for those structurally disadvantaged by global capitalism and other institutional
and cultural forms of subordination and exploitation.11 What is common among
these PD critics is that they consider democracy to be an instrument for realizing
people’s welfare––even if they (Young, Dahl or Weinstock) disagree about what
exactly that entails. They also seem to consider capitalism in its present form to be
inevitable.12 As such, democracy’s mission is to make government attentive and
responsive to its constituents’ interests and to somehow moderate the excesses of
the economy and deliver the bread and butter goods people covet––security,
access to resources and opportunities, education, and health care.13
Although Weinstock notes that there are myriad difficulties with the interest
view (e.g., individuals are not always the best judges of their own interests), none
is devastating and they are far less numerous than those difficulties facing PD
since (i) the interest view better corresponds to the best the interstate system has
to offer (the individual-freedoms promoting liberal multiparty states); and (ii) it
has more realistic expectations of its citizens: that is, it asks little when compared
to PD. Again, for Weinstock and others who stress the instrumental value of
democracy whatever its modality (deliberative, aggregative), the best justification
for the interest model is that it has given to its citizens a “level of welfare
unmatched in human history.”14
Other supposed strengths are that it does not require homogenization of the
demos or deep agreements about civic virtues or the public/communal good as in
republican or communitarian views. It also avoids the frequently noted pitfalls
faced by deliberative models: citizens need to be informed, have time, and be
motivated to participate on a regular basis. Of course, PD is said to suffer from both
sets of problems. What is striking, however, is despite this long list of reasons to
favor the interest view and discount the agency model, the demand for democratic
participation has exploded, especially since the fall of the Soviet Union and the
emergence of the Global Justice Movement (GJM) at the end of the twentieth
century.
 Transnational Participatory Democracy 23

The Global Justice Movement and the Reinvention of

Participatory Democracy

Participatory democracy is that view of politics which calls for the creation
and proliferation of practices and institutions that enable individuals and groups to
better determine the conditions in which they act and relate to others. The possi-
bility of such collective determination is dependent upon the capacities of partici-
pating individuals and the forms of association created or chosen. Because of its
focus on individual and group empowerment, PD is fundamentally an agency-
oriented view and is deeply suspicious of political and social hierarchies in
general and states, bureaucracies, and economic firms in particular. For propo-
nents of PD, any area of human endeavor could and should be subject to such
norms––not just government and political society (e.g., political parties and
NGOs), but the economic and social realms as well.15 The project of PD is not just
to criticize existing authoritarian or paternalist schemes but to generate and justify
alternatives to those institutions where democratization has not taken root. Recent
sites for PD approaches include the workplace, the family, schools and day care,
neighborhood organizations, economic cooperatives, and local governments.16
Though deemed impracticable, if not outright impossible, by much of demo-
cratic theory, the political and social production of agency-oriented participatory
democratic practices and organizations has dramatically increased since the mid-
1990s.17 This has occurred despite the further entrenchment of global neoliberal-
ism with its intensely antidemocratic tendencies. Indeed, part of the explanation
for the resurgence of interest in PD models is due to the failure of “interest-
oriented” models to deliver the promised goods––in other words, for many, the
interest model’s purported welfare increasing practicality seems a false promise
for far too many in the “underdeveloped” states and those marginalized within the
developed ones. Because of intensified interdependencies and mobilities brought
on by globalization, many of these local PD efforts have sought translocal con-
nections and alliances––for reasons of survival and possibility––and have come to
identify themselves with the Global Justice Movement.18
Initially regarded as a raucous and incommensurable ad hoc mix of antago-
nists lacking agreement and vision, the anti-(neoliberal) globalization movement
has matured into a diverse coalition of forces forging transnational commonalities
among one another as visions of “another world” are articulated both conceptually
and on the ground.19 Just as many social and political movements in the 1960s
inspired democratic theorists to contemplate the possibilities of participatory
democratic practices both within and outside the state,20 the Global Justice Move-
ment offers a rich array of practices and concepts to contemporary theorists
considering the possibility of local, international and/or transnational democracy.
This is true for at least three reasons. First, the existence and increasing popularity
of the GJM directly challenges the claim made by defenders of neoliberalism that
“development/growth” and “free trade” are the only effective means to obtain
security, freedom, and democracy, alleviate poverty and disease, and eliminate
24 Michael Menser

scarcities of whatever sort (jobs, income, consumer goods). Relatedly, many

within the GJM are skeptical of the state’s ability to remedy the aforementioned
ills, which if not initiated by neoliberalism are often exacerbated by it. Thus, the
GJM offers examples of transnational paths of democratization not centered upon
states. Second, the GJM has reenergized many local social justice and democracy
movements across the globe by giving them a common enemy and thereby
enabling them to overcome their parochialism or isolation and interconnect their
struggles. This interconnection is especially evident in the exponential growth of
the World Social Forum and the broader Social Forum movement. Third, the GJM
has become an increasingly popular and potent venue for the reinvention of
participatory democracy at a variety of scales, from the local and regional to the
national, transnational, and global and in a range of sectors: politics, economics,
and social life in general.21

Maximal Democracy as Self-determination

Despite tremendous ideological, cultural, religious, and geographic diversity

among actors in the GJM, a conception of participatory democracy has emerged
that cuts across these differences.22 This view of PD has not been much analyzed
by those working in democratic theory.23 I shall call this view maximal democracy
or maxD. MaxD is a model of participatory democracy defined by following four
tenets: (i) democratic self-determination; (ii) capacity development for individuals
and groups; (iii) delivery of economic, social, and/or political benefits; and (iv) the
construction, cultivation, proliferation, and interconnection of movements and
organizations that embody the first three tenets.
At the core of the above conception is the principle of democratic self-
determination––indeed, the last three tenets may be regarded as derivations of the
first one.24 By self-determination I mean the right of a particular group of persons
to define, justify and concretely articulate the normative framework under which
they act, deliberate, and plan with others. This requires the development and
exercise of the capacities required to engage in such activities. The definition of
self-determination offered here includes not just norm construction and justifica-
tion but institutional design and management. For self-determination to be demo-
cratic, members of the polity (however defined) must be recognized as equal, and
there must be mechanisms that seek to render this equality operational. Because of
the impact of changes within or outside the polity and the aspirational nature of
such norms, self-determination is perhaps best understood as the adaptive evolu-
tion of a self-regulating entity seeking to maximize the agency, equality, and
the good of its members over time. Operationally, for maxD, democratic self-
determination tends toward self-governance but always with an eye toward cre-
ating interconnections with separate polities that share its normative framework
(more on tenet 4 below).
Democratic self-determination takes the two basic tenets of democracy––
political equality and popular sovereignty25––and applies them throughout the
 Transnational Participatory Democracy 25

political, economic, and social fields. In the deliberative context this means “each
individual member of a decision-making body has equal power to determine the
outcome of decisions.”26 But for maxD, self-determination is not just about col-
lective deliberation; it is a multi-dimensional, long-term process that includes
collective forms of labor, ownership, and management. This focus on institutional
design is essential since PD views in particular are criticized for bring either
unappealing or impracticable.27
Maximal democracy’s modus operandi is not only expansive with respect
to sector, but also seeks to intensify the agency of individuals by developing
those capacities relevant for democratic participation.28 Such capacities may vary
depending on the sector and the society. For maxD, then, democracy is defined not
just as a discursive procedure for justification; it is a set of practices that actualizes
self-determination by linking together democratic procedures, capacity develop-
ment, material benefits. But what justifies the inclusion and interconnection of
all three?

Justifying MaxD: Gould’s Notion of Equal Positive Freedom

The above account of self-determination resonates with the normative frame-

work argued for by Carol Gould in her Globalizing Democracy and Human
Rights. In this and other recent work, Gould offers a justification for the intercon-
nection of democracy, capacity development, and justice. She does this by arguing
what normatively grounds democracy and justice is freedom, and freedom
requires capacity development. I draw upon this three-part schema to justify
maxD and further articulate the notions of self-determination and capacity
development.
For Gould, freedom is, in part, “a bare capacity for choice among alterna-
tives” in some given situation, but it is also the utilization of this ability in concert
with other persons in short- and long-term projects. As such, it is essential for any
project of self-development. Indeed, for Gould, freedom is self-development or
transformation. Ontologically, freedom is a fundamentally social capacity because
self-development requires other persons for both its ontogeny and exercise. To
emphasize that these goal-oriented social relationships are not abstract and static
but embedded and changeable, Gould calls them “common activities.”29
Gould argues that freedom is “the characteristic mode of human agency or
life activity,” and all persons are entitled to exercise it. Because it is an entitlement,
a society is obligated to make available “the means or conditions necessary for
making these choices effective [my emphasis].” Gould terminologically encapsu-
lates the conceptual interlinking of freedom, the conditions for capacity develop-
ment, and the end of justice with the phrase “equal positive freedom.” She writes,
“[T]his principle of equal rights to the conditions of self-development [is called]
equal positive freedom and [I] take it to be a principle of justice.”30
This account of equal positive freedom (or EPF) provides an ethical justifi-
cation for maximal democracy. It does this by: (i) defining freedom not merely as
26 Michael Menser

freedom from interference but as self-development; (ii) defining self-development

as a social or common activity that potentially includes not just the political realm
but any kind of institution or sector whether social or economic, private or public;
and (iii) arguing that “the principle of equality requires that the conditions nec-
essary for such freedom be accessible to all.” Gould’s interlinking of equality,
self-development, and common activity provides further support for the first three
of maxD’s tenets: that individuals be permitted to define the norms that frame their
common activities (tenet 1); that the relevant resources be made available so that
individuals may possess the capacities necessary for self-development (tenet 2);
thus, those lacking said resources must be provided with them (tenet 3). Finally,
as in maxD, EPF should be applied not just to the political realm but to any
“common activity” whether political, economic, or social.31
Gould’s account also outlines a theoretical basis for facing a problem that
besets procedural views of democracy: what to do when the decision-making
process is “fair” (all participants are treated equally with respect to the decision-
making procedure), but the outcome conflicts with some major principle of
justice? Procedural views are forced to accept such results as legitimate. For
Gould, however, the principle of EPF both founds and constrains the processes
and outcomes of the procedures. Thus, for example, if a majority resolves to
limit the freedom of a minority group, or even fails to properly provide resources
to such a group for its member self-development, such an outcome however
procedurally fair (free and open election and so on) is deemed unjust because it
violates EPF. While this brief explication cannot address all the pertinent prob-
lems that may arise, this theoretical rendering shall be made more robust below
in the discussion of how maxD founds and constrains (in this same manner as
EPF) with respect to LVC’s program for Food Sovereignty and its model of
agroecology.

MaxD and Democratic Theory

With the basic tenets of maxD laid out in the context of Gould’s notion of
EPF and my related conception of self-determination, it is easy to see how maxD
diverges from most views within contemporary democratic theory. Like most
participatory democratic views, maxD obviously opposes catallactic and aggre-
gative views, and is closer to deliberative and associative models. But maxD splits
with both camps. As noted above, maxD places an importance on deliberation
since it is essential for any project of self-determination, but it includes a wider
array of practices than discussion, debate, and reason-giving. Forms of collabo-
ration and cooperation, grounded by the norm of EPF and the requirement
to promote capacity development are at the core of maxD as democratic
self-determination.
In this regard, maxD shares much with the “associationist” tradition in demo-
cratic theory. In its early twentieth century formulations––which were often linked
with the syndicalist political tradition––associationism was posited as kind of
 Transnational Participatory Democracy 27

third way between the radical individualism of industrial capitalism and the
state-enforced collectivation of socialism. Unlike those models and communities
of fate and coerced groupings in general, associationism sought to create and
proliferate the formation of social groupings based upon a logic of affinity. The
functions of these groupings ranged from political deliberation to social service
delivery and economic production and included organizational types such as
worker and consumer cooperatives, labor unions, and neighborhood-based sup-
port organizations (e.g., neighborhood watch, eldercare groups). As numerous
empirical studies have shown, the production of said social formations often leads
to greater trust and solidarity among differently situated persons across society,
develops new individual capacities in group settings, creates new group capacities,
and aids in the alleviation of anomie and alienation common to both capitalist and
socialist polities.32
MaxD clearly resonates with and draws from these aspects of association-
ism, but it splits with the latter with regard to the relationship of the associations
to the state. Associationism still considers the state to be the center of political
activity and legitimacy whereas maxD, like Gould’s account, locates the right to
self-determination in common activities wherever they occur––usually outside
the state and political society. Thus, while associationism departs from many
versions of liberalism is in its insistence that voluntarily formed groups can
effectively actually carry out governance functions outside the state bureaucracy,
or indeed, instead of it, it does not consistently recognize actors in civil society
as genuine political agents with the right and capacity for self-determination.
This is especially the case in the account of Cohen and Rogers, who argue that
the key purpose of associations is to enable the state to function more effec-
tively and legitimately by gathering together diverse and especially disadvan-
taged groups to assist in policy formation. But it is also the case in Hirst––with
whom maxD is much more sympathetic––who gladly transfers governance
functions to voluntary groups but still sees the state as the political source of
legitimacy and thus fails to recognize social movements (such as the GJM) as
legitimate political agents.33
In sum, maximal democracy builds upon the traditions of participatory
democracy and associationism insofar as in both views––despite differences
regarding the role of the state––some or much government becomes self-
government as groups of freely associating individuals create and operate the
institutions required for the obtainment of some good. In this regard, both asso-
ciationism and participatory democracy can be grounded in Gould’s account of
empowered participatory governance since freedom as self-determination requires
that individuals be able to exercise control over the conditions in which they
engage in activities with others. For Gould, associationism, and PD, this position
is derived from an understanding of individuals as socially embedded agents
whose individual and collective freedom requires not just protection but assistance
and resources. But the case of LVC shall show that there is much at stake in
understanding the distinction between maxD and associationism.
28 Michael Menser

LVC: A Brief Description and Introduction to the Issues

In April 1992, several peasant leaders from Central America, North America,
and Europe met in Managua, Nicaragua, at the Congress of the National Union of
Farmers and Livestock Owners to address the deprivation caused by Cold War
food aid and economic “development” programs and the recent transformation
of both under neoliberal agricultural policy. Faced with the failure of states to
effectively protect the most basic interests of small agricultural producers and the
communities that rely upon them, those present formed a new organization, LVC.
LVC’s designated task was not just to critique neoliberalism, but to combat it and
produce and proliferate (maxD principle 4) an alternative model. Formed from
small-scale agricultural producers and workers, fishermen and women (and no
NGOs), LVC has expanded from its base in the Americas and Europe to the Indian
subcontinent, Southeast Asia, and most recently Africa. As of 2007, it is composed
of more than 130 organizations in more than sixty countries and represents tens of
millions of farmers.34
La Via Campesina stands out as a robust case of a transnational political
organization not only because of its size but because of its geographic scope and
cultural diversity. Many so-called global organizations and NGOs are made up of
and/or run by organizations from only a few (often very wealthy) countries or
many countries from only one or two regions. This is not the case with LVC. It
operates in dozens of countries from the First to Third World, North and South,
including South Korea, India, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, Mexico,
United States, Brazil, Chile, Thailand, France, Italy, Madagascar, Senegal, and
Mali. Furthermore, as this list indicates, it is not only geographically inclusive but
also is extremely diverse with respect to race, language, and religion.35 And all are
united in their opposition to neoliberalism and the realization of an alternative
kind of agricultural production.

Agriculture and Neoliberalism

Neoliberal agriculture builds upon a model of industrial production con-

structed after World War II, especially the “green revolution” model operative in
noncommunist block countries during the 1940s–60s in India and Latin America.
Following the basic premises of neoclassical economics, this industrial model
aims to maximize production and profits in certain staple crops (e.g., wheat, rice,
corn, soy). Under this model of production of such crops, outputs dramatically
increased, prices generally fell, and food production outpaced demand despite
massive population growth.36 Industrial agricultural achieved these high outputs
and profits by, as much as possible, drastically reducing the amount of human and
animal labor through technological innovation. Starting in the 1970s, the prolif-
eration and intensification of the industrial model combined with the growth in
global transportation, communication and financial systems brought forth a new
stage in the global agricultural market primarily because of the enormous quan-
 Transnational Participatory Democracy 29

tities of staple crops that were produced for export and the concomitant and
exponential increase in the number of countries requiring large imports to meet
their domestic food demands.37
Though industrial agriculture led to enormous gains in food output, it has
been criticized for causing a range of ecological, social, economic and political
problems. From an ecological standpoint, intensive tillage leads to degraded and
eroded soils, depleted aquifers, poisoned wells and waterways, and marine “dead
zones” caused by the runoff of crop fertilizers and animal waste. From an eco-
nomic standpoint, industrial agricultural practices eliminated millions of jobs
either through technical innovation or displacement of peasants from agricultural
land. And from a political standpoint, control over the management of such
operations shifted from small decentralized farms socioeconomically integrated
with local communities to large-scale agribusinesses heavily subsidized by
states.38
At the heart of LVC’s critique of the industrial neoliberal model is not only
that it has exacerbated economic and ecological problems but that it is antidemo-
cratic. Neoliberal industrial agriculture violates all four maxD tenets: (i) it
impedes democratic self-determination by concentrating ownership of the means
of production (land, seed stocks, water) in fewer (corporate) hands which dimin-
ishes the ability of producers to control the conditions in which they work; (ii) and
(iii) it displaces small farmers and employs practices that jeopardize worker health
and economic security; and (iv) it engages in political lobbying and organizing
that work against the desires of communities, producers, and consumers to inter-
link their struggles.39

Protecting Farmers’ Interests? The International Federation of

Agricultural Producers

Many recognize the situation described above as dire for small farmers and
their communities. Not surprisingly, there exist several organizations dedicated to
defending farmers’ interests. The oldest and largest is the International Federation
of Agricultural Producers (or IFAP). IFAP is a global network in which farmers
from industrialized and developing countries “exchange concerns and set
common priorities [my emphasis].” IFAP represents more than 600 million farm
families and has General Consultative Status with UNESCO and actively partici-
pates in WTO and OECD meetings.40
The International Federation of Agricultural Producers is a paradigmatic
interest-view advocacy organization as favored by Weinstock and Dahl. It aims to
“give farmers a voice” by representing their interests in those multilateral organi-
zations critical to agriculture. Specifically, it seeks to make the existing neoliberal
structure and policies work better for farmers by making genetically modified seeds
more available and securing loans from the World Bank for dams and irrigation
systems required by the industrial model. In addition, IFAP seeks to “slow the pace
of free trade” until countries from the South can effectively compete. Lastly, IFAP
30 Michael Menser

abides by the principles of “food security” and seeks to ensure that consumers
across the globe have access to food. However, it does not call for consumers or
producers to be able to determine how that food is produced.41
There are numerous problems with this kind of interest model “democracy.”
First, many members of IFAP are among the most powerful actors on the domestic
and global industrial agriculture scene including the American Farm Bureau, an
immensely powerful multimillion-dollar lobbying organization. Given such a
situation, one might ask after IFAP’s function. Indeed, LVC claims that IFAP has
stymied debate on what many consider to be the chief cause of peasant impover-
ishment and disempowerment: neoliberal agriculture. According to LVC, IFAP
has even “fabricated consent” by issuing “points of consensus” when groups
within it have dissented from the statement. Again, although IFAP has provided
financial and technical aid to farmers rendered vulnerable by the dramatic changes
of the last two decades, it has simultaneously intensified global neoliberalism’s
antidemocratic character by only representing, or overrepresenting, those interests
that are already in accord with it––and that already have easy access to major
decision-making bodies such as the WTO. This fabricated consensus enables the
WTO and related institutions to claim to have taken into account the interests of
key stakeholders.42 All of this calls into question Weinstock’s two main defenses
of the interest model: that the rulers of “developed democracies” can effectively
represent the interests of those in nondemocratic locales and deliver “prosperity”
to these groups.43

LVC’s Structure: Representation, Regionalism, and Gender Equality

La Via Campesina’s structure departs in several key ways from IFAP’s in

particular and the “interest” view in general. From the maxD perspective, LVC’s
most salient organizational feature is its associative “horizontality” and transna-
tional regionalism––this is also one of the reasons for LVC’s rapid growth with
respect to IFAP. To make an organization with such a large membership
democratic––so its broad base can participate in fact-gathering and policy and
strategy debate followed by discussions of tactics and implementation––LVC
has settled on the following structure. It is divided up into seven regions: North
and Southeast Asia, South Asia, North America, Central America, South
America, the Caribbean, and Western/Eastern Europe. Each region has assem-
blies where members deliberate and strategize face-to-face as well as discuss the
needs, failures and successes, and aspirations and innovations of the groups
within the region. Each region then chooses delegates that meet every three to
four years at the International Conference “to determine the overall direction,
policies, and strategies” of LVC. From these international gatherings, a fourteen-
member Internal Coordinating Commission (ICC) is formed with two repre-
sentatives from each region. Desmarais writes, “Outside of the international
conference, the ICC becomes the key decision-making and coordinating body
 Transnational Participatory Democracy 31

of the LVC. All major decisions are made in consultation with the fourteen
members of the ICC.” The ICC is the most important link within LVC and
member groups.44
From a functional perspective, the key role of LVC as an organization is that
it holds deliberative assemblies at the regional and global levels so as to analyze
the efficacy of existing practices and construct programs capable of interconnect-
ing groups and cultivating individual and collective capabilities and provide
material benefits to members. Examples of program areas include training
workers in sustainable production techniques, fair-trade agreements, conservation,
gender equality, and the implementation of banking and credit policies that
support the aforementioned initiatives and programs.45
Although localization and regionalization may increase participation and
intergroup collaboration, such mechanisms by themselves do not guarantee equal-
ity among members. Because of LVC’s commitment to equality in participation,
it has been forced to innovate to address a most pervasive source of social and
political exclusion within its base: patriarchy and sexism. Women make up more
than 70% of agricultural workers worldwide; thus, failure to include them would
be make any claim to participatory democracy preposterous. Yet, mere formal
inclusion is not enough; women must have equal agency in the institutional
processes. Starting in 1996, a few LVC members formed the following institu-
tional response. To ensure women’s input and agency at the local and national
levels, many national farming organizations created separate women’s organiza-
tions so that women could directly engage with one another and attempt to avoid
insidious forms of patriarchy that can arise when men usurp women’s voices in the
role of representative or interlocutor.46 LVC too has followed this innovation and
formed a “Women’s Assembly” that addresses the particular needs and insights of
women with respect to agricultural production and the needs of families, commu-
nities, and ecologies. The Women’s Assembly meets before every international
meeting. But of course such an assembly only has institutional power within LVC
if it directly impacts upon the ICC. In order to maximize such impact, one of every
two delegates from each region must be a woman.47

LVC’s Political Program: Food Sovereignty

Faced with the devastation wrought by neoliberalism and the impotence (or
complicity) of IFAP and others, LVC’s mission is not simply debate and discus-
sion at conferences. Rather, it also aims to cultivate and proliferate an alternative
model of agricultural production and a corresponding political program. After
many years of debate and divergence, much agreement among members has arisen
with respect to the type of model of production and it now usually goes by the
name of “agroecology.” Agroecology is that model of agricultural production that
draws upon local and traditional knowledge in combination with laboratory
studies to farm in such a way as to meet local cultural needs, provide for human
health and conserve biodiversity. LVC has named its corresponding program Food
32 Michael Menser

Sovereignty (FS). LVC defines “food sovereignty” as a right of all peoples, their
nations, or unions of states to define their respective agricultural and food policies.
LVC introduced the concept of food sovereignty in 1996 at the World Food
Summit to conceptually encapsulate an alternative to neoliberal food policy.48
The concept of food sovereignty declares that states should be free from
external interference but only with respect to (domestic) food policy. LVC has
justified this right in part by referencing Article 25 (1) of the Universal Decla-
ration of Human Rights and Article 11 of the International Covenant on Eco-
nomic, Social, and Cultural Rights (Committee on Economic, Social and
Cultural, Rights 1999). This covenant recognizes the right to self-determination
as a “right of peoples” to exercise sovereignty over “their natural wealth and
resources.”49
The justification of this non-state grounding and the formation of relation-
ships among communities within and across states is justified by Gould’s concept
of self-determination––so long as said associations abide by the principle of
EPF.50 MaxD follows this account. This view of sovereignty as arising from
democratic self-determination helps render the divergence between LVC and
IFAP even more explicit insofar as IFAP aims to represent the interests of farmers
as they are defined by neoliberalism while LVC aims to empower farmers to create
the norms to guide and justify an alternate form of agricultural production––what
Gould calls the autonomy of “common activity.” Such autonomy requires not that
LVC be effectively represented to the WTO, rather it necessitates the banishment
of neoliberalism and its institutions from the agricultural sector, hence the LVC
chant heard at WTO meetings, “WTO out of agriculture!”51
According to the program for food sovereignty, food policy is to be deter-
mined by agricultural communities in conjunction with the nutritional, ecologi-
cal, and cultural needs of the other communities within each state.52 First off,
what is produced and how much is produced are determined by social need––not
global market price––while factoring into account the capacities and limits
afforded by local knowledges, the labor pool, and ecological conditions. Agri-
cultural products may be exported but only after local needs are met. Signifi-
cantly, it was due to the aforementioned Women’s Assemblies that Food
Sovereignty was extended to include human health and that the concept of envi-
ronmental sustainability was deepened and modified so as to require that farming
methods be organic and that farmers have the right to grow in their own territory.
This latter requirement reflects the fact that women frequently farm in conjunc-
tion with household and community activities, both of which limit their ability to
commute.53 As noted above, the geographic framework in which Food Sover-
eignty is implemented is anchored upon agricultural communities themselves but
it also includes other sorts of communities including those of workers, consum-
ers, and members of the nation-state. But what exactly does production for social
need entail and how is it different from the industrial/neoliberal model of agri-
culture? And is it viable given today’s ecological conditions and human popu-
lation levels?
 Transnational Participatory Democracy 33

LVC’s Model of Ecosocial Agricultural Production: Agroecology

Agroecology is a system of agricultural production that aims not for the

maximization of commodity production but community and ecological sustain-
ability. It “responds to the agroeconomic inefficiencies and social failures of
conventional agriculture” discussed above by transforming or replacing existing
farming and livestock systems.54 It also constitutes an alternative to traditional
programs of wildlife conservation insofar as it integrates farming communities
with local biodiversity in such a way that both are sustained and reproduced.
Agroecology is that model of agricultural production and knowledge acqui-
sition that seeks to “reduce risks to farmers and environment by increasing the
resilience and self-regulating capacities of agroecosystems.”55 In practice, this
involves the replacement of nitrogen-based fertilizer with green and animal
manure, the utilization of seed varieties that are well suited for the local habitat
(e.g., in terms of water requirement), and the use of biopesticides rather than
chemical-based controls. As a science, agroecology is not founded upon labo-
ratory studies but is based on extended farm-field observations of “pest-predator
relationships, the ongoing evolution of pest species and the effects of soil organ-
isms on plant vigor.”56 Other commonly employed practices include not just
crop rotation but multiple intercropping, polyculture, biomass recycling, and the
use of open-pollinated seeds that can be selectively gathered and reused (unlike
hybrids or GMOs). These practices have been put into effect across many
regions of the world and currently benefit millions of people.57
A paradigmatic case of agroecology is the invention of the milpa in
Mesoamerica about four thousand years ago and expertly honed over the sub-
sequent millennia. A milpa is a field of corn that is planted with avocados,
multiple varieties of beans and squash, and other plants. This modality of plant-
ing (i.e., polyculture) exhibits incredible complimentarity both in terms of the
local ecology and human health. Ecologically, the beans provide the soil with
nitrogen––which the corn requires. From the standpoint of human health, corn
is a good source of B vitamins, folate, dietary fiber, vitamin C, phosphorus and
manganese but it lacks digestible niacin. Beans provide the niacin in abundance
as well as various proteins and squash an additional compliment of vitamins,
and avocados are a fine source of disease-alleviating essential fatty acids. LVC
members, and others, throughout Central America continue to practice
milpa.58
A more recently originated agroecological practice comes from cofounding
LVC member the Landless Peasants Movement of Brazil (Movimento sem Terra
or MST) who have created the Bionatur Network for Agroecological Seeds.
Formed in 1997 amid the superior topsoils of the southern state of Rio Grand du
Sol, Bionatur collects organically harvested seeds and distributes them to farmers
looking for options to the industrial corporate model. In 2004, the network yielded
a harvest of approximately seven tons of seed, “made up of more than 90 varieties
of plants, all organic.”59
34 Michael Menser

The last example, also from the Americas, concerns the founding of an
agroecology school in Venezuela.60 True to the most robust articulations of the
agroecology program, this school combines technical training with political edu-
cation and draws upon populations both peasant and indigenous. As its charter
states,

It is necessary to develop all possible efforts to defend the principle of food sovereignty of
our peoples, for the protection and multiplication of native seeds and all productive
agricultural species, for affirming the value of small-scale community and family farming,
to strengthen internal markets and to search for new agricultural techniques adapted to the
environment to produce a high quality of food for our peoples. [. . .] The goal is to train
qualified activists for the organization and development of agro-ecology, contributing to a
new ethic in the relationship between technicians and farmer, indigenous and afro-descent
organizations, in order to construct a new paradigm in the Latin American countryside.61

As this statement indicates, the school not only teaches the basics of agroecologi-
cal practice, it does so within the political framework of Food Sovereignty. And
like the formation of the LVC internal coordinating committee, it is dedicated to
gender balance: each class of students contains equal numbers of men and women.
Because of the tight link that LVC has forged between agroecology and food
sovereignty, the politics of such ecologically oriented production is firmly demo-
cratic in the maxD sense. Agroecological researchers Farvar and Pimbert write,
“Regenerating localised food systems means shifting away from uniformity,
concentration, coercion, and centralization toward diversity, decentralisation,
dynamic adaptation, and democracy. This is what the struggle for food sovereignty
and agroecology is all about.”62 In addition, many advocating this view, but
certainly not all, push the bottom-up social-communal dimension of such a
struggle and juxtapose such an orientation to that of the top-down expert-managed
state. This contrast is provocatively rendered by the same authors who argue that
agroecology challenges “liberal views of citizenship as a set of rights and respon-
sibilities granted by the state. Instead, in the context of locally determined food
systems, citizenship is claimed and rights are realized through people’s own
actions.”63 This non-state focus resonates with Gould’s aforementioned consider-
ation of common activities in the context of EPF and the more general “civil
society” tendencies found in the Global Justice Movement.64
It is clear from the above that food sovereignty as “freedom from external
interference”/self-determination is not a freedom to implement any food policy
deemed desirable by a local governing body, no matter how democratically
decided. Rather, the concept of FS is itself constrained by the norms embodied in
socially sustainable agriculture as is evident in the cases of agroecology described
above. Yet, these global norms are not mere “restrictions”; they are constraints that
seek to privilege maxD agroecology practitioners and eliminate those who are not.
One of the most striking institutional changes that would occur under a global
FS regime is that multinational corporations (MNCs) in general and limited
liability corporations in particular would be banished from agriculture and related
 Transnational Participatory Democracy 35

industries. Under Food Sovereignty, there would be good reasons for states to be
banned from owning land for agriculture––though there is not broad agreement on
this point among practitioners of agroecology.65 As stated above, land used for
agriculture should be locally owned and controlled. This of course dramatically
affects the size and internal structure of economic organization. Each firm must be
appropriate to the size of the community or set of communities in which it is
embedded. The size and capacities of the labor pool, the needs of the community,
and the ecological situation will all be significant variables in determining the size
of the organization and its output. But the kind of ownership is also restricted.
Local ownership in itself does not lead to justice in accordance with the Food
Sovereignty framework. Indeed, local semifeudal relations have dominated the
countryside of many LVC member states (e.g., Brazil), and fair wages, much less
ecological sustainability, are not their goal. Ownership must be democratized as
well as local.66 Again, the land should be democratically owned, the farming
operation democratically managed, and the entire operation must be socially and
ecologically sustainable.67
In this regard, maxD further specifies the democratic potentials of agroecol-
ogy and simultaneously concretely articulates what democracy is and is not in this
context. For example, MNCs could not meet the criteria of maxD since the rights
of workers are too often trumped by those of shareholders. This would irrevocably
impede self-determination if not capacity development. It also compromises the
concept of shared ownership and social regulation. Again, agroecology is not just
about food production and the preservation of biodiversity; it directly concerns
itself with human health (including that of workers), and the rights of those who
participate in this production process to control the conditions in which they live
and work with others (e.g., Gould’s “common activities”).

Conclusion: Problems and Possibilities

From the standpoint of democratic theory, LVC is a real-world example of a

transnational organization that enables capacity development and delivers mate-
rial benefits to its members without considerable help from states either materially
or organizationally. It has shown considerable innovation with respect to the
formation of institutional mechanisms (e.g., ICC, school of agroecology) and
political concepts (e.g., Food Sovereignty, agroecology) to both operationalize
and justify participatory democratic practices that can proliferate despite global
neoliberalism.
But LVC faces considerable difficulties both logistical and theoretical. The
formation of the school of agroecology only reaffirms this: it has a class of 250
students and LVC contains tens of millions of members, thousands of whom could
benefit from such a technical and political education. Clearly, LVC needs to do
more to support cross-border collaboration with respect to both education and
production. Fair-trade agreements among members––building upon the Bionatur
project––would be another crucial step. Also, although it is comparatively speak-
36 Michael Menser

ing truly international, LVC lacks adequate representation in sub-Saharan Africa,

the Middle East, and China. Clearly, the political future of the planet is especially
tied to the fates of these most populated and volatile regions and strengthening
democratic farmers’ and environmental movements could dramatically shift the
fortunes of those places.
From the theoretical standpoint, the concept of Food Sovereignty contains
several tenets that are either confusingly underdetermined or, conversely, so defini-
tive as to make their inclusion difficult to integrate with other claims. Chief among
the first set of difficulties is the specification of what unit is to be sovereign with
respect to agricultural policy. “Local community” is often the response, but LVC
also names “nation” or “state” as legitimate units. While LVC usually states that
local agricultural communities are sovereign and calls for states to protect these
units against external interference (e.g., by WTO or other states), this still raises the
question about conflicts that could arise among communities or communities and
the state and of whether and how nonagricultural areas (such as heavily populated
urban areas) should have a say beyond the role of consumer. More generally, given
the number of demands made by the Food Sovereignty program and the agroecol-
ogy model of production, the possibility of multiple conflicts among demands is
quite high, especially in transitional situations where decisions must be made about
which parts of the program are doable and which are not. Mechanisms and
standards for conflict resolution would then need to be developed, since for many
groups this could amount to whose needs get satisfied first.68
A worry facing the maximal democracy approach is how to relate to com-
munities that implement only part of the program. Or put another way, how is it
to be determined whether or not an existing organization is maximally democratic
if the ideal is never achieved? This concern includes existing sites of agroecology
ventures that employ poorly paid illegal immigrants in order to remain financially
viable as well as small farms that possess innovative maxD participatory mecha-
nisms to address gender and class inequality but are not committed to biodiversity
preservation or ecological health. Of course, this sort of problem besets any
political view––e.g., does the lack of campaign finance reform in the United States
jeopardize the one person/one vote norm that is at the basis of representative
democracy?69 I do not believe that this problem can be abstractly resolved. Rather,
resolution must come from actions that LVC has and will take with its members.
If an organization signs on and is accepted into LVC, then said organization is
committing itself to the goals, norms, and practices of LVC defined by food
sovereignty and agroecology. Although most groups imperfectly instantiate such
norms, joining indicates their dedication to transform themselves in accordance
with such norms. If a group did not have such aspirations, presumably it would not
seek membership. An effective test of this claim would occur if LVC banished an
existing member for not adhering to its basic principles. Or, more interestingly, if
it could be shown that there are norms frequently ignored by large sectors of the
membership thereby indicating a lack of resolve on the part of LVC. I know of no
studies that could answer either of these questions.
 Transnational Participatory Democracy 37

Despite these difficulties, LVC is growing in terms of raw numbers and

geographic scope (especially in Africa). It is becoming more politically ambitious
by now calling not for the reform of the WTO but its banishment from agricultural
policy. And it is becoming more economically innovative and attractive with its
adoption and articulation of the agroecology model of agricultural production.
Relatedly, although the maximal democracy model may seem extraordinarily
demanding from the standpoint of most democratic theory, one finds examples of
movements and organizations that embody these principles––imperfectly and to
varying degrees––in dozens of countries and at a variety of scales.70 The case of
Brazilian LVC member the Landless Peasants Movement (MST) is most instructive
in this regard. The MST began as a collective effort by peasants and others to obtain
the land and resources needed for survival, but after many initial gains morphed
into a mixed cooperative/community-based model of agricultural production. This
cooperative (maxD) logic was later utilized to build and operate schools, childcare
centers, and media outlets,71 thereby making available the resources (and opera-
tional logic) needed for EPF through various sectors of everyday and institutional
life. It also has formed transnational alliances in order to gain allies in its fight
within Brazil, and these alliances have also enabled the growth of LVC and the
development of the program for Food Sovereignty. Clearly, the evolution of the
MST shows that maxD is an attainable and efficacious political project.
The example of LVC as a transnational path of local and global democrati-
zation offers much to democratic theory as well as to social and political philoso-
phy. It is entirely appropriate to contemplate the possibility of global democracy
by focusing on the EU, the WTO and international financial institutions, and the
UN. Each has undeniable power and influence, and all operate internationally; the
evolution (or reform) of each might somehow contribute to “global democratiza-
tion.” Yet, within the Global Justice Movement there are many other existing paths
of democratization that have both materially benefited and politically empowered
groups across the globe. Further analyses of these paths contribute to our under-
standing of just what “real world” democracy looks like.

An earlier version of this essay was presented at the “Dehegemonization” con-

ference held at George Mason University in April of 2006. I would like to thank all
those participating and attending, especially Wendy Harcourt and conference
organizer Carol Gould. The author also wishes to thank Marina Sitrin, Andrej
Grubacic, David Graeber, and Boa Santos for their thoughts on participation,
democracy, and the Global Justice Movement, and Brenda Biddle and Santos for
their perspectives on La Via Campesina.

Notes
1
Daniel Weinstock, “The Real World of (Global) Democracy,” Journal of Social Philosophy 37, no. 1
(Spring 2006): 6.
2
Ibid., 9–10.
38 Michael Menser

3
For my first attempt at defining maximal democracy, see Michael Menser, “The Global Social Forum
Movement, Porto Alegre’s ‘Participatory Budget,’ and the Maximization of Democracy,” Situa-
tions: A Journal of the Radical Imagination 1, no. 1 (Fall 2005): 87–108.
4
All of these politics have the following in common: the political, economic and social realms are
irrevocably intertwined; (ontologically distinct or not) all are proper subjects for democratic
transformation (Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri, Multitude [New York: Penguin, 2004], xiii–
xvii); capitalism in its current form is not reformable and the state and interstate system are an
inadequate basis for the project of global democracy. They also all tend to see democracy as having
an essentially ecological dimension. See Santos for one of the more nuanced explanations of what
it means to be post-socialist or post-Marxist in the context of the Global Justice Movement in his
“General Introduction: Reinventing Social Emancipation: Toward New Manifestos” in Democra-
tizing Democracy: Beyond the Liberal Democratic Canon, ed. Boaventura de Sousa Santos (New
York: Verso, 2005), i–xxxiii. On the meaning of anarchism in the GJM, see Graeber’s “The New
Anarchists,” New Left Review 13 ( January–February 2002): 61–73, and Richard J. F. Day,
Gramsci Is Dead: Anarchist Currents in the Newest Social Movements (Ann Arbor, MI: Pluto
Press, 2005). On Indigenous movements and the GJM, see Paradigm Wars: Indigenous Peoples’
Resistance to Globalization, ed. Jerry Mander and Victoria Tauli-Corpuz (San Francisco: Sierra
Club Books, 2006).
5
From the Via Campesina website. Full list at http://www.viacampesina.org/main_en/index.
php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=60.
6
My focus from here on will not be agency views as such but those that comprise the participatory
democratic view. For a history of views on democracy and participation from the eighteenth
century until 1970 and the recurrent marginalization of participatory views in Western political
philosophy, see Carole Pateman’s Participation and Democratic Theory (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1970), chap. 1 and 2. For a more recent take congruent with the Global Justice
Movement, see Santos, “Introduction: Opening Up the Canon of Democracy,” in Democratizing
Democracy, ed. Boaventura de Sousa Santos (New York: Verso, 2005), xxxiv–lxxiv.
7
For skepticism on the possibility of PD, see Robert Dahl, On Democracy (New Haven, CT: Yale
University Press, 1998), chap. 5 and “Can International Organizations be Democratic? A Skeptical
View,” in Democracy’s Edges, ed. Ian Shapiro and Casiano Hacker-Cordon (Cambridge: Cam-
bridge University Press, 1999), 19–36.
8
Paul Hirst, Associative Democracy: New Forms of Economic and Social Governance (Amherst, MA:
University of Massachusetts. Press), 2–29.
9
While Weinstock does not claim agency accounts require homogeneity of the demos, Dahl does. Dahl
also argues against the possibility (or desirability) of any such homogeneous demos. Weinstock
quotes Dahl’s criticisms of the contemporary viability of PD (Weinstock, “Real World,” 10–11, 20).
10
Dahl, On Democracy, 33–4.
11
See Iris Young’s Inclusion and Democracy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), esp. 124–53.
12
Ibid., 6–7.
13
Weinstock offers two different justifications for this view. The first is epistemic: individuals are the
best judges of what they want, and democracy is the best system for ensuring that the government
acts on those wishes. This type of justification is frequently found in aggregative views of
democracy. See Pateman, Participation, 1–22. The second is motivational: democracy permits
persons to pursue their interests effectively by voting, running for office, joining a political party
or interest group. Weinstock, “Real World,” 6–7.
14
Weinstock, “Real World,” 10.
15
Pateman, Participation, 35; Peter Bachrach, The Theory of Democratic Elitism: A Critique (Boston:
Little, Brown and Co., 1967), 70–8.
16
Frank Cunningham, Theories of Democracy: A Critical Introduction (London: Routledge, 2002),
127.
17
For detailed analyses of such practices and organizations, see both Santos volumes cited above for
case studies in India, Colombia, Brazil, Mozambique, and South Africa. For Argentina, see Marina
 Transnational Participatory Democracy 39

Sitrin, Horizontalism: Voices of Popular Power in Argentina (Oakland, CA: AK Press, 2006) and
Day, Gramsci.
18
For an explicit linking of the popularity of PD to the failure of interest models—and neoliberalism––
see D. L. Sheth’s “Micro-movements in India: Toward a New Politics of Participatory Democ-
racy” in Santos, Democratizing Democracy, 3–37.
19
See, for example, Immanuel Wallerstein’s remarks on the 2007 World Social Forum http://
www.alterinfos.org/spip.php?article873 and both Santos’ volumes cited above.
20
Cunningham, Theories of Democracy, 141.
21
On the re-energization of the local and criticisms of state-focused political movements, see Sheth,
“Micro-movements in India,” 14. For more on the reinvention of PD and skepticism toward the
state with respect to its efficacy and its ability to be democratized, see Santos, “Introduction:
Opening Up the Canon of Democracy,” and on the social forum see Menser, “The Global Social
Forum Movement.”
22
Elements of this view can be found in Vandana Shiva’s Monocultures of the Mind: Perspectives
on Biodiversity and Biotechnology (London: Zed Books, 1993) and Earth Democracy
(Cambridge, MA: South End Press, 2005); Veronika Bennholdt-Thomsen, Nicholas Faraclas, and
Claudia von Werlhof’s There is an Alternative: Subsistence and Worldwide Resistance to
Corporate Globalization (New York: Zed Books, 2001) and in those works cited in endnote 6
above.
23
Day, Gramsci, 14, 48–50.
24
In this essay I claim the priority of self-determination but do not place any stake on whether tenets
2, 3 and 4 can be derived from it. At this point I am open to both interpretations because they are
all justified in the section above. I am also open to the idea that maximal democracy carries with
it a conception of justice (as in Gould’s account below) and is not just a theory of democracy.
Thanks to an anonymous reviewer for this point of clarification.
25
Moore, “Globalization and Democratization,” Journal of Social Philosophy 37, no. 1 (Spring 2006):
24–5.
26
Pateman, Participation, 71.
27
For PD proponents, purported obstacles such as apathy and political inactivity are largely the result
of the design of contemporary political institutions. See Cunningham, Theories of Democracy,
127.
28
See Menser, “The Global Social Forum Movement.”
29
Carol Gould, Globalizing Democracy and Human Rights (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2002), 4.
30
On freedom and equal positive freedom, see ibid., 33–4.
31
Ibid., 4, 46, 110–1.
32
Cunningham, “Theories of Democracy.”
33
See Hirst, Associative Democracy, 20, 50–6. Ironically, Iris Young makes this criticism of associa-
tionism but then restricts the political agency of social movements to the right of representation
rather than self-determination; the state—not civil society––is the only legitimate venue for the
latter. See Iris Young, “Social Groups in Associative Democracy,” in Associations and Democracy,
ed. Erik Olin Wright (New York: Verso, 1995), 207–213.
34
Annette Aurelie Desmarais, The Via Campesina: Peasants Resisting Globalization (Diss., University
of Calgary. 2003).
35
Including Buddhism, Christianity, Islam, and many polytheistic faiths (see http://www.
viacampesina.org).
36
Industrial agriculture is defined by the following practices: intensive tillage, monoculture planting,
irrigation, application of inorganic fertilizer, chemical pest control, genetic manipulation of
domesticated plants and animals, and “factory farming” of animals. Thomas Lyson, Civic Agri-
culture: Reconnecting Farm, Food and Community (Lebanon, NH: Tufts University Press, 2004),
chap. 2 and 3; Stephen R. Gliessman, Agroecology: The Ecology of Sustainable Food Systems
(New York: CRC Press, 2006), 3.
40 Michael Menser

37
Desmarais, “Via Campesina,” 46–50, 53–5.
38
Gliessman, Agroecology, 14–8.
39
See Desmarais, Via Campesina.
40
Go to http://www.ifap.org/en/about/aboutifap.html.
41
Desmarais, Via Campesina, 53–4. As defined by the home institution for this program, the Food and
Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the UN, “Food security exists when all people, at all times,
have access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food to meet their dietary needs and food preferences
for an active and healthy life.” And while the article in which this concept was laid out (the Rome
Declaration) is quite comprehensive, the evolution and implementation of the accord has been less
than favorable to peasants, small farmers and consumers throughout the world. Of special concern
for LVC is that the FAO has not unequivocally called for a ban on terminator seeds and genetically
modified organisms, nor has it acted to protect biodiversity and water from ecological degradation
and privatization. Also, multinational corporations (MNCs) and states are considered to be critical
to the success of the food security program. “Food security” has in no way made food production
or even the debate about it more democratic, nor has it seriously taken into account social and
environmental concerns. Desmarais, Via Campesina, 134–76.
42
For a detailed discussion of LVC and IFAP, see ibid., 19.
43
See Frederic Mousseau, “Rice and Food Sovereignty in Asia Pacific” (2006), available at http://
www.viacampesina.org.
44
Desmarais, Via Campesina, 115–7, 177–222.
45
Ibid.
46
Female producers used these separate spaces to cultivate their voices but they also participate as full
members of the local and national assemblies. Ibid., 204–6.
47
See LVC’s “Gender Position Paper” reproduced in ibid., 312–5 and Desmarais’ analysis, 203–222.
48
The main tenets of Food Sovereignty subscribed to by LVC and its allies are: (i) the local home unit
(community, nation, state) decides food policy; (ii) the local community should own agricultural
land; (iii) agricultural communities should manage production and distribution of products with
regard to social need; (iv) workers have a right to a living wage and to be protected from coercion
(this also includes price controls to make sure fair prices are paid to producers); (v) women’s rights
as agricultural producers must be recognized and protected; (vi) consumer rights are to be
protected especially with respect to labeling (e.g., contains GMOs); (vii) community cultural
rights are to be protected (e.g., right to grow particular foods, retain common ownership of seed
stocks); and (viii) aforementioned practices should promote ecological sustainability. This list is
meant to highlight the many dimensions of food sovereignty rather than articulate every detail. It
is adapted from http://www.foodfirst.org/progs/global/food/finaldeclaration.html.
49
Desmarais, Via Campesina, 148. For the purposes of this essay, I will argue, following Gould, that
the two articles just named can be justified by her concept of equal positive freedom. (See
discussion above.) She states, “to the degree that these new localities represent quasi-voluntary
associations, they can be permitted to exercise a sort of autonomy with regard to their own affairs.”
(Gould, Globalizing Democracy, 55.)
50
Carol Gould, “Self-determination Beyond Sovereignty: Relating Transnational Democracy to Local
Autonomy,” Journal of Social Philosophy 37, no. 1 (Spring 2006): 44–60.
51
http://www.viacampesina.org/main_en/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=57&
Itemid=35.
52
There is nontrivial confusion concerning what constitutes the proper sovereign unit—see the final
section of this essay below.
53
See Desmarais, Via Campesina, 205–17 and esp. 206–08.
54
Sometimes, this transformation is direct as in the case of the Morimento Sem Terra (MST) occupying
Syngenta’s GMO plantation and seeking to make the site into a school of agroecology. http://
www.mstbrazil.org/?q=book/print/357.
55
Cohn et al., Agroecology and the Struggle for Food Sovereignty in the Americas, ed. Avery
Cohn, Jonathan Cook, Margarita Fernandez, Rebecca Reider, and Corrina Steward
 Transnational Participatory Democracy 41

(New Haven, CT: International Institute for Environment and Development, Yale University,
2006).
56
Kathleen McAfee, “Sustainability and Social Justice in the Global Food System,” in Agroecology
and the Struggle for Food Sovereignty in the Americas, ed. Avery Cohn, Jonathan Cook, Margarita
Fernandez, Rebecca Reider, and Corrina Steward (New Haven, CT: International Institute for
Environment and Development, Yale University, 2006).
57
Cohn et al., Agroecology and the Struggle; Lyson, Civic Agriculture; Gliessman, Agroecology,
chaps. 1, 2, 22, and 23.
58
Charles C. Mann, 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus (New York: Vintage
Books, 2006), 220–27; Phil Dahl-Bredine, “Case Study: Food Sovereignty in the Mixteca Alta,”
in Agroecology and the Struggle for Food Sovereignty in the Americas, ed. Avery Cohn, Jonathan
Cook, Margarita Fernandez, Rebecca Reider, and Corrina Steward (New Haven, CT: International
Institute for Environment and Development, Yale University, 2006), 65–7.
59
http://www.mstbrazil.org/?q=book/print/101.
60
See Fausto Torrez, “Vía Campesina in Latin America Will Form an Agro-Ecological Contingent,”
available at http://www.viacampesina.org. Nicaragua, July 2006. Available at http://www.
landaction.org/display.php?article=447.
61
Ibid.
62
Michael Pimbert and M. Taghi Farvar, “Foreword,” in Agroecology and the Struggle for Food
Sovereignty in the Americas, ed. Avery Cohn, Jonathan Cook, Margarita Fernandez, Rebecca
Reider, and Corrina Steward (New Haven, CT: International Institute for Environment and Devel-
opment, Yale University, 2006), viii.
63
Ibid.
64
See Santos, Democratizing Democracy, 2005.
65
In the current milieu, there are good reasons for being a pluralist when it comes to models of
ownership. From a practical political standpoint, a few state-based actors have backed maxD-
promoting agroecology to great effect. See Margarita Fernandez, “Case Study: Cultivating Com-
munity, Food, and Empowerment: Urban Gardens in New York and Havana,” in Agroecology and
the Struggle for Food Sovereignty in the Americas, ed. Avery Cohn, Jonathan Cook, Margarita
Fernandez, Rebecca Reider, and Corrina Steward (New Haven, CT: International Institute for
Environment and Development, Yale University, 2006). From a philosophical perspective, self-
determination emphasizes self-management and social regulation, but (in the context of this essay)
there is no necessary theoretical objection to state ownership, especially in a transitional setting.
This is true of both Gould’s account of common activity and freedom as development as well as
my own conception of democratic self-determination.
66
For detailed accounts of this democratic communal model in action, see Sue Branford and Jan
Rocha’s Cutting the Wire (London: Kumarian Press, 2002) on LVC member the Landless Peasants
Movement (MST). Also see Santos, Another Production is Possible.
67
For an excellent case study on how democratization occurs at the local level and then is configured
and reconfigured regionally and nationally, see Branford and Rocha on the MST’s operations in
Brazil. For a detailed comparative analysis of the industrial model versus the agroecology model
within the same country (India), see Shiva, Monocultures, and Ramachandra Guha, The Unquiet
Woods: Ecological Change and Peasant Resistance in the Himalaya (Oxford: Oxford University
Press, 1989). As Shiva puts it, sustainability means maintaining the conditions of productivity in
a locale over the course of several generations (Shiva, Monocultures, 50–59). This definition is
consistent with that found in agroecology. See Gliessman, Agroecology, chaps. 2 and 21.
68
Gliessman, Agroecology, chaps. 23 and 24.
69
See Philip Green and Drucilla Cornell, “Rethinking Democratic Theory: Why the US is not a
Democracy,” Journal of Social Philosophy 36, no. 4 (2005): 517–35.
70
See endnotes 5 and 18 above.
71
For an extensive study of the practices of the MST, see Branford and Rocha, Cutting the Wire, and
for a debate about its democratic structure and efficacy see Santos, Another Production is Possible.