Caring about food: Rethinking the UK's approach to the right to food through Tronto's political theory of care

Abstract

Whilst the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland has one of the largest national economies in the world, households across the state experience difficulties accessing adequate food. This is despite the state’s obligations under international law to respect, protect and fulfil the right to food for all individuals, as well as the additional duties it owes to specific groups on account of their increased vulnerability to violations of the right. Recent crises - namely the COVID-19 pandemic and the ensuing rising cost of living - have exacerbated the threat of food insecurity, illuminating systemic socioeconomic inequalities.

Though a rights-based approach is necessary to ensure that access to adequate food is recognised as a universal guarantee that all states must secure, socioeconomic rights, as currently conceived, are unable to contest neoliberalism. Consequently, rights must be informed by alternative underlying philosophies, particularly those which explicitly prescribe in detail the political processes needed to combat the escalating scale and severity of violations of the right to food.

This thesis presents care ethics, specifically Tronto’s political theory of care, as one such philosophy which can transform the right to food into the counterhegemonic tool required to target inequalities in access to adequate food. It argues that an approach to socioeconomic rights informed by care ethics can help combat the commodification of food, fostering a culture where adequate food is perceived by all as a universal entitlement. In addition to imposing more stringent obligations, care appreciates the complex web of interpersonal relations between rights-holders which fails to be captured by individualistic conceptions of human rights. The thesis concludes by providing examples of how the political theory of care can improve food security through the transformation of state policies governing access to food, liberating the right from appropriation by neoliberal forces.