Cultivating Socialism

The politics of ‘food sovereignty’ is both global and diverse. From organic farmers to nomadic herdsmen, the countless examples of rural peoples fighting back against the predations of capitalist agriculture share a common call to re-centre the countryside in the fight for dignity, sustainability and social cooperation. Yet they also share another key feature – for decades, food sovereignty movements were sidelined from spaces of political decision-making and institutional empowerment.

With the arrival of Latin America’s ‘Left Turn’ at the beginning of the 21^st century, a strategic opportunity arrived unlike any that had come before. One after another, Latin American states began to incorporate food sovereignty principles – such as land reform, secure tenure, and agroecological farming – into national legislation, while peasant movements were themselves often key constituents in the ascendance of left-wing governments. Moreover, Venezuela’s socialist president, Hugo Chávez Frías, proposed an ambitious project of regional cooperation among kindred states in the form of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (Alianza Bolivariana para los pueblos de Nuestra América-Tratado de Comercio de los Pueblos – ALBA-TCP), likewise incorporating peasant movements and food sovereignty principles into its institutional complex.

Yet what eventually transpired was far from the radical visions proposed. The ALBA space had limited reach, and little to show for its efforts towards rural development and regional trade cooperation. The only trace of ALBA’s food policies were to be found in a string of factories in Venezuela producing for the home market. And with the passing of Chávez in 2013, Venezuela soon found itself facing an unprecedented food crisis.

In Cultivating Socialism: Venezuela, ALBA, and the Politics of Food Sovereignty, Rowan Lubbock explores this complex picture through a wide-ranging and penetrating analysis. Based on extensive field research in Venezuela, Lubbock critically analyses the political economy of one of the most radical regional institutions ever created, matched only by its spectacular fall from grace. With testimonies from peasant movements and factory workers, the contested politics of food sovereignty in Venezuela, and the wider ALBA space, reveals the ongoing tensions between the ‘two souls’ of socialism, between a top-down vision of bureaucratic domination and a bottom up process of re-making society in the service of the people.

The majority of contributions to this forum emerged from two collective discussions on the book, one during a book launch at the South London Botanical Institute (1 November, 2024), and a research seminar at the Centre for Global Political Economy, Sussex University (7 April, 2025). Special thanks to Eugenia Giraudo, Chris Hesketh, Angus McNelly, and Armando van Rankin Anaya for bringing their insights and critiques into this forum, and to Aiko Ikemura Amaral and Kyla Sanky for offering further reflections on the book.