"Three meals a day and a place to stay" : Non-waged labor, household formation and the politics of scale on organic farms in the southeastern United States

Abstract: Family farms practicing organic agriculture often struggle to make a profit. Unable to pay wages, farms are increasingly recruiting laborers who agree to work without pay, instead receiving food and accommodation. To date, there has been little research examining everyday life in farm households shared by familial owner-operators and non-waged laborers. Based on ethnographic fieldwork at organic farms in the southeastern United States, this thesis describes how farm work, housework and consumption are organized in these households. Situating my analysis within debates on the agrarian question, I investigate how the recruitment of non-waged labor affects the ability of farm-family households to reproduce themselves. My findings suggest that, though farm owner-operators recruit non-waged laborers with the expectation of solving labor challenges, their recruitment produces numerous conflicts internal to the household. I analyze how farm owner-operators deploy scale constructions to defend and legitimize arrangements of productive and social-reproductive work which preserve the ability to self-exploit. I also show how laborer’s bodies are identified as both the problem and the solution in conflicts over consumption. Through attention to the lived experiences of farmworkers, this thesis contributes to debates concerning the social sustainability of organic farming.