Whose sovereignty? : Food Regimes and Food Sovereignty in Indonesia

Abstract: This thesis examines how food sovereignty has been conceptualized by the Indonesian peasant union, Serikat Petani Indonesia, and how this framing has been affected by the transnational food sovereignty movement and national ideology of food self-sufficiency in Indonesia. This thesis will analyze how food sovereignty is conceptualized in the document Vision for Food Sovereignty 2014-2024 released by Serikat Petani Indonesia. The analysis will be conducted through a critical discourse analysis. Critical discourse analysis will account for both the theory and method, however the theory will be synthesized through FRT. The analysis will look at the food sovereignty discourse in its larger historical context. This thesis finds that while food sovereignty has traveled transnationally through the food sovereignty movement as a counter-hegemonic concept that propagate support for peasant farmers and their control for land and resources, in the Vision for Food Sovereignty 2014-2024 document, food sovereignty is framed as food sovereignty for Indonesia, the country. This means that the ability for peasants to mobilize food sovereignty in Indonesia for the purpose of supporting the control of land and recourses is diminished. Thus, food sovereignty has been co-opted and reproduced in the hegemonic relations between farmers, corporations and the state.