Periodic Reporting for period 2 - LivingTogether (Living Together: a study of Hansalim as a model for solidarity pathways towards sustainable food systems)
Reporting period: 2023-09-01 to 2024-08-31
In recent years, national governments and international bodies have woken up to the urgent need to transform food systems towards fairer and more sustainable models as part of the global effort to respond to the rapidly worsening climate emergency. As policy and research priorities have shifted, grassroots initiatives have also proliferated across Europe, aimed at bringing together farmers and consumers into partnership to detach themselves from the industrial food system and organise their own food production and distribution at local scales on agroecological principles.
Although they employ a huge diversity of models and methods, they share three common goals: to provide affordable good food for citizens, a decent and stable livelihood for producers and to restore the health of agricultural and natural ecosystems. While many of these projects are highly productive and successfully deliver fresh fruit and vegetables and other staples to hundreds and sometimes thousands of local members, they remain small scale, scattered and limited in terms of scope of goods and accessibility to the majority of consumers. What would it take for these diverse and innovative experiments to initiate a larger-scale transformation of regional and national food systems? Are there examples we can learn from?
The Hansalim Life Movement in Korea represents an ambitious experiment in uniting producers and citizen-consumers into a single democratic movement for social transformation and creation of a comprehensive alternative food system. Starting as a single CSA-style multi-stakeholder cooperative of farmers and consumers with a single rice store in 1986, Hansalim has grown to become a national federation of 30 consumer 'Life Cooperatives' and 15 producer associations with a combined membership of 800,000 citizen-consumer households and 2,300 producer households, 242 stores across the country and a product range of over 4,000 goods. From the beginning until the present day, it has maintained an emphasis on social and ecological values and working towards the public good through joint activities between producer members and citizen members, education, publishing, environmental campaigning.
My research has demonstrated that Hansalim is best understood as multi-stakeholder organizations distinct from traditional consumer cooperatives. I have highlighted the previously unrecognized role of Korean traditional rural culture and institutions in the development of the cooperative movement in Korea. My research also offers a reinterpretation of the Hansalim Life Movement as an example of a form of council democracy setting it apart from conventional coop governance. I have also identified the important role of Korean philosophy in the democratic culture of the Hansalim Life Movement which acts as a powerful mitigation against the instrumentalisation of human-human and human-nature relationships inherent in western utilitarianism and which hinders the evolution of many cooperative initiative in the west.
Although they employ a huge diversity of models and methods, they share three common goals: to provide affordable good food for citizens, a decent and stable livelihood for producers and to restore the health of agricultural and natural ecosystems. While many of these projects are highly productive and successfully deliver fresh fruit and vegetables and other staples to hundreds and sometimes thousands of local members, they remain small scale, scattered and limited in terms of scope of goods and accessibility to the majority of consumers. What would it take for these diverse and innovative experiments to initiate a larger-scale transformation of regional and national food systems? Are there examples we can learn from?
The Hansalim Life Movement in Korea represents an ambitious experiment in uniting producers and citizen-consumers into a single democratic movement for social transformation and creation of a comprehensive alternative food system. Starting as a single CSA-style multi-stakeholder cooperative of farmers and consumers with a single rice store in 1986, Hansalim has grown to become a national federation of 30 consumer 'Life Cooperatives' and 15 producer associations with a combined membership of 800,000 citizen-consumer households and 2,300 producer households, 242 stores across the country and a product range of over 4,000 goods. From the beginning until the present day, it has maintained an emphasis on social and ecological values and working towards the public good through joint activities between producer members and citizen members, education, publishing, environmental campaigning.
My research has demonstrated that Hansalim is best understood as multi-stakeholder organizations distinct from traditional consumer cooperatives. I have highlighted the previously unrecognized role of Korean traditional rural culture and institutions in the development of the cooperative movement in Korea. My research also offers a reinterpretation of the Hansalim Life Movement as an example of a form of council democracy setting it apart from conventional coop governance. I have also identified the important role of Korean philosophy in the democratic culture of the Hansalim Life Movement which acts as a powerful mitigation against the instrumentalisation of human-human and human-nature relationships inherent in western utilitarianism and which hinders the evolution of many cooperative initiative in the west.
2021:9 - 2022.2: The first six months were spent on full-time Korean language study. I also built a project website to introduce my research and publish blog posts about my progress and wrote a short article for publication in Hansalim's own 'Mosim Magazine' to introduce my research to people involved with the Hansalim Life Movement.
2022.3 - 8: The research phase began with a review of Korean language literature and Hansalim's own published documents and a series of seminars with Mosim researchers to gain a broad understanding of the Hansalim Life Movement. The results were published in the Journal of Cooperative Studies.
2022.9 - 10: Narrative interviews were conducted with five members of Hansalim from different stakeholder groups.
2022.11 - 12: To understand the operation and organisation of Hansalim's business activities 15 interviews were conducted with employees and producers.
2023.1 - 3: A research visit was made to Busan Hansalim to interview directors, activists, employees and producers (9 in total).
2023.4 - 6: Archive research was carried out, historical accounts gathered and a visit to Wonju was made to interview one of the founders of Hansalim. Many of archive documents were digitized and translated.
2023.6 - 8: A joint research trip to Jeju was carried out with Mosim researchers during which a further 19 Hansalim members were interviewed including local coop directors, employees and producers.
2023.8 - 11: Research visits were made Norway, Denmark, Austria, Germany and Italy to visit food cooperatives, agroecological farms and academic institutions to present my research and discuss connections between Hansalim's experience and the experience of European actors involved in local solidarity-based partnerships for agroecology (LSPA). An academic workshop and several practitioner workshops were organized.
2023.12 - 2024.4: Interview transcription and translation, digitisation and translation of materials and writing up of results continued along with planning for further outreach and knowledge exchange.
2024.5: A study tour to Hansalim was organized for a delegation of four from Norway and Finland and a short documentary video was made of the visit.
2024.6 - 7: Mosim researcher Dr Miseong Cho was hosted at the University of Sussex for a three week visiting fellowship during which time a final project webinar and a series of workshops were organised at Sussex University and in Vienna with BOKU, RCE Graz and Morgenrot Cooperative.
2024.8: A 'Transformative Food Systems Knowledge Exchange' (TFS) network and online community was set up with collaborators from BOKU, RCE Graz and Morgenrot to take forward collaboration on research and knowledge exchange beyond the end of the project.
2022.3 - 8: The research phase began with a review of Korean language literature and Hansalim's own published documents and a series of seminars with Mosim researchers to gain a broad understanding of the Hansalim Life Movement. The results were published in the Journal of Cooperative Studies.
2022.9 - 10: Narrative interviews were conducted with five members of Hansalim from different stakeholder groups.
2022.11 - 12: To understand the operation and organisation of Hansalim's business activities 15 interviews were conducted with employees and producers.
2023.1 - 3: A research visit was made to Busan Hansalim to interview directors, activists, employees and producers (9 in total).
2023.4 - 6: Archive research was carried out, historical accounts gathered and a visit to Wonju was made to interview one of the founders of Hansalim. Many of archive documents were digitized and translated.
2023.6 - 8: A joint research trip to Jeju was carried out with Mosim researchers during which a further 19 Hansalim members were interviewed including local coop directors, employees and producers.
2023.8 - 11: Research visits were made Norway, Denmark, Austria, Germany and Italy to visit food cooperatives, agroecological farms and academic institutions to present my research and discuss connections between Hansalim's experience and the experience of European actors involved in local solidarity-based partnerships for agroecology (LSPA). An academic workshop and several practitioner workshops were organized.
2023.12 - 2024.4: Interview transcription and translation, digitisation and translation of materials and writing up of results continued along with planning for further outreach and knowledge exchange.
2024.5: A study tour to Hansalim was organized for a delegation of four from Norway and Finland and a short documentary video was made of the visit.
2024.6 - 7: Mosim researcher Dr Miseong Cho was hosted at the University of Sussex for a three week visiting fellowship during which time a final project webinar and a series of workshops were organised at Sussex University and in Vienna with BOKU, RCE Graz and Morgenrot Cooperative.
2024.8: A 'Transformative Food Systems Knowledge Exchange' (TFS) network and online community was set up with collaborators from BOKU, RCE Graz and Morgenrot to take forward collaboration on research and knowledge exchange beyond the end of the project.
Through presentations and workshops across Europe I have articulated the structure and principles of a long lived self-sustaining large-scale democratically governed eco-friendly food system (as seen in Hansalim) and I have identified a potential pathway for grassroots based food system transformations and the potential challenges likely to be faced by LSPA initiatives as they seek to scale up and replicate in Europe.
The main output from the research will be an open access online book. It will be the first detailed English language account of the Hansalim Life Movement and the first piece of work to consider Hansalim from the perspective of New Cooperativism and solidarity-based food system transformation. It will provide a historical account of the Hansalim Life Movement, its philosophical roots, and an in-depth analysis of how it functions as a solidarity-based food system providing a comprehensive alternative to the contemporary industrialised food system. For practitioners and researchers in Europe this will provide a rich source of inspiration and ideas to stimulate their own efforts towards transformative change in local and national food systems.
Over the longer term, through the book, articles and networking activities (i.e. TFS Network and planned Vienna Forum) the New Cooperative movement and LPSA initiatives can be brought together around the goal food system transformation with an enlarged vision of cultural renewal, economic justice and grass-roots democracy with a deeper awareness of the role of trans-national history and the diverse philosophy foundations for cooperation and mutual aid.
The main output from the research will be an open access online book. It will be the first detailed English language account of the Hansalim Life Movement and the first piece of work to consider Hansalim from the perspective of New Cooperativism and solidarity-based food system transformation. It will provide a historical account of the Hansalim Life Movement, its philosophical roots, and an in-depth analysis of how it functions as a solidarity-based food system providing a comprehensive alternative to the contemporary industrialised food system. For practitioners and researchers in Europe this will provide a rich source of inspiration and ideas to stimulate their own efforts towards transformative change in local and national food systems.
Over the longer term, through the book, articles and networking activities (i.e. TFS Network and planned Vienna Forum) the New Cooperative movement and LPSA initiatives can be brought together around the goal food system transformation with an enlarged vision of cultural renewal, economic justice and grass-roots democracy with a deeper awareness of the role of trans-national history and the diverse philosophy foundations for cooperation and mutual aid.