Food insecurity, inequality, and the environment

This chapter examines the intersections of food insecurity, inequality, and the environment. Utilizing a comparative and interdisciplinary sociological perspective, it therefore explores the complexities of some of the most significant and persistent challenges to humanity. Climate change has escalated food insecurity and complicated the sustainable production and distribution of food. Food insecurity is inseparable from the natural environment, and the cultural, economic, social, and political systems that determine food access including inequity and justice. The chapter makes sense of the connections between food insecurity, ecological change, and systems of inequality. It provides a foundation for conceptualizing these issues along with the theoretical perspectives framing the issues including Malthusian ideas and critical considerations tied to the political economy of food systems, power, and social inequality. Next, the chapter includes an examination of agriculture and the environment, closing with a reorientation of the conversation toward food justice, food sovereignty, and agroecology.