Fields of Glass
Labour Regimes, Techno-Science and Biopolitics in Agrifood Value Chains
Published on 19. June 2025
Book
Hardback
263 pages
978-1-009-45284-7 (ISBN)
Description
What is the relationship between technology and labour regimes in agrifood value chains? By deploying the concept of agrarian biopolitical articulations, Field of Glass formulates new perspectives that bridge the hitherto distinct worlds of value chain research, agrarian political economy, labour regime theory, and agrarian techno-science to explain the enduring insecurity of food systems in the United Kingdom. Using both historical and contemporary research, Adrian Smith explores how the precarity and exploitation of migrant labour intersects with ecology and techno-science/innovation, such as hydroponic and robotic technologies, to explain the development and changing nature of glasshouse agrifood value chains in the UK. Smith concludes by reflecting on how agrarian bio-politics have shaped the glasshouse agrifood sector and the emergence of contemporary 'high road' and 'low road' strategies, highlighting their contradictions and negative consequences for local development and food supply security.
Reviews / Votes
'This is a terrific book - theoretically incisive and empirically rich. It uses the fascinating story of UK glasshouse agrifood production since World War II to lucidly explore the complex interplay between value chain dynamics, labour regimes and notions of food security across multiple scales and timeframes. In so doing, it develops a sophisticated theoretical framework with much wider implications for our understanding of the articulations of labour, ecology and technology in contemporary capitalism.' Neil Coe, Professor of Economic Geography, The University of Sydney 'A powerful account of development and change in UK glasshouse agrifoood production and value chains. Spanning over 70 years of the glasshouse industry, Adrian Smith draws on his rigorous archival and interview-based research to historicise and theorise relationships among growers, workers, the UK government, technological change and the ecological processes upon which we all depend. He shows how these 'agrarian biopolitical articulations' underpin the food economy, paying special attention to the often obscured but integral role of migrant labourers.' Liam Campling, Queen Mary University of London, and author of Capitalism and the SeaMore details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Cambridge
United Kingdom
Illustrations
Worked examples or Exercises
Dimensions
Height: 235 mm
Width: 157 mm
Thickness: 19 mm
Weight
538 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-009-45284-7 (9781009452847)
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Schweitzer Classification
Person
Adrian Smith is Professor of Management in the Department of Management at the University of Sussex Business School where he teaches and undertakes research on work, sustainability and technology in global value chains. He has authored/co-authored four other books: Free Trade Agreements and Global Labour Governance: The European Union's Trade-Labour Linkage in a Value Chain World (2021), Articulations of Capital: Global Production Networks and Regional Transformations (2016), Domesticating Neo-Liberalism: Spaces of Economic Practice and Social Reproduction in Post-Socialist Cities (2010) and Reconstructing the Regional Economy: Industrial Transformation and Regional Development in Slovakia (1998). He has co-edited four other books including most recently Labour Regimes and Global Production (2022).
Content
1. Food security and the 'total ecology' of glasshouse agrifood value chains; 2. Agrarian biopolitical articulations: towards an understanding of value chains, labour regimes and techno-science; 3. Fields of glass: glasshouse agrifood value chains in regional context; 4. The dynamics of the glasshouse agrifood value chain; 5. The post-war labour regime and the labour process; 6. Labour segmentation and contemporary seasonal migrant worker regimes; 7. The state, techno-science and agrifood value chains; 8. Hydroponics, the 'total ecology' and upgrading; 9. 'AgTech', automation and the restructuring of work; 10. Fields of glass and agrifood value chain futures; Bibliography.