Gender and resource management: Community supported agriculture as caring-practice

Agriculture and Human Values18: 107–119, 2001.© 2001Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.

Gender and resource management: Community supported agriculture ascaring-practice

Betty L. Wells and Shelly GradwellDepartment of Sociology, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, USA

Accepted in revised form April 23, 2000

Abstract. Interviews with Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) growers in Iowa, a majority of whom arewomen, shed light on the relationship between gender and CSA as a system of resource management. Growers,male and female alike, are differentiated by care and caring-practices. Care-practices, historically associatedwith women, place priority on local context and relationships. The concern of these growers for community,nature, land, water, soil, and other resources is manifest in care-motives and care-practices. Their specific mix ofmotives differs: providing safe and nutritious food, educating self and others, and building relationships withother growers, shareholder-members, and the land. Care-practices include reducing or eliminating chemicalusage, encouraging or accepting beneficial insects and wildlife, building soil, and creating resource managementpartnerships with shareholder members. CSA, viewed through a lens of care, may offer a means of transcendinggender stereotypes.

Key words: Agriculture, Care, Caring-Practice Community Supported Agriculture, Diversity, Gardening,Gender, Resource Management, Rural, Women

Betty Wells, Professor of Sociology at Iowa State University, is a rural community development practitioner. Herresearch focuses on local responses to rural restructuring, especially its gendered aspects, including CSA andrural women’s activism.

Shelly Gradwell is a research assistant in the Department of Sociology at Iowa State University. She conductsresearch on CSA and local food system development in rural Iowa.

Introduction to CSA

The Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) part-nership concept originated in the 1960s when Japanesewomen, concerned with the increase in imported foodand the loss of farmers and farmland, asked localfarmers to grow vegetables and fruit directly for them.The farmers agreed, on the condition that a number offamilies commit themselves to supporting the farmers.With this, “The teikei concept was born, which trans-lated literally means partnership, but philosophicallymeans ‘food with the farmer’s face on it’ ” (Van En,1995: 29). This model, first implemented in the UnitedStates in the mid-1980s, became known as CSA. Asdefined by Gradwell et al. (1999: 1), CSA is

. . . a partnership between farmers and communitymembers working together to create a local foodsystem. CSA farmers may produce fresh vegetables,fruits, meats, fiber, and related products directlyfor local community members. CSA differs fromdirect marketing in that its members commit to afull-season price in the spring, sharing the risks

of production. With this up-front support, farmerscan concentrate on growing quality food and caringfor the land. In return, members know where theirfood comes from and how it is grown; they share aconnection to the land and farmers who feed them.CSA establishes a direct economic and social linkbetween farmers and community members.

The number of CSAs in the United Statescontinues to grow from an estimated 635 in1996 (Bio-Dynamic Farming and Gardening Associ-ation, personal communication, 1997) to over 1,000in 1999 (Robyn Van En Center for CommunitySupported Agriculture Resources, 1999, website:www.csacenter.org).

CSA in Iowa

To assess the current status of CSA in Iowa, weconducted a field study within the borders of Iowa,where CSA has only recently taken root. Despite along association with agriculture and its continued

108 BETTY L. WELLS AND SHELLY GRADWELL

economic importance, Iowa has become increasinglyurban and we import most of our food. As a result,Iowans are in danger of losing the indigenous knowl-edge needed to grow, process, and prepare food andour local and small-scale food processing capacity.

In 1999, at least 51 farmers grew for 34 IowaCSAs. Of these CSAs, three started during the 1995growing season, six in the 1996 season, five in 1997,11 in 1998, and 9 in 1999. Although CSA typicallythrives on urban borders where markets are availableand transportation costs are low, in 1999 over half ofIowa’s 34 CSAs served rural areas and small towns– despite growers’ initial misgivings about findingsupport in rural areas (Wells et al., 1999). For somerural CSAs, all their members live within a few milesof the farm. Even some conventional farm families joinbecause they prefer homegrown vegetables but lack thetime to grow them, often because they work off thefarm.

Because of low start-up costs and seasonal produc-tion, CSA offers opportunities for small-scale, begin-ning, and part-time farmers. Most CSA farms aresmall-scale and produce vegetables, but mid-sizedproducers, especially of livestock, find a supplementalvalue-added market for animal products such as meat,eggs, and wool. Larger conventional farms also diver-sify by adding a vegetable production enterprise.

Methods

We conducted 15 interviews with 21 CSA growers:19 women and two men. We interviewed 13 womenduring and following the 1996 growing season, andsix additional women and two men prior to the 1998growing season. Our selection was intentional. Thegreater number of women reflects the original women-only focus of our research. Women CSA growersoutnumber men in Iowa, a notable trend in a statewhere men generally dominate agriculture. In 1999,women were the main grower or full partner in 34 of51 (67 percent) CSAs in 1999, 27 of 40 (68 percent)in 1998, and 19 of 27 (70 percent) in 1997. Althoughour selection was not random, we sought geographicrepresentation from various regions of the state.

We conducted most of the interviews on site at theCSA farms. We conducted others at off-farm locations,and one by mail. Eight of the interviews were withindividuals, and the remainder with partners or groups.Growers were asked a standard set of questions abouttheir background and connection with agriculture, howtheir CSA interest and practice developed, how CSAbenefits their local communities, and whether womenplay a unique role within CSA. In this paper, we takeup the latter issue, considering the characteristics of

growers and perceived connections between genderand CSA.

While CSA can be viewed as a system ofmarketing, or as a food system, this paper exploresCSA as a system of resource management, emphasiz-ing the grower side of the CSA partnership. Theproduction systems managed by these growers arediverse. Most are small-scale, labor intensive opera-tions with low capital investment. Some are describedas gardens, others as farms. Among the latter, someCSAs operate within the confines of what is consideredin Iowa to be a conventional farming operation. Evenwhen part of a larger farming operation, some CSAsconstitute an independent enterprise. In those caseswe identified, women manage the independent CSAenterprises on conventional farms.

Opportunities abound for on-farm diversification,as noted by two growers:

CSA is a really good opportunity for producers todiversify their farms and make some money from acompletely different source. . . CSA is diverse notonly in space, but in time and enterprise require-ments. The labor requirements blend well withsome grain farms, since CSA labor requirementsare highest in the midsummer when grain labor isneeded least. [Grower 1]1

The CSA has been a way to make contacts andexpand other possibilities for diversification of otherconventional aspects of the farm. [Grower 2]2

Some growers work individually, while otherswork together in a system or network of growers.Growers involved in multiple-producer CSAs, such asthe Magic Beanstalk CSA in central Iowa or the LocalHarvest CSA in eastern Iowa, see this arrangement asa source of mutual support and benefit to members:

We are in four different parts of the county. I like theinsurance of that because if something happens to acrop on our farm maybe somebody else has it andcan supply the shareholders. [Grower 3]3

The more options and varieties, the more thewhole system is seen to thrive. [Grower 4]4

Given this diversity among CSA operations, whatdo these growers have in common? As noted earlier,approximately two-thirds of CSA growers in Iowaare women. How can we explain this empiricalphenomenon in a state where men generally dominateagriculture? Are specific characteristics of women atwork? For example, do women hold values that causethem to go the CSA route? Are women willing towork for less economic return? Do they simply fillthe spaces left by men? Are certain universal humanvalues nurtured and validated more in the CSA system

GENDER AND RESOURCE MANAGEMENT 109

than in other marketing systems? Are some valuesspecific to women, called “feminine values” by main-stream culture, exhibited by both men and womeninvolved in CSA? These questions prompted and figurecentrally in this exploration of what practices andvalues CSA growers, female and male, might share.

Connecting gender and CSA

The first western European farmers to settle in Iowahad specific gender orientations toward the land andfarming (Fink, 1986: 46). Accounts by male settlersof the North American prairies and plains reveal aninstrumental orientation toward the land, metaphorsof domination, conquest, and control, and the asso-ciation of nature with femaleness. Women settlerstended to view the land as a setting for interaction,in contrast to the male view of land as a resource tobe exploited. Women used metaphors stressing reci-procity, cooperation, and the desire to nurture andcultivate. For women, a central image was the garden(Kolodny, 1975 and 1984, as cited in Fink, 1986).Historically, women managed the garden, poultry, anddairy enterprises (Riley, 1994: 86–87).

Fink (1986) believes that women’s fundamentallydifferent relation to the land likely grew from differentaccess to and experience on it. But, as revealed inour interviews, questions persist about women’s rela-tionship to the land. Growers were asked about therelationship between gender and CSA. Most see aconnection, but interpretations vary. Consider thisambivalent answer:

In Iowa we’re seeing more women involved thanmen. More women are coming from the gardeningperspective. From the community to the garden.Whereas the men might be more inclined to becoming from the business side. But I don’t thinkit necessarily has to or needs to be that way. Itcertainly fits in with people who like nurturing typeactivities and people who like to be at home. I didthis after my kids were grown, but people who liketo be home raising their children and involving theirfamilies in it, that could mesh very nicely. But other-wise is there anything unique that women bring toit? I don’t know. A lot of guys are doing this inWisconsin and Minnesota, a lot of couples. Whichis nice, it fits well with family stuff. [Grower 5]5

Several growers, including the following, pointto something special about women’s perspectives,women’s ways of knowing the world:

Women can keep bringing different points of view.Women think differently. You can see a different

angle sometimes. I think of shading that row withwhat that plant is going to be like. He is not worriedwhat that plant is going to be like, just get the weedsout. Women tend to be easier on things. I can go outand delicately hand pick a row without any problem,I enjoy doing that. I can do that all day if my kidswould let me, just pull weeds all day. I think a lotof men, in general terms, are not the hand pickingkind of people. Whereas I think women are at times.That is the kind of tender loving care a garden needs.[Grower 6]6

Women are credited variously by other growerswith different ways of processing information, makingdecisions, managing power, and working with peoplethat are essential for sustainable agriculture andsustainable living.

Many growers note the compatibility of raisingfood and raising children, a traditional female role.CSA allows growers, male and female, who sochoose, to combine growing food and parenting. CSA-scale and methods of production are child-friendly,much less dangerous than large-scale and mechanizedconventional agriculture. Indeed, several started CSAsfor the opportunity to earn additional income whilestaying on the farm and involving children:

The other dynamic of growing things for people hasto do with being able to generate income and stillstay on the farm. In general, women are able tostay home with the children. The children can getinvolved in gardening. [Grower 7]7

This is a thing that a woman could do to makesome money for the family without going away toget a job. She can be home with the kids. This is herniche. [Grower 8]8

However, neither this logic nor role is limited towomen:

Annie is working off the farm. I am staying home. Iam here for our son. Another advantage is to be herenear my Mom and Dad. [Grower 4]

Adds Annie: “I don’t know what our neighborsthink. It’s kind of unusual to see a man out in thegarden all day.” [Grower 9]9

One grower who has farmed with her husband in aconventional operation describes CSA as comfortableand accessible:

Any opportunity to take some initiative to go aheadand sell hogs or figure out what kind of grain saleto make, you’re always dealing with a man on theother side of the telephone line. It’s just not veryeasy, not very comfortable. But with CSA there aremore women to work with and more men who are


used to working with women. It’s just a lot easier.I find it an enterprise that’s just more accessible tome, to other women. [Grower 2]

Vegetable growing in particular, at least in Iowa, isan “equal opportunity employer,” affordable and scale-appropriate:

Gardening can be done by anybody. You don’t haveto start off with heavy equipment and strong musclesto do it. [Grower 6]

A male CSA grower explains the other side: “Theboys like big toys. That is true. You can call me sexist[Grower 10].”10 He recalled “big toys” at a recentworkshop on growing herbs, “They were redoingtractors to do the rows (for herbs) and redoing some-thing else to do mulching.” Another grower participa-ting in the same interview relates a similar view:

I have a husband who is the same way. When I needhelp, he wants to know if he can use his big equip-ment. “Can I use my bobcat?” I say, “How aboutyour shovel?” [Grower 11]11

A female grower explains that “CSA is not viewedas a farm thing. The women are more likely to do thegardens and markets while the men are doing the bigfarming.” [Grower 3]

Another female grower sees her husband as typicalof a lot of men:

My husband, because he is a farmer, doesn’t viewplanting the same way I do. He has a farmer attitude.I have a gardener attitude. Things are on too large ofa scale. It has to be done with a planter, he has tobe able to spray it, to cultivate it. I say plant thoserows so close together that the first couple of timesyou got to hand weed it. You never have to weed itagain because it will shade its own rows. He doesn’tthink that way because he is thinking that you gotto get the tiller through. And you don’t. Just littleattitudes like that. I think men have a tendency towant to think that way. [Grower 6]

But she quickly qualifies this: “Maybe not, my dadis a gardener and he doesn’t think like that. He isnot a farmer either.” Gardening is socially coded asfeminine and farming is socially coded as masculine,yet feminine values are not the exclusive property ofwomen nor do only men possess masculine values. Amale grower acknowledges his feminine side:

When I was growing up, I developed a strongerfeminine side than some other males might. Iremember hearing conversations as I was growingup. The women would be talking about relationships

and getting along. My father would be talking aboutthe price of corn and beans. I thought, “Man, that’sboring!” I was much more attracted to my mother’sconversations with friends. So relationships wereimportant to me growing up. I think the main differ-ence in CSA is that females are more interested inrelationships. And more into cooperative ventures –as opposed to competition and patriarchal models.[Grower 4]

CSA in rural Iowa combines elements of gardeningand elements of farming. Most CSAs in Iowa arefrom one to five acres in size, a scale requiring more“farmer-like” thinking. Unlike conventional farming,much CSA work is done by hand. However, appro-priate mechanization and efficient methods of planting,cultivating, and harvesting are required for CSA-scale production. Stereotypical distinctions betweenfarming and gardening break down in CSA.

CSA: Modeling difference?

Several growers note their influence on the decisionsof their farming partners to move toward more sustain-able practices. For example:

My husband thinks that being organic is just a fad.He says that if people get hungry enough they won’tcare if the food had some chemicals on it whenit was a small plant. But our situation isn’t that.We are not at war and fighting off starvation. Imentioned to him that I could find some contactsif he wanted to grow some organic grain. So he istoying with this idea, saying let’s check into this, itmight be feasible, we might try it. And once we getorganic grain then we can do organic hogs. We’llsee. [Grower 4]

He would never have considered organic produc-tion, she is certain, without her participation in CSA.In CSA, as elsewhere in Iowa agriculture, women areinfluencing the trend toward sustainability.

Could what men and women CSA growers have incommon be their very difference from the conventionalway of farming, their willingness, as described by onegrower, to “buck a mentality?” The biggest challenge,she says, is lack of creativity in the way that peoplegarden, farm, or keep up yards:

It’s a mania in our neighborhood to mow yourlawn, to have your farmstead picture perfect. Theidea of having like a beneficial insect garden whereyou might have a milkweed growing, “my good-ness,” you know. I surrounded my garden withfruit bearing shrubs, to create both a windbreak


and a beneficial environment for the snakes and thedifferent things that we want in our garden. And theperson who owned our farm, he just could not dealwith the idea of these sprawling shrubs. [Grower12]12

She describes dealing with the constant ques-tioning, “What are you doing? Why do you do that?Why do you put manure on your garden?”:

The farm that we bought had been part of a hugecattle farm, nearly a thousand acres. They did rowcrops, and had lots of pigs and cattle. They had neverin all those years put even a wheelbarrow of manureon the garden. And he gardens a lot. His children allgarden. It wasn’t until last year that they put manureon their garden. They came and they looked at whatwe were doing. The first year he made fun of me.The second year he came and asked if he could havesome of our manure. And this year his daughter wholives down the road from us, who has told me what awonderful garden she has and always tells me abouther yields, called me up and said, “Can I have someof your manure? I think my garden isn’t doing aswell as it should.” She’d been over to see my gardenlots of times, and I think that it finally started to hither that there’s something that I could do. So it’sbeen amazing. I grew up where we did put manureon our gardens. We were pretty conventional, but wealways put a lot of manure on the garden. Here it’s away different mentality. [Grower 12]

By being different, however, she is a model to otherprospective CSA growers who visit her farm.

A grower whose CSA is part of her independentfarming operation finds freedom in being different:

I don’t know if it’s gender or age or that I’m notfrom here, but I think it might be gender, that makesit possible for me to grow prairie flowers. They thinkI’m a little bit nutty, but I haven’t gone broke yet. So,like, it might be okay to do that. They’re a little bitmore accepting. [Grower 1]

She not only plants flowers and vegetables andopen-pollinated corn, but also engages in moreconventional grain production:

I made a real effort at the start to be as conventionalas possible because I’ve lived in a lot of small townsin a lot of states. I think it’s important to try to fitin. It’s not easy, and it’s not always desirable, but Ithink in the end it’ll probably pay off. So, I tried tobe as conventional as I could, where they could seeit. For the longest time everybody said, “oh, this isan organic farm, right?” When I say no, they’d kind

of be relieved, like, “okay, at least she’s not doingthat.” [Grower 1]

She admits to feeling some pressure, but not much:

People keep a very close eye on what I do. But Ithink I have a lot more freedom than a man wouldhave to try some stuff. I want to be as normal aspossible. But I’m not. I’m the wrong gender. I’mthe wrong age, and I’m not from here. And I’m notmarried. So, okay, within those parameters I want tobe as normal as possible. But those are so abnormalthat it’s okay to be a little goofy. [Grower 1]

She may be more able to promote changebecause she is less confined by local social norms,norms that define both male gardeners and femalefarmers as “different.” CSA provides a space inwhich traditional boundaries between male/femaleand farming/gardening are blurred and softened. Wesuggest that CSA viewed through a lens of care offersa means of transcending the gender stereotypes, andwe explore this idea in light of specific resourcemanagement practices.

CSA as care and caring-practice

Based on our observations, we suggest that theseCSA growers are distinguished by caring, and thatconceptualizing CSA in terms of care might illuminatethe relationship between gender, CSA, and resourcemanagement. What do we mean by care? Dictionariesdefine care in terms of watching over, being respon-sible for, attending to, being concerned for or about,and paying watchful attention to. Bowden (1997: 1)offers an intentionally vague definition in order to gainwide acceptance and interest in its ethical possibilities:“Caring expresses ethically significant ways in whichwe matter to each other, transforming interpersonalrelatedness into something beyond onotological neces-sity or brute survival.” Tronto (1993: 103), drawingfrom earlier work, suggests that caring “includeseverything that we do to maintain, continue, and repairour ‘world’ so that we can live in it as well as possible.”She includes in this world “our bodies, our selves, andour environment, all of which we seek to interweavein a complex, life-sustaining web.” Clement (1996:5) sees caring manifest in contextual decision-making,maintaining relationships, and a social conception ofself. Warren (1998: 7) views care as an importantmoral value, necessary to the maintenance of societyand to any adequate conception of ethics or ethicaldecision-making.

The emerging literature on care alludes frequentlyto Carol Gilligan’s (1982) work,In a Different Voice,


which contrasts caring and justice as moral orienta-tions. Much of the elaboration and refinement ofconceptions of care spring from the ensuing justice-care debate. Although not the focus of this paper, threerecurrent and related threads in this discourse meritbrief mention: (1) the position of the care ethicvis-à-vis justice, (2) the breadth of its scope and application,and (3) the association of care with women.

Some, typically traditional ethicists, subsume careunder the justice ethic – confining it to its place, so tospeak, or giving it no place at all. Others say care is anethic with its own full measure of status, i.e., on a parwith justice. For example, Clement (1996: 1) elevatescare (along with justice) to a special place, suggestingboth are more fundamental than other ethics becausethey thematize basic vertical and horizontal dimen-sions of human relationships that can arise in anycontext – attachment and detachment in the case ofcare, and equality and inequality in the case of justice.Karen Warren (1998: 14–15) takes a different view,a lead we follow, suggesting that the ability to careis fundamental to human interaction with selves andothers, humans and nonhumans, necessary foranyethical reasoning, and that care-sensitivity is a require-ment for any ethic. Care is not an ethical principle perse, but necessary for the possibility of ethical reasoningand practice.

Although some would restrict the scope of care-thinking to the private sphere of family and personalrelationships, others, including Clement (1996),Tronto (1993), and Robinson (1999) advance aconception of care as a morality that extends beyondthe role of women and has public and political rele-vance. Warren, Tronto, and others extend the scope ofcaring even further to nonhumans.

To Robinson (1999), the transformatory potentialof care does not, and must not, rest on its associationwith women. Despite feminist origins and orientations,she argues, the ethics of care and feminist ethics arenot synonymous, and not all or even most feministtheorists embrace the ethics of care. Yet, as Warren(1998) points out, all feminist ethicists and not justcare ethicists want to expose male gender bias inethical theorizing and to offer in its place theories orpositions that are not male-gender biased. The exclu-sion of the significance of care and care practicesfrom traditional, canonical Western philosophy is aserious omission. Taking care and caring practicesseriously “holds some promise of providing a gender-sensitive corrective to conventional moral theories. . .”(Bowden, 1997: 9). According to Bowden (1997:5), such gender sensitivity would require “an equalstress on the ethical implications of the special and‘partial’ relations in which women are characteris-tically involved,” and which are historically associated

with women, with those of the dominant philosophicaltradition “focused primarily on the obligations oweduniversally and impartially in the kinds of relationsthat are typically associated with men.” This correctivewould seem to require attending to the experiences andpractices of caring, typically those of women, suchas nursing, mothering, elder-care, and food provi-sioning (for more on the latter, see DeVault, 1991).To the realm of food provisioning, we add gardeningand community agriculture. If women’s ethical prac-tices – those typically omitted from traditional ethicsand central to women’s lives – are different frommen’s, then attending to women’s ways of relating maychange our understanding of what we name as humanand our understanding of ethics.

Warren advances the criterion of care-practices forassessing the appropriateness of any given ethical prin-ciple in a given context, suggesting that we can chooseamong competing ethical principles by ponderingwhich, when applied, reflect or create care-practices.Care-practices either “maintain, promote, or enhancethe well-being of relevant ‘parties,’ or do not causeunnecessary harm to the well-being of those ‘parties’ ”(Warren, 1998: 15). Warren enumerates a number ofpractices that are not genuine care-practices: thosethat oppress, torture, or exploit selves or morallyrelevant others; those that violate the civil rights ofselves and others; and those that cause unnecessaryand avoidable harm to selves and others. Her examplesinclude the destruction of the stability, diversity, andsustainability of “first peoples” cultures and naturalecosystems such as rainforests, oak savannas, andfragile deserts. To these, we would add, as agriculturaland local examples, the poisoning of water throughexcessive use of pesticides, warehousing animals inmega-livestock confinements, exploiting immigrantworkers in meat processing plants, soil loss resultingfrom standard tillage practices, and losing wildlifehabitat by tiling wetlands and removing fencerows.In characterizing CSA as caring-practice, we aredrawing a contrast to conventional, industrial agricul-ture, which, we believe, fails the criterion of care-sensitivity.

We will next consider care as both a value and apractice that informs daily lives. We will first considermotives and values – why CSA growers care – beforeturning to the actual, concrete actions that constitutetheir practice of care.

The motivation of care

Why care? To Warren (1988: 10), the ability to care ispossible, necessary, and desirable for moral reasoningand action. The most compelling reason to protect and


honor other living beings, says Warren, is because theydeserve our care and concern. We can and we oughtto care. Furthermore, “one cannot reason morally, bemotivated to act morally, choose to act morally, orvalue certain practices as moral and others as immoralor amoral –unless one has emotional intelligence– or,. . . unless one cares (Warren, 1998: 13).” Thus feelingshave moral significance (Warren, 1998: 6), and theability to care is one of the basic skills of emotionalintelligence:

So understood, the ability to care is not simplyan “add on” feature of ethical deliberation; itis an element of emotional intelligence [withoutwhich] one cannot engage in moral reasoning at all.(Warren, 1998: 10)

If care is a moral emotion crucially relevant toethical practice and decision-making (Warren, 1998:8), the emotion and motivation of care can shapeapproaches for protecting or managing resources. Thisview, as Aldo Leopold (1973: 252) recognized over 50years ago in articulating his land ethic, “presupposesthe existence of some mental image of land as a bioticmechanism.” Leopold (1973: 261) thought it “incon-ceivable” that an ethical relation to land could existwithout love, respect, admiration, and high regard forits value: “We can be ethical only in relation to some-thing we can see, feel, understand, love, or otherwisehave faith in” (Leopold, 1973: 251).

It is also rational to care. Emotions matter forrationality (Warren, 1998: 11): “What we do andmorally ought to do in life is determined by emotionaland rational intelligence in concert.” Reason withoutemotion – rational intelligence without emotionalintelligence – is inadequate for ethics and ethicalpractice (Warren, 1998: 10).

Care in CSA

We found that growers’ motives differ, are rarelysingular, and extend beyond systems of resourcemanagement. In addition to concern for land, water,and other resources and for nonhuman nature (encour-aging native species to remain or reestablish, acceptingwildlife), we observe caring in concern for people(providing them with safe, healthy, and nutritiousfood; educating them on food and resource manage-ment issues); for community (knitting connections);for place (helping people reconnect to the land); andfor the future (modeling a community-based alter-native food system). CSA producers also expressmonetary motives, the need to make a living, whileemphasizing quality of life.

For some growers, food is central and connectswith how it is grown:

I am very concerned about the quality of food. Theonly way to improve the quality of food is throughimproving the quality of the medium in which it’sgrown. So if the inputs are impure or manufacturedor polluted or environmentally unsound, that willtranslate into your food supply as well. People’seyes plop out when I relate the two, “Oh, really?”It’s a whole connection. Everything is connectedand we are quite disconnected. [Grower 13]13

For some, food connects with community:

The number one draw for our members and benefitfor community is as a place to get fresh, chemical-free produce at some convenience. We have amother really anxious that her children know howfood is grown and be involved with the growing.Second is the social aspect, those for whom the CSAprovides a group interested in kindred concerns– something other social circles don’t offer themin this rural area. For yet others they just enjoythe good old-fashioned community times. [Grower14]14

For some, education is the primary motive:

I also have learned that my core passion is educa-tion. Farming is a specific and unique vehicle forthat passion. [Grower 14]

For some, it is about nurturing – self, others, plants,earth:

Growing things is very fulfilling. It’s very concrete,very nurturing. A friend of mine and I always usedto laugh that all the jobs and things we liked to dowere these nurturing type things that didn’t pay well.Everything that we wanted to do, no one was willingto pay for. That may be the down side to it. Andthat will be the challenge, to find how to supportoneself doing that. But it’s nurturing and it feelsgood. Doing it in a way that’s kind to the earth feelsgood. As for the CSA aspect, knowing the peopleand getting even more personal comments and allmakes it even more rewarding. [Grower 5]

To this recipe, some add relationships and recon-necting with place:

We see this as a place where people can come andbe grounded in the reality of what’s happening inthis world, where people can come and reconnect tothe earth. It is a place that can be a healing place.A nurturing place in people’s lives, that they need.[Grower 4]

So much of what’s happening in this worldis about competition. Pitting one farmer against


another, pitting one country against another. It’sabout broken relationships. It’s about hunger. It’sabout poverty. And what this little bit is aboutis reconnecting. It is about healing. It is aboutnurturing. In CSA, it’s all about cooperation. We areall trying to help anyone who is interested insteadof beating one another down. Sharing informationinstead of keeping secrets. “This is what I am doing.What are you doing?” We are building somethingup rather than tearing down. That is one reasonpeople are getting so into this movement. Peopleare examining their own lives. All of a sudden, theyhear about CSA and say, “Oh, this makes sense!” Itconnects. [Grower 4]

Cooperation and relationship building are funda-mental.

As a political concept, care can serve as a basis forpractical change and a strategy for organizing (Tronto,1993: 173), extending beyond the personal and privateto the political and even global context of social life.A number of growers see CSA as a path to socialchange, to the future. One grower is motivated byhope: “That’s the answer for me in one word.” Sheelaborates:

The picture of domination in the food system isoverwhelming for me. My involvement with thehog confinement debate was a personal turningpoint from naivete. I spent time with other activ-ists lobbying and strategizing, but I felt it was tono avail. Many Iowans are concerned about the hogissue, but don’t believe they can impact it politically.CSA allows Iowans with concern a place for theirenergies. By choosing where their food comes from,I see them voting for this new food system. [Grower14]

Another is motivated by her personal responsibilityto the future:

I am in charge of this piece of land for the timeI have it, and I have to take care of it. I am alsoguided by the idea of sustainability. I’m going toimprove what I have inherited, enhance it, andgive something better to the next generation. I havegrand-children so I see the 21st century. For bothcommunities, the producers, and the customers,the idea is to rejuvenate farming. Agriculture isvery important. It could be just agribusiness andwith the wrong decisions destroy the land. I thinkthat every little drop helps. All lives add up.[Grower 15]15

Critique and vision, two ingredients of constructivepolitical change (Sturgeon, 1995, 1997: 196), becomegrounded in CSA:

I am drawn by a rather strong vision of where andhow I’d like things to be. CSA is one of the placeswhere I translate the vision into action among thereal circumstances that surround me. It keeps megrounded and balanced. Being more grounded chal-lenges me to interpret my vision in terms of therealities I’ve often found limiting. That helps me tohold on to my vision, yet convey and understand itin a way that is more relevant to folks around me.[Grower 14]

This grower understands her CSA work as a“calling.”

I feel so honored to grow food for my neighbors,friends, and family. I wonder if other local businesspeople have a similar feeling about serving theircommunity. Maybe it’s because it’s still so freshfor me, but I kind of expect this tingly feeling tocontinue through the years. Perhaps the context ofproviding food that feeds these bodies does bringwith it a special role. I take this very seriously – Imust confess I understand it as a calling. It providesa place where so much of my whole can expressitself. It amazes me. [Grower 14]

Each of these growers has chosen to operate a CSA,and caring has prompted this choice.

All CSA growers interviewed have alternativeemployment options and many could earn more moneyotherwise engaged. Nonetheless, most CSA producerswork with a budget and all want to make money.One grower contacted us following her interview tomake certain that we understood that “if the CSAdoes not generate adequate income, it will not besustained.” However, CSA producers also expressnon-monetary motives including education, modelinga community-based alternative food system, concernfor safe, healthy, and nutritious food, and a healthyenvironment. They express the need for balance, forreversing the priority placed on economics versusquality of life:

The bottom line isn’t the only goal. We have goalsin terms of producing quality products. As much asthat is possible. Not using chemicals. [Grower 3]

I do want to receive enough financial return tofeel satisfied in what I am doing. I don’t just wantthis to be a hobby. I am learning a lot. It is a lot ofhard work. It is satisfying, but I want that monetaryreward too. I need to feel nurtured and satisfied bythe financial return as well. [Grower 4]

CSA is a way to make a livinganda way of life, notjust one or the other. Consider the balance sought by


one self-described “conventional-farmer” who marketspoultry via CSA:

There’s always been a tension in our household, andin me particularly, that the kinds of things that I dobe productive and not just enjoyable. I’ve alwayshelped in the fields, and with the hogs, and with thebookwork. That’s been real important to the farm,but it’s never been real satisfying for me. I’ve alwaysbeen pushing for a couple of different things. Onewas to be the main manager of something, to havemy own enterprise. The other part is that we dosomething on our farm with a little bit more of asocial conscience, not strictly just dollars and cents.The thing that appealed to me about CSA was that Icould produce something. I had a farm. I had someresources. I had some know-how. As the CSA ideadeveloped that has felt good to me, it’s given me amuch stronger position in our farming family, ourfarming business. [Grower 2]

Autonomy and caring are mutual attractions to thisgrower. Autonomy does not mean isolation, but inthis case the freedom to shape one’s own enterprise,and in other cases the freedom from the industrialfood system. The values that propel and energize CSAgrowers factor in care.

The practice of care in CSA

Many theorists, as well as several of the growers citedpreviously, point to the need to ground the meaningof care in concrete situations and practices (Bowden,1997; Warren, 1998). Conceiving of care as a prac-tice that informs daily life focuses attention on thereal contextual conditions under which, and the placewhere, caring occurs. Caring is manifest in relation-ships and contextual decision-making (Clement, 1996:5). We see the dual and interrelated themes of situatedcontext and relationship woven throughout growers’descriptions of their resource management practices,as typified by the following grower:

CSA allows people to develop a relationship withthe grower and the land. They form a relationshipnot just with the vegetables but with a specific place.[Grower 4]

Place is home, where we are born, live our dailylives, and die. Place is where meaning lies, where weconnect with what grows, where and at what time.Place provides the context, the fabric and texture, forethical deliberations (Cheney, 1989: 1).

Although Warren (1998) does not offer a list ofpractices maintaining, promoting, or enhancing the

well-being of selves and others that would constitutecare-practice, the practices of these CSA growers arereplete with possibilities. Many, but not all, growersuse organic techniques. With this avoidance of chem-icals comes acceptance of beneficial insects. A growerdescribes the insect habitat in her garden as a big partof her production and gardening philosophy.

Part of it’s organic gardening, but sometimes it goesbeyond that. A lot of organics are still using poisons,just botanical poisons instead of other poisons. Idon’t use those. I’m striving for a balanced environ-ment. When people come to my garden, a lot arestruck that everything is all mixed up. At most I haveone bed that is all one thing. There’s lots of flowersand herbs interspersed throughout the garden. That’simportant for a number of reasons. It is importantnot to have mono-crops because if a destructiveinsect does find the crop, then they’ve found yourwhole crop. Whereas if it’s mixed up they might findone area but not another. The grasshoppers foundone bed of leeks and were devouring them, but theydidn’t find the other bed of leeks. The flowers areimportant because they’re the food source for thebeneficial insects, the parasites, not the predators.The predators are the ones that eat the insect, butthe parasites are the ones that eat sugars from theflowers and then go lay their eggs in the insect that’stheir host. And their eggs hatch and eat the insects.But they need a food source and that’s where theflowers come in. When people are using chemicals,they only think that they’re killing the “bad” insect,they don’t think that they’re also killing all the bene-ficials. And the bad insects are going to come backfirst because their food source is there, meaning thevegetable or whatever they’re eating. Whereas theother insect can’t come back until they’re alreadythere because that insect then is their food source.So it’s sort of like a chain of events. As you continueto use the chemicals then it’s really hard to everget those beneficials built back up. So that’s sort ofthe balanced approach with all the flowers and otherthings integrated in. [Grower 5]

Some even tolerate a certain population of weeds,although not without some residual guilt.

I want to be chemical free. I think that we are betteroff without the chemicals. I really do like the idea ofthe gardening the way we are doing it even if we dohave tons of weeds. [Grower 3]

Since she gets an “amazing” level of production,she concurs that it is really not a problem: “It justlooks bad.” How it looks depends on the eye of thebeholder, noted a CSA member: “It looks like she is


not using chemicals; one doesn’t have to wonder aboutthat.” One grower explains the place of weeds in hergarden:

I leave weeds in my garden for a couple of reasons.They give the insects something else to chomp onso it provides some diversity of bugs in my garden.Weeds provide some shade protection to the soil,and some cover protection to the soil so the winddoesn’t pick it up and take it away. Sometimesthe shade of the weeds protects some of the moretender plants that are coming up. I’ve never had afeeling that the weeds were invading in a place theyshouldn’t be invading. The new plot on the farmwas very, very weedy. I left the weeds there becausethere wasn’t enough cover of other things to holdthe soil and the moisture for the rest of the plot. Itreally was the ugliest garden I’ve ever had. But nextyear will be better; you just have to break that cyclenaturally and the first time you turn the soil, you’regoing to get weeds. So if you just know that, that’sokay. So this year, whether it looks gorgeous or not,we’ll do it and we’ll just have to do a little bit ofeducation and say this is organic gardening. We’llhandle it. [Grower 13]

Despite skirmishes with raccoons and deer,growers tolerate and sometimes welcome wildlife. Agrower tells how her children have come to understandthe interactions between wildlife and farms.

Obviously you don’t want coyotes eating yourlambs, but yet there’s a place for them. As my youngson said, “well, you know, if you shoot one, there’sgoing be another one to replace it. So really what’sthe point?” We feel that there’s a place for wildlifeon the farm. Lots of kids don’t even know whatwildlife’s out there, let alone what farm animalsare out there and what they have to do with eachother. What’s helped is going from a big city out tothe country. When we moved to Illinois we boughtfive acres in the middle of an area surrounded byagribusiness. It was flat land. We were surroundedby farmers who farmed a thousand, two thousandacres. Everybody had Stiegers and big equipment.There was high pesticide, herbicide use all aroundus, constant overspraying. We had very little wild-life. We saw coons and scavenger-type birds thatpicked up road kill and that was pretty much it. Weput in hundreds of shrubs and bushes and plantedour big garden. By the time we left four years later,we had birds because we put in some habitat. Webecame very conscious of what all of that chemicaluse can do to the environment. There was a wholedifferent environment moving to Iowa where we’resurrounded by Conservation Reserve Program land

and lots of wildlife. So we’ve seen both sides andwe’re much more knowledgeable with how devasta-ting agribusiness can be to the wildlife population.We still get really excited about redtail hawks, andowls, and all these things that we had never seenbefore we moved here. [Grower 12]

Diversity, including weeds, insects, and wildlife,figures in their systems of resource management. Thispaper was prompted by one grower who describedCSA as alternative land use in which resources aremanaged more intensively, with more diversity, thanin conventional production agriculture. Some point tovariety in their garden:

I have grown and eaten quite a wide variety of stuff,but not as wide a variety as I’m growing now. Someof the stuff I’m growing I had never grown before,never eaten before. I’m educating myself as well asmy customers. [Grower 5]

I have over 30 varieties of flowers in my two-acre CSA vegetable garden. The flowers adddiversity, beneficial insects, habitat, and beauty tomy gardens. My members are excited to see themeach week. [Grower 15]

We have interest in using heirloom vegetable vari-eties, and that will be a way to introduce people towhat we are doing with saving our seeds. [Growers8 and 12]

CSA growers in northeastern Iowa see a cycleof diversity, a positive relationship among diverseproducts, crops, people, and ideas.

There could be a nice coop of crafts (here) and in theupstairs of the barn – dried flowers! It’s not one ideathat will be successful, it’s where it will lead. Youhelp me with this idea and I’ll help you with youridea. [Grower 8]

If, as Vandana Shiva (1993: 7) posits, monoculturesfirst inhabit the mind, and are then transferred to theground, perhaps these growers may reverse the pattern,changing minds through their example and practices.

Even organic CSA growers see something more inCSA:

Part of the value is growing things organically soyou’re not harming the earth, and the communitieswith creatures on the earth. But a thing that the CSAseems to have over that is a cooperative spirit aboutit as opposed to a competitive spirit, focusing moreon cooperation with nature and cooperation withpeople. [Grower 5]

This dual partnership with nature and with peopledistinguishes CSAs from organic farms. The social and


political motivations we discussed earlier translate intoa practical politics:

The system (politics as it is practiced today) is so outof touch with real people. I have essentially optedout of that system as a source of any real solution.When I turned my energies to creating a tangiblealternative I began to feel refueled. Networking withothers has happened more intentionally and builds astronger sense of optimism. [Grower 14]

The motivation and the action cannot be fullyseparated. Several growers recognize the systemic,deliberate nature of what they are doing:

CSA is a place to begin some dialogue. Even moreimportant is the experience. Without preaching, theexperience allows participants the opportunity towalk their way into new ways of eating and relating.For this to really create change, it needs to be pairedwith careful education, but so much is learned justby doing. We can’t brush the reality aside, butneither can we bite off big chunks all at once. Wemove toward more sustainable lifestyles one step ata time. [Grower 14]

Although this paper has focused primarily on CSAproducers, this perspective is admittedly incompletebecause the shareholders support the growers’resource management practices. CSA growers’engagement with CSA members makes transparentgrower’s resource management practices:

We often feel that there’s not a real good under-standing about what decisions you have to make tobe a farmer, and what constraints you’re under. Thatit’s not so simple to produce food in a real healthyway. It’s nice for us to have people come out andask us real directly, “Well, how does it work?” and“Explain this.” [Grower 2]

The reason that CSA is important is because wehave a running dialogue with the people who eat ourfood. When somebody comes out to the farm, andsees us popping in these wiggly worm kind of stripsinstead of straight rows and they say, “what’s that?,”we can tell them why that happens. [Grower 10]

We always ask for feedback from people. Wereally want people to let us know if this isn’tright, or if something isn’t good.. . . In a typicalfarmer/consumer relationship, what kind of feed-back can the farmer get? It usually doesn’t happen.It certainly doesn’t happen in the grocery store.[Grower 4]

The growers also see how their produce is used.One describes the trust bestowed upon him as sacred:

You are entering someone’s privacy, when theyshare their eating habits with you. I wonder whatthey eat. They’ll take a little of this and a little ofthat. And other households just consume everythingin sight! So it is really fascinating to learn from thesepeople. [Grower 4]

CSA growers and shareholder-members are moralactors in relation to the world; their practices arerooted in relationships. Buying CSA produce is acaring-practice by which rural and urban shareholderscontribute to a caring agriculture. Shareholders conveycare through financial support, a concrete caring-practice, so that fair profit for farmers is not a hope,but a reality. Some shareholders also contribute byworking on the farm.

CSA rebinds longstanding connections and knitsa variety of new relationships with human andnonhuman beings with whom we share place. As onegrower articulates,

Everything is connected and we are quite discon-nected. As we become a richer society, we haveless need to be connected to other parts of society.We’ve certainly lost connection with agriculture.Fewer and fewer people grow up on the farm, welose our understanding of the cycles of the seasonsand the cycles of life and the cycles of death. Webecome quite callused then, quite uncaring about alot. [Grower 13]

CSA connections stand in contrast to conventionalproduction agriculture that grows for distant marketswith technology that separates the grower from theland, that mines instead of builds the soil, and thattreats food as commodity rather than sustenance.

Summary and conclusions

CSA is a system of marketing, but not just that.CSA is a way to operate within a certain marketthat connects grower and member-shareholder incommunity context. CSA is a food system, but notjust that. CSA is also a system of resource manage-ment characterized by caring. These growers revealthe primacy of relationships as they speak of closingthe gap between grower and eater, and between peopleand nature; of land, plants, and animals as communitymembers, not commodities; and of moving fromcontrol of nature to partnership and respect.

Would the CSA growers agree with Val Plumwood(1993: 7) who sees “a way of relating to the other thatis especially associated with women, which containsthe seeds of a different human relationship to the earthand perhaps too of human survival on it and with


it?” Would they agree that women have the abilityto close the growing separation between people andnature, head and heart, to eliminate the gulf betweenthe human sphere and the natural one? One growerdoes not flinch in her answer:

Who is initiating most of the CSAs? Where comesmuch of my hope, but from the consciousness thatit is women’s voices who are so often instrumentalin shaping this type of food system – one that ismuch more whole and comprehensive. The systemI described opting out of is driven by men. It is nocoincidence. [Grower 14]

Conventional agriculture is indeed a systemsocially coded as masculine. A more holistic system,one coded as feminine, would place value on cooper-ation, social relationships and connection, making adifference, future generations, nonhuman nature, andcommunity.

CSA growers are overcoming some damagingaspects of conventional agriculture by infusing theirpractice with care. Knowledgeable CSA growers, maleand female, caring about local ecology, manage, ratherthan exploit, local resources. The emergence of CSAin Iowa and elsewhere signals a possible renewalof a smaller-scale, people-focused, nature-friendly,and community-based agriculture. The blurring ofdivisions between male/female and gardening/farmingholds promise:

I believe our biggest challenge in CSA is to integratethe strengths of women and men in a way that allowsall to more fully experience their human potential.In our family operation, you will still see somerather traditional divisions of labor, but far moresharing of duties than in many other systems. I sensewithin the CSA movement people are free to bemore fully who they really are. That’s so consistent– it’s as healthy as the food. [Grower 14]

We believe that viewing resource managementthrough a lens of care can help us move beyond genderstereotypes while validating the moral significance ofcare and its historical connection with women. CSAis women-friendly: scale-appropriate, economicallyaccessible, and congruent with their experiences andpriorities. Certain human values, those more oftenassociated with women, are nurtured and validatedmore in CSA than in other agricultural systems. Menand women in CSA put these values into practice intheir farms and gardens, furthering the potential of careas a fundamental dimension of relations with otherswith whom we share this place on earth.

Notes

1. Grower 1 (1996). Individual personal interview by ShellyGradwell.

2. Grower 2 (1996). Group interview by Betty Wells, October.3. Grower 3 (1996). Individual personal interview by Shelly

Gradwell, July.4. Grower 4 (1998). Couple interview by Danielle Wirth, May.5. Grower 5 (1997). Individual interview by Shelly Gradwell

and Rhonda Yoder, January.6. Grower 6 (1996). Individual personal interview by Shelly

Gradwell, July.7. Grower 7 (1996). Partner interview by Shelly Gradwell and

Rhonda Yoder, October.8. Grower 8 (1998). Group interview by Danielle Wirth,

February.9. Grower 9 (1998). Couple interviewed by Danielle Wirth,

May.10. Grower 10 (1998). Group interview by Danielle Wirth,

February.11. Grower 11 (1998). Group interview by Danielle Wirth,

February.12. Grower 12 (1996). Partner interview by Shelly Gradwell

and Rhonda Yoder, October.13. Grower 13 (1996). Individual interview by Shelly Grad-

well, July.14. Grower 14 (1997). Individual interview by Rhonda Yoder,

March.15. Grower 15 (1996). Individual interview by Shelley Grad-

well. July.

References

Bowden, P. (1997).Caring: Gender-Sensitive Ethics. NewYork: Routledge.

Cheney, J. (1989). “Postmodern environmental ethics: Ethicsas bioregionial narrative.”Environmental Ethics11: 117–134.

Clement, G. (1996).Care, Autonomy, and Justice: Feminismand the Ethic of Care. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press.

DeVault, M. L. (1991).Feeding the Family: The Social Organi-zation of Caring as Gendered Work. Chicago: University ofChicago Press.

Fink, D. (1986). “Constructing rural culture: Family and land inIowa.” Agriculture and Human Values(Fall) 4: 45–53.

Gilligan, C. (1982). In a Different Voice: PsychologicalTheory and Women’s Development. Cambridge, Massachu-setts: Harvard University Press.

Gradwell, S., J. DeWitt, D. Mayerfeld, R. Salvador, and J.Libbey (1999). Community Supported Agriculture: LocalFood Systems for Iowa. Ames, Iowa: Iowa State UniversityExtension, Pm-1692.

Kolodny, A. (1975).The Lay of the Land: Metaphor as Exper-ience and History in American Life and Letters. Chapel Hill,North Carolina: University of North Carolina Press.

Kolodny, A. (1984).The Land before Her: Fantasy and Exper-ience of the American Frontiers, 1630–1860. Chapel Hill,North Carolina: University of North Carolina Press.


Leopold, A. (1973).A Sand County Almanac. New York:Ballatine Books.

Plumwood, V. (1993).Feminism and the Mastery of Nature.New York: Routledge.

Riley, G. (1994).Frontierswomen: The Iowa Experience. Ames,Iowa: Iowa State University Press.

Robinson, F. (1999).Globalizing Care: Ethics, FeministTheory, and International Relations. Boulder, Colorado:Westview Press.

Shiva, V. (1993).Monocultures of the Mind: Perspectives onBiodiversity and Biotechnology. Atlantic Highlands, NewJersey: Zed Books.

Sturgeon, N. (1995). “Theorizing movements: Direct action anddirect theory,” in M. Darnovsky, B. Epstein, and R. Flacks(eds.),Cultural Politics and Social Movements(pp. 35–51).Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

Sturgeon, N. (1997).Ecofeminist Natures: Race, Gender,Feminist Theory, and Political Action. New York: Routledge.

Tronto, J. (1993)Moral Boundaries: A Political Argument foran Ethic of Care. New York: Routledge.

Van En, R. (1995). “Eating for your community: Towardsagriculture supported community.”Context(Fall) 42: 29–31.

Warren, K. (1998). “Care-sensitive ethics and situated univer-salism.” Paper presented atEcofeminist Conversation, March13, Drake University, Des Moines, Iowa.

Wells, B., S. Gradwell, and R. Yoder (1999). “Growing food,growing community: Community supported agriculture inrural Iowa.”Community Development Journal34(1): 38–46.

Address for correspondence: Betty L. Wells, Department ofSociology, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa 50010-5010,USAPhone: +1-515-294-1104; Fax: +1-515-294-0592; E-mail:[email protected]

Documents

Gender and resource management: Community supported agriculture as caring-practice