Elise Wach is a Research Fellow within the Resource Politics and Environmental Change research cluster. She seeks to contribute to creating food systems which are ecologically regenerative, socially just and democratic. Working as both a researcher and a food producer, she is a ‘critical participant’ of the agroecology and food sovereignty social movements.
Elise uses political ecology and participatory approaches in her research to identify practical pathways away from exploitative and exclusionary food and land use systems, and towards more ecologically sound and socially equitable systems. This includes inquiring into and experimenting with more democratic and counter-capitalist governance of land, food and seeds. It also includes shedding light on the specific dynamics of capitalism and (neo)colonialism that cause ecological degradation and social inequities, particularly but not limited to racialised, gendered and class-based inequities and injustices in farming and food systems.
Current research includes examining the potentials of ‘public restaurants,’ state-subsidised eateries providing universal access to nutritious, and sustainably produced foods in settings which support dignity, cultural meaning and enjoyment. See DISHED for more details.
She is also examining land commoning movements in other contexts and their potentials for changing agri-food systems and how they might be relevant in a UK context.
Elise incorporates participatory approaches into her research when possible. She has facilitated deliberative and arts based participatory processes in relation to food systems at transnational and local levels, including as Principle Investigator for the Transitions to Agroecological Food Systems project in England, Nicaragua and Senegal. She also incorporates participatory learning approaches into her teaching.
While previous work has been embedded in East Africa, Central America and South Asia, since 2014 she has focused her work primarily in the UK and Europe, but with strong international links, given the historical and contemporary links between the UK / Europe and other localities including via colonialism, enslavement and neocolonialism.
Apart from her research, Elise works as a food producer, and is a co-founder of a community food project which produces food for local consumption with a focus on social equity, while also re-skilling and supporting nature connectedness and belonging. She is an animist and seeks to practice embodied relationality.
Elise is currently accepting PhD students. Themes of particular interest include: food sovereignty, food justice, land justice, agroecological food systems, food and land social movements, approaches for equitable access to food (including through public restaurants), equitable and reparative access to land for food production, human-more-than-human relationships / animist belief systems shaping land-based and food practices, decolonial / post-capitalist / non-commodified exchange.
