Introduction

Hello readers and thank you for taking the time to stop and read my blog. This blog is an assignment for a university anthropology course. In this blog I plan to discuss a branch of the fair trade movement that involves coffee production, from the people working in the coffee plantations to the people commercialising it.  As I gain further knowledge in my research on the topic I will post interesting links, pictures and of course facts!

Before I get going, I think it is important for me to provide the definition of a social movement I used as my reference and starting point while developing my topic. A Social movement as defined in my class discussions is: a group or informal network of people who are linked by shared beliefs and solidarity. A second word I'd like to define for you is 'fair trade'. In the words of Sarah Lyon, "[f]air trade is a form of alternative trade that seeks to improve the position of disempowered producers through trade as a means of development." (Lyon 2007:100)

Image courtesy of Simon Bowers. The Guardian. November 4, 2010

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/nov/04/multinations-development-fairtrade-report

Before I begin to share my findings and views, from my research on this fair trade social movement, I will post my list of references so that you too can immerse yourself in Fair Trade: Coffee Culture!

References Cited:

Bacon, Christopher M.; Méndez, V. Ernesto and Gliessman, Stephen R. et al

2008  Confronting the coffee crisis: fair trade, sustainable livelihoods and Ecosystems in Mexico and Central America. USA: Massachusetts Institute of Technology

De Pelsmacker, Patrick; Driesen, Liesbeth and Rayp, Glenn

2005  Do Consumers Care about Ethics? Willingness to Pay for Fair-Trade    Coffee. Journal of Consumer Affairs 39(2): 363-385

Fischer, Kate

2011  Fair Trade and a Global Commodity: Coffee in Costa Rica. By Peter Luetchford. The Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology 16(1): 210-212

Fisher, Carolyn

2007  Selling Coffee, or Selling Out?: Evaluating Different Ways to Analyze the Fair-Trade System. Culture & Agriculture 29(2): 78-88

Fridell, Gavin

2007  Fair trade coffee: the prospects and pitfalls of market-driven social justice. Toronto: University of Toronto Press Incorporated

Lyon, Sarah

2007  Maya Coffee Farmers and Fair Trade: Assessing the Benefits and Limitation of Alternative Markets.

Lyon, Sarah

2010  Coffee and Community: Maya Farmers and Fair-Trade Markets. Colorado: University Press of Colorado

Lyon, Sarah and Moberg, Mark

2010  Fair trade and social justice: global ethnographies. New York: New York University Press

Taylor, Peter Leigh; Murray, Douglas L. and Raynolds, Laura T.

2005  Keeping trade fair: governance challenges in the fair trade coffee initiative. Sustainable Development 13(3): 199- 208

Weber, Jeremy

2007  Fair Trade Coffee Enthusiasts Should Confront Reality. Cato Journal 27(1): 109-117