The term ‘innovation’ is everywhere, from government policies to company slogans. We are told to ‘innovate or die’. But what does this constant push for newness really mean for our food systems, and for the movements trying to create a fairer, more sustainable future? This article explores why the focus on ‘innovation’ might be holding us back.
Historically, ‘innovation’ wasn’t always seen as a good thing. It once meant social rebellion. Later, it became linked to modernity and progress. Today, it’s largely about new technologies and economic growth. Think of AI in farming, gene editing, or lab-grown meat. Policymakers and big companies promote these as solutions to hunger, climate change, and other global issues.
Movements like food sovereignty and agroecology have pushed back. They argue that corporate-driven ‘innovations’ don’t fix the root causes of problems like hunger and climate change. Instead, they often create new inequalities. These movements have also tried to reclaim the word ‘innovation’. They highlight how local communities, Indigenous Peoples, and farmers have always found new ways to grow food. They say agroecology itself is a form of innovation.
However, the authors argue that even trying to ‘reclaim’ innovation can be problematic. It can create confusion and a weak stance against potentially harmful technologies. Many activists are wary of AI and big tech in farming, but the movements haven’t always found a strong way to resist this digital push.
The article suggests that our unclear stance on ‘innovation’ makes it hard to resist the growing influence of digital agriculture. The authors believe that trying to fit grassroots practices and agroecology into the ‘innovation’ box might actually hinder real transformation.
While agroecology is gaining some policy attention, the food system is still dominated by industrial models. The push for ‘innovation’ in areas like ‘deep tech’ by the EU, for example, often prioritises competitiveness over social and environmental well-being.
The authors identify six key misconceptions that arise when movements try to reclaim innovation:
1. **Isolated fixes for systemic issues:** The idea that each problem needs a new, invented solution. This overlooks the need for deep, systemic change and can distract from urgent action. It also makes us look outside our communities for answers instead of building on what we already have.
2. **Technologies as the sole solution:** Believing that new technologies will solve everything, even when we say innovation includes social practices. This can lead us to accept the rules and hierarchies of the current science and technology system, which often favours industrial agriculture.
3. **Reproductive work is undervalued:** Innovation narratives often focus on ‘productive’ work, ignoring the vital role of ‘reproductive’ work like care and feeding. This reinforces a productivist mindset that relies on exploiting the labour of certain groups and makes invisible important social change processes.
4. **The need to constantly speed up:** The belief that constant improvement and newness are always good. This modernist view sees slowness and preservation as negative. It can lead us to instrumentalise traditional knowledge by labelling it as ‘innovative’ instead of valuing it for its own dignity.
5. **Change will be comfortable:** The idea that transformation is a smooth process. Framing innovation as purely positive places change in a distant future and removes the focus from present political struggles and embodied actions.
6. **Ignoring past injustices:** The misconception that we can innovate our way to a new future without addressing historical injustices like colonialism and patriarchy. This ‘running forward’ approach avoids dealing with the root causes of current crises, which stem from past exploitation and oppression.
The article concludes that the current concept of ‘innovation’ is deeply tied to modern, colonial, patriarchal, and capitalist systems. Trying to adapt it for a fairer system is difficult. The authors propose that food sovereignty and agroecology movements might consider ‘innovation’, in its current form, as “bullshit” – empty, lacking substance, and disconnected from reality.
Instead of reclaiming innovation, the authors invite movements to *refuse* it. Refusing innovation can help clarify our goals, develop better analysis of technologies, and create space for diverse futures. It allows us to focus on deep, relational practices and stories of transformation that don’t need to be labelled as ‘innovations’ for recognition. This approach prioritises collective making and unmaking, solidarity, humility, and facing difficult histories. It requires creating political, legal, and material conditions where everyone has the autonomy to develop and share practices that meet their needs, without harming others or nature. Refusing innovation and building autonomy must go hand in hand.