Food and Politics

 Hi Charlie, 

In order to wait until the next holidays (yes, I am already counting down...), I decided to write a small article about two things that I love : Food and Politics. I know, you may have the same reaction that I had when I saw my cousin eating a meat-nutella sandwich : "these two things are really cool separately but together I don't think so". But let me try to convince you that the way we eat is impacted by politics and has an impact on politics.

Firstly, let's see how the way we eat has an impact on politics.

For example in South Korea, one meal is not composed by one dish but by several small dishes and looks like this: 

You may have guessed it, even if it seems very delicious, preparing several dishes for the same meal can provoque a lot of food waste which is already a big problem in many parts of the world. On average, South Koreans throw 130 kg of food per person and per year; more than in Europe or in the US. To solve that problem, the government made people pay for the food they waste. And when it touches people's money, we have to admit it is really efficient. 

Secondly, in France a dish became so popular that it created a polemic and even appeared in electoral programmes : the kebab. Indeed, France is the world's second consumer of this cheap, tasty and easy-to-eat dish. However, it is considered as "a threat for French history and cultural identity" by many far-right activists that think it as "too often accompanied by veiled women and bearded men" or a way to "make false money". The polemic became so important that the Kebab became a weapon : Thierry Marx a famous French cook decided to fight racism by serving in his starred restaurant this dish he considers as a French. But its critics made of the kebab a political weapon too and it is not rare to find on members of the RN's electoral programmes "decrease of communitarianists shops such as kebabs". 

You will have understood it, the way we eat has an impact on politics because it reflects our society and its problems such as food waste or racism. But food can also be a way to solve those problems as we saw it with the 'food waste tax'.

But it can go the other way around and it can be politics that impact the way we eat. We can see it through History : for example, I think that a lot of you are aware that january 21st 1789 is the day we killed our beloved Louis XVI. In order to remember this sweet person, a lot of French people still eat a pork every january 21st (so poetic...). Moreover, in England restaurants ceased to serve French food during the war against Napoléon and the traditional French croissant is not even French as it was created by Austrian people after they chased the Ottomans from Vienna. As the crescent was a symbol present on the Ottoman flag, Viennese people were happy to "eat" their defeated Turkish enemy. 

More recently, mcdonald's can help us find examples about politics impacting the way we eat. The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 was already foreshadowing the end of USSR two years later and the victory of the US concerning the cold war. One of the symbols of this victory was the implantation of a mcdonald's in Moscow in 1990 before the official end of USSR. Considering the really hard conditions people were living in under the regime, this new fast food represented life beyond the iron curtain and attracted dozens of people at its opening :

Another example about mcdonald's and the Cold War is the fact that I ate my first bigmac only 3 years ago. As some of you may know, I am muslim so I never ate anything else than ice cream at mcdonald's (by the way, if you ever want to make me surprise, buy me a mcflurry with an MM's and chocolate topping ;)). Three years ago, I went to Morocco and was really surprised to find mcdonald's there ; as Morocco is a muslim country i could eat everything in the fast foods and restaurants (you may have guessed how I spent my money there...). When I came back to France, bigmacs and stuffs were not there anymore to disturb me so I started to reflect and I finally wandered why there were no mcdonald's in Algeria (at this point I felt betrayed by my origins). The answer is that during Cold War and until our days, Morocco was more 'friend' with the US and Algeria saw in USSR (now Russia)an example. Because of that, you can find mcdonald's in Morocco and not in Algeria.

ADVERTISEMENT- If the influence of Russia and the US on North Africa interests you, come to the next session of the MUN club about the conflict in Western Sahara!-ADVERTISEMENT

  

I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it, have a nice end-of-holidays and don't forget to buy me mcflurries ;)

ILRDM