Peter Hitchens International relations and national sovereignty Can you tell me anything interesting about this article? Hitchens supports Israel and denies the notion of occupied Palestinian territory, Why does Hitchen support Isreal and deny the notion of occupied Palestinian territory? viewing the British exit from Mandatory Palestine as having left a legal vacuum.
how does Peter gain national sovereignty?
how does Peter gain national sovereignty?
Hitchens opposed the Kosovo and 2003 Iraq War, on the grounds that neither was in the interests of either Britain or the United States, and opposes the British military presence in Afghanistan, arguing that it has no achievable aim. He believes in upholding the principle of Westphalian sovereignty, which he described as that "you didn't interfere in foreign countries because you didn't like the way they were governed". He urges better relations between the West and Russia, viewing conflict as unnecessary, and, while condemning the old Soviet Union as an "evil empire" and Vladimir Putin as corrupt, he states his "strong affection for post-communist Russia." Also, he endorsed the 2014 Crimea referendum. On Europe, Hitchens argues that the United Kingdom should negotiate an amicable departure from the European Union, whose laws and traditions he regards as incompatible with the laws and liberties of Britain, and with the national independence of the United Kingdom as a whole. Likewise, he opposes the Human Rights Act (which incorporates the European Convention on Human Rights into UK law) and the European Court of Human Rights. Hitchens has described London as "the fifth state in the United Kingdom" and as having "an explicitly republican form of government." He views the Good Friday Agreement as a "surrender" of the British state to the IRA, and its referendum as "manifestly unfair", arguing that the Protestant community was "browbeaten" into voting for it, and that the British government was put "under huge duress, both from IRA violence and from the White House." He opposes Scottish independence, because of his affection for Scotland and because he believes that independence within the EU would not be independence at all, but he also said in 2014 that, having itself ceded power to the EU, the British government cannot argue against Scottish independence. However, he supports devolution for Scotland, having changed his mind, but he is ambivalent about devolution for Wales, and still "completely against" it for Northern Ireland, while predicting that the province will eventually be absorbed as a "special autonomous zone" of the Republic of Ireland. Hitchens has stated his "love" for the United States and his support for the US's being the successor to Britain as the world's leading power, but he has denounced "sentimental" attitudes towards the alleged "Special Relationship", arguing that the US rightly follows its own self-interest to the detriment of Britain. Hitchens supports Israel and denies the notion of occupied Palestinian territory, viewing the British exit from Mandatory Palestine as having left a legal vacuum. He also praises Israel's "European" culture, which he says makes Israel "the permanent ally, in the Middle East, of the world's lawful and free countries", and which he suspects is the main reason for the perceived hostility of the Arab governments. However, he condemns past Jewish terrorism and some Israeli military actions. CANNOTANSWER
He believes in upholding the principle of Westphalian sovereignty, which he described as that "you didn't interfere in foreign countries because you didn't like the way they were governed".
Peter Jonathan Hitchens (born 28 October 1951) is an English journalist and author. Hitchens writes for The Mail on Sunday and is a former foreign correspondent in Moscow and Washington. He has contributed to The Spectator, The American Conservative, The Guardian, First Things, Prospect, and the New Statesman. Hitchens has published numerous books, including The Abolition of Britain, The Rage Against God, The War We Never Fought and The Phoney Victory.

Previously a socialist and supporter of the Labour Party, Hitchens became more conservative during the 1990s. He joined the Conservative Party in 1997 and left in 2003, and has since been deeply critical of them and opposed many of their policies. His conservative Christian political views, such as his opposition to same-sex marriage and support of stricter recreational drug policies, have been met with criticism and debate in the United Kingdom. His older brother was author and journalist Christopher Hitchens.

Hitchens has frequently criticised the UK's response to the COVID-19 pandemic, in particular lockdowns and mandates that the public wear face masks.

Personal life

Early life and family 
Peter Hitchens was born in Malta, where his father, Eric Ernest Hitchens (1909–1987), a naval officer, was stationed as part of the then Mediterranean Fleet of the Royal Navy. Hitchens had hoped to become a naval officer himself, but an eye defect prevented him from doing so. His mother, Yvonne Jean Hitchens (née Hickman; 1921–1973) had met Eric while serving in the Women's Royal Naval Service (Wrens) during World War II.

As a boy, Hitchens wanted to be an officer in the Royal Navy, like his father. However, when he was 10, he learned he had a lazy eye that could not be corrected, thereby barring him from serving in the Royal Navy.

Hitchens attended Mount House School, Tavistock, the Leys School, and the Oxford College of Further Education before being accepted at the University of York, where he studied Philosophy and Politics and was a member of Alcuin College, graduating in 1973.

He married Eve Ross, the daughter of journalist David Ross, in 1983. They have a daughter and two sons. Their elder son, Dan, was editor of the Catholic Herald, a London-based Roman Catholic newspaper. Hitchens lives in Oxford.

Religion 
Hitchens was brought up in the Christian faith and attended Christian boarding schools but became an atheist, beginning to leave his faith at 15. He returned to church later in life, and is now an Anglican and a member of the Church of England.

Hitchens has Jewish descent via his maternal grandmother, a daughter of Polish Jewish migrants. His grandmother revealed this fact upon meeting his wife Eve Ross. Though his brother Christopher was quick to embrace his Jewish identity following the principle of matrilineal descent, Peter noted that they were only one-32nd Jewish by descent and has not identified as Jewish himself.

Relationship with his brother 
 
Hitchens' only sibling was the journalist and author Christopher Hitchens, who was two years older. Christopher said in 2005 that the main difference between the two was belief in the existence of God.

Peter was a member of the International Socialists (forerunners of the modern Socialist Workers' Party) from 1968 to 1975 (beginning at age 17) after Christopher introduced him to them.

The brothers fell out after Peter wrote a 2001 article in The Spectator which allegedly characterised Christopher as a Stalinist. After the birth of Peter's third child, the two brothers reconciled.

Peter's review of his brother's book God Is Not Great led to a public argument between the brothers but no renewed estrangement. In the review, Peter wrote that his brother's book made a number of incorrect assertions.

In 2007, the brothers appeared as panellists on BBC TV's Question Time, where they clashed on a number of issues. In 2008, in the US, they debated the 2003 invasion of Iraq and the existence of God. In 2010 at the Pew Research Center, the pair debated the nature of God in civilisation.

Christopher died in 2011; at a memorial service held for him in New York, Peter read a passage from St Paul's Epistle to the Philippians which Christopher had read at their father's funeral.

Journalism 
He joined the Labour Party in 1977 but left shortly after campaigning for Ken Livingstone in 1979, thinking it was wrong to carry a party card when directly reporting politics, and coinciding with a culmination of growing personal disillusionment with the Labour movement.

Hitchens began his journalistic career on the local press in Swindon and then at the Coventry Evening Telegraph. He then worked for the Daily Express between 1977 and 2000, initially as a reporter specialising in education and industrial and labour affairs, then as a political reporter, and subsequently as deputy political editor. Leaving parliamentary journalism to cover defence and diplomatic affairs, he reported on the decline and collapse of communist regimes in several Warsaw Pact countries, which culminated in a stint as Moscow correspondent and reporting on life there during the final months of the Soviet Union and the early years of the Russian Federation in 1990–92. He took part in reporting the UK 1992 general election, closely following Neil Kinnock. He then became the Daily Express Washington correspondent. Returning to Britain in 1995, he became a commentator and columnist.

In 2000, Hitchens left the Daily Express after its acquisition by Richard Desmond, stated that working for him would have represented a moral conflict of interest. Hitchens joined The Mail on Sunday, where he has a weekly column and weblog in which he debates directly with readers. Hitchens has also written for The Spectator and The American Conservative magazines, and occasionally for The Guardian, Prospect, and the New Statesman.

After being shortlisted in 2007 and 2009, Hitchens won the Orwell Prize in political journalism in 2010. Peter Kellner, one of the Orwell Prize judges, described Hitchens's writing as being "as firm, polished and potentially lethal as a Guardsman's boot."

A regular on British radio and television, Hitchens has been on Question Time, Any Questions?, This Week, The Daily Politics and The Big Questions. He has authored and presented several documentaries on Channel 4, including critical examinations of Nelson Mandela and David Cameron. In the late 1990s, Hitchens co-presented a programme on Talk Radio UK with Derek Draper and Austin Mitchell.

In 2010, Hitchens was described by Edward Lucas in The Economist as "a forceful, tenacious, eloquent and brave journalist. He lambasts woolly thinking and crooked behaviour at home and abroad." In 2009, Anthony Howard wrote of Hitchens, "the old revolutionary socialist has lost nothing of his passion and indignation as the years have passed us all by. It is merely the convictions that have changed, not the fervour and fanaticism with which they continue to be held."

Foreign reporting 
Hitchens first worked as a foreign reporter in the 1980s, mainly reporting from the Eastern Bloc, with his first such assignment to Poland during the Solidarity crisis in November 1980. He travelled to Japan and Germany during his time as an industrial reporter and reported from several other countries, including the US, Japan, and South Korea as part of the group of reporters accompanying Margaret Thatcher. After witnessing the Velvet Revolution and the Romanian Revolution, he became the Daily Express resident Moscow Correspondent in June 1990. He left Moscow (via the Bering Strait) in October 1992, and was briefly based in London during which time he reported from South Africa during the last days of apartheid, and from Somalia at the time of the United Nations intervention in the Somali Civil War.

In September 1993 he became the Daily Express resident Washington correspondent and, during the next two years, he reported from many of the 50 states, as well as from Canada, Haiti and Cuba. He continued his foreign reporting after joining The Mail on Sunday, for which he has written reports from all over the globe, including Russia, Ukraine (described by Edward Lucas as a "dismaying lapse"), Turkey, Gaza, a visit to Iraq in the wake of the 2003 invasion, an undercover report from Iran (described by Iain Dale as "quite brilliant"), China, and North Korea.

Political views

Hitchens describes himself as a Burkean conservative, a social democrat and more recently, a Gaullist. In 2010, Michael Gove, writing in The Times, asserted that, for Hitchens, what is more important than the split between the Left and the Right is "the deeper gulf between the restless progressive and the Christian pessimist." Hitchens joined the Conservative Party in 1997 and left in 2003. This was when he challenged Michael Portillo for the Conservative nomination in the Kensington and Chelsea seat in 1999.

He has been consistently dismissive of the modern UK Conservative Party since the 1990s. This is because he believes that the party has since then abandoned true social conservatism. His view is that conservatism should embody a Burkean sense of public duty, conscience and the rule of law, which he sees as the best guarantee of liberty. Furthermore, this view holds a general hostility to hasty reforms and adventurism. This was central to his criticism of many policy proposals by the New Labour government, which he viewed as attacks on liberty and facets of a constitutional revolution. He believes the Conservative Party should be a defender of establishment institutions such as the church and the monarchy, but has shifted to social liberalism instead. He believes that atheism, along with cultural liberalism, are the causes of the systematic undermining of Christianity. Hitchens has written "The left's real interests are moral, cultural, sexual and social. They lead to a powerful state. This is not because they actively set out to achieve one." He also believes that the First World War and the devolution of marriage are the causes of the demise of Christianity in Europe.

In his book The Cameron Delusion, Hitchens argues that in the last few decades, the party has become virtually "indistinguishable from Blairite New Labour". He thinks the Conservative Party is now just a vehicle for "obtaining office for the sons of gentlemen" and he loathes the party. Hitchens's claim that the "Conservatives are now the main Left-wing party in the country" in his Mail on Sunday column has been met with much criticism.

He is in favour of capital punishment, and was the only British journalist to attend and write about the execution of British-born Nicholas Ingram in America in 1995.

He is opposed to the privatisation of railways.

Hitchens has been a prominent member of the campaign to clear the name of the late Bishop of Chichester, George Bell from allegations of child sexual abuse. He has argued that the Church of England convicted him in what he described as a kangaroo court, and stated his wish that allegations are not treated as proven facts.

Writings and thought 

Hitchens often comments on current issues and wider political and philosophical subjects.

He is a supporter of grammar schools.

War and terrorism 
Hitchens takes a critical stance on many wars. He was opposed to the Kosovo and 2003 Iraq War, on the grounds that neither was in the interests of either Britain or the United States, and opposed the war in Afghanistan.

He believes that the UK should never have joined in World War I, and is very critical of the view that World War II was "The Good War". His view on World War II is laid out in his book The Phoney Victory, in which he argues that the UK entered World War II too early, and that the UK overly glorifies World War II. He argues that while the allies were, indeed, fighting a radical evil, they sometimes used immoral methods, such as the allies’ carpet bombing of German civilians. He believes that Britain's entry into World War II led to its rapid decline after the war. This was because, among other things, it could not finance the war and was not prepared. As a result, it had to surrender much of its wealth and power to avoid bankruptcy. Hitchens' views on the UK in World War II been met with criticism by historians, with Richard J. Evans describing his book The Phoney Victory as 'riddled with errors'.

However, Hitchens is not anti-war since he believes that this position often leaves countries unprotected and defenceless in times of war. Instead, he argues that military power and the threat of war can be necessary deterrents against war.

Hitchens wrote about his concern of the use of security (anti-terrorism) legislation and increased police powers under New Labour, and how it has been used to suppress civil liberties; in Channel 4's Dispatches, Hitchens said the result of this legislation was that Britain ended up "sleepwalking into a Big Brother state".

European Union 

Peter Hitchens is very critical of the European Union and has argued for many years that Britain would be better off outside it. In 2017 he endorsed the Flexcit model proposed by Richard North and Christopher Booker as the most sensible and moderate way to leave the EU while remaining in the European Economic Area to preserve the economic benefits of EU membership. However, he did not vote in the 2016 UK EU referendum because he is critical of referendums. Instead of a referendum, he argued that a leave decision would be best done by voting into power a political party whose manifesto committed the country to withdrawal by an act of Parliament.

Vaccination

Hitchens promoted anti-vaccination views and misinformation about the MMR vaccine following the Lancet MMR autism fraud. He asked in a 2001 article: "Is it really our duty to risk our children's lives with this jab?" In 2013, he defended this earlier article, saying he was criticising "State bossiness in an age that has seen a catalogue of mistakes, panics and mysteries in the world of disease and medicine" and referred to the thalidomide scandal. He has defended discredited former doctor Andrew Wakefield.

After being vaccinated against COVID-19 in 2021, Hitchens rejected accusations he is an anti-vaxxer, but said that he was "more or less forced to have an immunisation I would not normally have bothered with".

War on drugs 
Hitchens has written about the enforcement of drug laws, most notably in his book The War We Never Fought (2012). He advocates harsher penalties properly enforced for possession and illegal use of cannabis, claiming that "cannabis has been mis-sold as a soft and harmless substance when in fact it's potentially extremely dangerous." He is opposed to the decriminalisation of recreational drugs in general. In 2012, Hitchens gave evidence to the Parliamentary Home Affairs Select Committee as part of its inquiry into drugs policy, and called for the British government to introduce a more hard-line policy on drugs. Hitchens disagrees with the notion of drug addiction, arguing that it goes against the notion of free will. He says: "People take drugs because they enjoy it."

LGBT rights and marriage 
Hitchens has strongly criticised the transgender rights movement, claiming that it promotes zealotry and that changes in traditional gender roles in society are "destroying truth itself".

Hitchens was one of the most outspoken opponents of same-sex marriage in 2013, the year before same-sex marriage was legal in Britain. However, in speaking to Guardian journalist Owen Jones in 2015, he said his real issue was with the decline of heterosexual marriage in society and the legalisation "of what was in effect no-fault divorce", and that same-sex marriage is "a side-effect ... It's a consequence of the collapse of heterosexual marriage, and I regret now getting involved in the argument about same-sex marriage, because it was a Stalingrad, a diversion. Why is one worrying about a few thousand people who want to have same-sex marriages, without being at all concerned about the collapse of heterosexual marriage, which involves millions of people, and millions of children?"

In 2019, the University of Buckingham organised a "free-speech society" after Hitchens' "no-platforming" by the University of Portsmouth over his views on gay rights, which they believed would cause conflict with LGBT events on campus. Hitchens was the first guest invited by the society to address students. In response to his being no-platformed by the University of Portsmouth, Hitchens was invited by the Archivist and the Head of History and Politics at The Portsmouth Grammar School to give a short talk on "The myth of Russian aggression" to Sixth Form pupils.

Environment 
Hitchens rejects the scientific consensus on climate change. He has criticised wind power in the United Kingdom and argued in 2015 that its expansion put the UK at risk of blackouts.

Rhodes Must Fall movement 
Upon reporting on the third day of Rhodes Must Fall protests at Oxford University in June 2020, footage of Hitchens strolling through the streets of the university, followed by protesters who opposed his presence, emerged. One video, edited and set to "Stayin' Alive" by the Bee Gees, went viral and was watched nearly one million times. Speaking to Mike Graham on talkRADIO, Hitchens described the protests as "the Establishment on parade".

COVID-19 pandemic 
Hitchens has repeatedly criticised the British government's response to the COVID-19 pandemic. His statements casting doubt on the scientific efficacy of pandemic restrictions have been described as misinformation by several sources.

He has particularly criticised COVID-19 lockdowns in the UK, suggesting they would have negative consequences and questioned their epidemiological efficacy. Hitchens also criticised Imperial College London modelling, which suggested that there could be up to 500,000 COVID-19 deaths if the government did not impose a lockdown.

He has been a proponent of Sweden's response to the pandemic.

He has been against the mandatory wearing of face masks during the pandemic, referring to them as "face muzzles" or "face nappies". He also believes that government mandates to wear face coverings are oppressive.

Publications 
Hitchens is the author of The Abolition of Britain (1999) and A Brief History of Crime (2003), both critical of changes in British society since the 1960s. A compendium of his Daily Express columns was published as Monday Morning Blues in 2000. A Brief History of Crime was reissued as The Abolition of Liberty in April 2004, with an additional chapter on identity cards ("Your papers, please"), and with two chapters – on gun control ("Out of the barrel of a gun") and capital punishment ("Cruel and unusual") – removed.

The Broken Compass: How British Politics Lost its Way was published in May 2009, and The Rage Against God was published in Britain in March 2010, and in the US in May.

Hitchens's book The War We Never Fought: The British Establishment's Surrender to Drugs, about what he sees as the non-existence of the war on drugs, was published by Bloomsbury in the autumn of 2012.

In June 2014, Hitchens published his first e-book, Short Breaks in Mordor, a compendium of foreign reports.

The Phoney Victory: The World War II Illusion was published in August 2018 by I.B. Tauris. It addresses what Hitchens views as the national myth of the Second World War, which he believes did long-term damage to Britain and its position in the world. It was negatively reviewed by the historian Richard Evans in the New Statesman, who described the book as "riddled with errors".

Bibliography 
 
 The Abolition of Britain (1999)
 Monday Morning Blues (2000)
 A Brief History of Crime (2003), updated in paperback as The Abolition of Liberty: The Decline of Order and Justice in England (2004)
 The Broken Compass (2009), updated in paperback as The Cameron Delusion (2010)
 The Rage Against God (2010)
 The War We Never Fought (2012)
 Short Breaks in Mordor (2014)
 The Phoney Victory (2018) 
 Unconventional Wisdom (2020)

See also 

 Christian right
 Traditionalist conservatism

References

External links 

 
 
 
 
 
 

1951 births
Alumni of the University of York
British anti-communists
British male journalists
British people of Polish-Jewish descent
Conservatism in the United Kingdom
Converts to Anglicanism from atheism or agnosticism
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Critics of Marxism
Daily Express people
Daily Mail journalists
English Anglicans
English bloggers
English columnists
Former Marxists
Former atheists and agnostics
British social commentators
Living people
People educated at The Leys School
People from Tavistock
People from Sliema
Socialist Workers Party (UK) members
20th-century British writers
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Sovereignty unconditionally belongs to the People ( or Egemenlik ulusundur, ) is the founding principle of the Republic of Turkey. This principle is written on the wall behind the chairman of the General Assembly Hall in the Grand National Assembly.

Anybody, any clan, any denomination or any group should not have directly power of order in the community. The Nation has unique source and one owner for superior power of order itself. 

The first letter in the word "Milletindir" (People of the Nation) is written with a capital letter, as it refers to the "Turkish Nation".   

The phrase has been used by some Turkish newspapers in the aftermath of the failed 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt.

Chronology
23 April 1920 - For the parliament's first meeting Şerif Bey talked about sovereignty and freedom in his opening speech.
20 January 1921 - It was in the first article of the 1921 constitution. 
Sovereignty belongs to nation without any reservation or condition.
Original is; Hâkimiyet bilâ kaydü şart milletindir. İdare usulü halkın mukadderatını bizzat ve bilfiil idare etmesi esasına müstenittir.
20 April 1924 - It was in third article of the 1924 constitution;
Article 3- Sovereignty belongs to nation without any reservation or condition.
Originally; Madde 3- Hâkimiyet bilâ kaydü şart Milletindir.
10 January 1945 - Hakimiyet bila kaydü şart Milletindir is changed to Egemenlik kayıtsız şartsız Milletindir.
The sentence has same meaning, but it expressed with modern way. 
9 July 1961 - It was in fourth article in the 1961 constitution.
Article 4- Sovereignty is vested in the nation without any reservation or condition. The Nation shall exercise its sovereignty through the authorised agencies as prescribed by the principles laid down in the Constitution. The right to exercise sovereignty shall not be delegated to any individual, group or class. No person or agency shall exercise any state authority which does not drive its origin from the Constitution.
Originally; Madde 4- Egemenlik kayıtsız şartsız Türk Milletinindir. Millet, egemenliğini, Anayasanın koyduğu esaslara göre, yetkili organlar eliyle kullanır. Egemenliğin kullanılması, hiçbir suretle belli bir kişiye, zümreye veya sınıfa bırakılamaz. Hiçbir kimse veya organ, kaynağını Anayasadan almayan bir devlet yetkisi kullanamaz.
18 October 1982 - It is in sixth article in the 1982 constitution. 
Article 6- Sovereignty belongs to the Nation without any restriction or condition. The Turkish Nation shall exercise its sovereignty through the authorized organs, as prescribed by the principles set forth in the Constitution. The exercise of sovereignty shall not be delegated by any means to any individual, group or class. No person or organ shall exercise any state authority that does not emanate from the Constitution.
Originally; Madde 6- "Egemenlik, kayıtsız şartsız Milletindir. Türk Milleti, egemenliğini, Anayasanın koyduğu esaslara göre, yetkili organları eliyle kullanır. Egemenliğin kullanılması, hiçbir surette hiçbir kişiye, zümreye veya sınıfa bırakılamaz. Hiçbir kimse veya organ kaynağını anayasadan almayan bir Devlet yetkisi kullanamaz."

References 

1920s neologisms
1921 establishments in Turkey
1921 in law

Kemalism
Turkish nationalism
Government of Turkey
Democracy
Mottos
Mottos
Legal history of Turkey Food sovereignty is a food system in which the people who produce, distribute, and consume food also control the mechanisms and policies of food production and distribution. This stands in contrast to the present corporate food regime, in which corporations and market institutions control the global food system. Food sovereignty emphasizes local food economies, sustainable food availability, and center culturally appropriate foods and practices. Changing climates and disrupted foodways disproportionately impact indigenous populations and their access to traditional food sources while contributing to higher rates of certain diseases; for this reason, food sovereignty centers indigenous peoples. These needs have been addressed in recent years by several international organizations, including the United Nations, with several countries adopting food sovereignty policies into law. Critics of food sovereignty activism believe that the system is founded on inaccurate baseline assumptions; disregards the origins of the targeted problems; and is plagued by a lack of consensus for proposed solutions.

Definition

The term "food sovereignty" was first coined in 1996 by members of Via Campesina, an international farmers' organisation, and later adopted by several international organisations, including the World Bank and United Nations. In 2007, the "Declaration of Nyéléni" provided a definition which was adopted by 80 countries; in 2011 it was further refined by countries in Europe. As of 2020, at least seven countries had integrated food sovereignty into their constitutions and laws.

History 
Aligned somewhat with the tenets of the Slow Food organization, the history of food sovereignty as a movement is relatively young. However, the movement is gaining traction as more countries  take significant steps towards implementing  food systems that address inequities.

Global gatherings 
At the 2007 Forum for Food Sovereignty in Sélingué, Mali,  500 delegates from more than 80 countries adopted the "Declaration of Nyéléni", which says in part:

Food sovereignty is the right of peoples to healthy and culturally appropriate food produced through ecologically sound and sustainable methods, and their right to define their own food and agriculture systems. It puts those who produce, distribute and consume food at the heart of food systems and policies rather than the demands of markets and corporations. It defends the interests and inclusion of the next generation. It offers a strategy to resist and dismantle the current corporate trade and food regime, and directions for food, farming, pastoral and fisheries systems determined by local producers. Food sovereignty prioritises local and national economies and markets and empowers peasant and family farmer-driven agriculture, artisanal fishing, pastoralist-led grazing, and food production, distribution and consumption based on environmental, social and economic sustainability.

In April 2008 the International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD), an intergovernmental panel under the sponsorship of the United Nations and the World Bank, adopted the following definition: "Food sovereignty is defined as the right of peoples and sovereign states to democratically determine their own agricultural and food policies."

Becoming part of government policy 
Issues of  food production, distribution and access are seldom apolitical or without criticism. For example, the adoption of the Green Revolution in countries across the globe has increased world food production but has not "solved" the problem of world hunger. Food sovereignty advocates argue this is because the movement did not address access to land or distribution of economic power. Others argue that food sovereignty is based on incorrect baseline assumptions around the role of subsistence farming in government policy. Agrarian aspects of food sovereignty put the movement in conflict with globalisation, industrialisation, and urbanisation trends.

In September 2008, Ecuador became the first country to enshrine food sovereignty in its constitution. As of late 2008, a law is in the draft stages that is expected to expand upon this constitutional provision by banning genetically modified organisms, protecting many areas of the country from extraction of non-renewable resources, and to discourage monoculture. The law as drafted will also protect biodiversity as collective intellectual property and recognize the Rights of Nature.

Since then Venezuela, Mali, Bolivia, Nepal and Senegal; and most recently Egypt (2014 Constitution) have integrated food sovereignty into their national constitutions or laws.

Indigenous food sovereignty

Global Issues

Climate 
Climate change is impacting the food security of indigenous communities as well, including Pacific Islanders and those in the Circumpolar North, due to rising sea levels or erosion.

Cuisine 
Activists claim that native food sovereignty is also appropriated as a cuisine for mainstream dining because indigenous foods are framed to be culturally authentic, desired by those outside of these communities. Ingredients that are cultural staples, which are harder for these populations to find, are displaced due to a greater demand for access outside of indigenous populations.

Indigenous food sovereignty in the United States 
Native Americans have been directly impacted in their ability to acquire and prepare their food and this disruption of traditional diets has resulted in health problems, including diabetes and heart disease.  Indigenous food sovereignty activists in the United States assert that the systematic displacement of indigenous communities has led to mass food insecurity.  Activist groups advocate for revitalization of traditional practices, development of local food economies, the right to food, and seed sovereignty.

Indigenous people’s food sovereignty and food security are closely related to their geographical location. Traditional indigenous foodways in the United States are tied to the ancestral homelands of Native American populations, especially for those with strong subsistence traditions. For instance, it is taught among the Muckleshoot that “the land that provides the foods and medicines we need are a part of who we are."

The disruption of traditional foodways is described to be tied to the disruption of the connection between traditional Native land and their people, a change Rachel V. Vernon describes as being tied to “racism, colonialism, and the loss of autonomy and power.”  Pre-colonial lands were expansive and thriving with traditional foods.  Because of disease and war, Native peoples in the early 20th century were directly impacted in their ability to acquire and prepare their food. In addition to this, relocation away from ancestral lands further limited traditional foodways. Many indigenous people in the United States now live in food deserts. Due to inadequate or inhibited access to food, indigenous peoples suffer disproportionately from food insecurity compared to the rest of the US population. At reservations, the “‘highly processed, high sugar, high fat, and processed foods,’” further contributed to health issues in Native populations, leading to indigenous peoples in the United States having the highest rates of diabetes and heart disease in the nation. In addition to this, a majority of Native peoples also live off-reservation, and so are even further removed from traditional foodways.

Because Native American nations are sovereign from the United States, they receive little help in rehabilitating traditional foodways. As defined by the National Congress of American Indians, tribal sovereignty ensures that any decisions about the tribes with regard to their property and citizens are made with their participation and consent. The United States federal government recognizes Native American tribes as separate governments, opposed to “special interest groups, individuals, or ... other type of non-governmental entity.”

Activism 
Native Americans today fight for food sovereignty as a means to address health, returning to culturally traditional foods for healing. Returning to traditional eating is challenging, considering an extensive history of relocation and cultural genocide.  Many Native American histories of traditional culture foods have been lost or are now difficult to recreate.

Indigenous food sovereignty activists in the United States assert that indigenous communities have been systematically displaced from their traditional foodways, which has led to mass food insecurity. It is argued that the most effective way to achieve food security for indigenous groups is to increase their agency in food production. Some activists also argue for food sovereignty as a means of healing historical trauma and as a means of decolonizing their communities. In the United States the Indigenous Food Systems Network and the Native American Food Sovereignty Alliance work towards education and policy-making concerned with food and farming security. Another group focused on requiring food and energy sovereignty is the White Earth Anishnaabeg from Minnesota, who focus on a variety of foods, planting and harvesting them using traditional methods, a form of decolonization. Such groups meet to establish policies for food sovereignty and to develop their local food economies at summits such as the Diné Bich’iiya’ Summit in Tsaile, Arizona, which focused on Navajo traditional foods.

Indigenous food sovereignty activists also often advocate for seed sovereignty, and more generally for plant breeders’ rights. Seed saving is important to indigenous communities in the United States because it provides those communities with a stable food source and holds cultural importance. In addition, seed sovereignty advocates often argue that seed saving is an important mechanism in creating agricultural systems that can adapt to climate change.

Seed Sovereignty 
Seed sovereignty can be defined as the right “to breed and exchange diverse open-sourced seeds." It is closely connected to food sovereignty, as seed sovereignty activists argue for the practice of seed saving partly as a means of increasing food security.  These activists argue that seed saving allows for a closed food system that can help communities gain independence from major agricultural companies. Seed sovereignty is distinct from food sovereignty in its emphasis on seed saving specifically, rather than food systems in their entirety. Seed sovereignty activists often argue for seed saving based on environmental reasoning, not just food justice ones. They argue that seed saving fills an important role of restoring biodiversity to agriculture, and producing plant varieties that are more resilient to change climatic conditions in light of climate change.

Food sovereignty versus food security 
Food sovereignty was born in response to campaigners' disillusion with food security, the dominant global discourse on food provisioning and policy. The latter emphasises access to adequate nutrition for all, which may be provided by food from one's own country or from global imports. In the name of efficiency and enhanced productivity, it has therefore served to promote what has been termed the "corporate food regime": large-scale, industrialised corporate farming based on specialized production, land concentration and trade liberalisation. Critics of the food security movement claim that its inattention to the political economy of the corporate food regime blinds it to the adverse effects of that regime, notably the widespread dispossession of small producers and global ecological degradation.

Writing in Food First's Backgrounder, fall 2003, Peter Rosset argues that "food sovereignty goes beyond the concept of food security... [Food security] means that... [everyone] must have the certainty of having enough to eat each day[,] ... but says nothing about where that food comes from or how it is produced." Food sovereignty includes support for smallholders and for collectively owned farms, fisheries, etc., rather than industrializing these sectors in a minimally regulated global economy. In another publication, Food First describes "food sovereignty" as "a platform for rural revitalization at a global level based on equitable distribution of farmland and water, farmer control over seeds, and productive small-scale farms supplying consumers with healthy, locally grown food."

Food sovereignty has also been compared to Food justice, which focuses more on race and class inequities and their relation to food, whereas food sovereignty refers more so to agency over food production systems.

Criticisms of the Green Revolution 
The Green Revolution, which  refers to developments in plant breeding between the 1960s and 1980s that improved yields from major cereal crops, is upheld by some proponents of food security as a success story in increasing crop yields and combating world hunger. The policy focused primarily in research, development and transfer of agricultural technology, such as hybrid seeds and fertilisers, through massive private and public investment that went into transforming agriculture in a number of countries, starting in Mexico and India. However, many in the food sovereignty movement are critical of the green revolution and accuse those who advocate it as following too much of a Western culture technocratic program that is out of touch with the needs of majority of small producers and peasants.

While the green revolution may have produced more food, world hunger continues because it did not address the problems of access. Food sovereignty advocates argue that the green revolution failed to alter the highly concentrated distribution of economic power, particularly access to land and purchasing power. Critics also argue that the green revolution’s increased use of herbicides caused widespread environmental destruction and reduced biodiversity in many areas.

Academic perspectives

Food Regime theory 
It is in its capacity as a social movement that food regime analysts are interested in food sovereignty.  With its Marxist influences, food regime theorists are interested in how moments of crisis within a particular food regime are expressive of the dialectical tension that animates movement between such configurations (i.e., periods of transition).  According to leading theorist Philip McMichael, food regimes are always characterized by contradictory forces.  Consolidation of a regime does not so much resolve as it does contain, or else strategically accommodate, these tensions.

According to McMichael, a "world agriculture" under the WTO Agreement on Agriculture ("food from nowhere") represents one pole of the "central contradiction" of the present regime.  He is interested in the food sovereignty movement's potential to escalate the tension between this and its opposing pole, the agroecology-based localism ("food from somewhere") advocated by various grassroots food movements. Offering slightly different conclusions, recent work by Harriet Friedmann suggests that "food from somewhere" is already being co-opted under an emergent "corporate-environmental" regime  (cf. Campbell 2009).

Criticisms

Wrong baseline assumptions 
Some scholars argue that the Food Sovereignty movement follows wrong baseline assumptions, citing that small-scale farming is not necessarily a freely chosen lifestyle and farmers in least developed and highly developed countries do not face the same challenges. These critics claim the Food Sovereignty movement may be right about the mistakes of neoliberal economic ideology, but it is silent about the fact that many famines actually occurred under socialist and communist regimes that pursued the goal of food self-sufficiency (cf. Aerni 2011).

Political-jurisdictional model 
There is a lack of consensus within the food sovereignty movement regarding the political or jurisdictional community at which its calls for democratisation and renewed "agrarian citizenship"  are directed.  In public statements, the food sovereignty movement urges strong action from both national governments and local communities (in the vein of the indigenous rights movement, Community-Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) . Elsewhere it has also appealed to global civil society to act as a check against abuses by national and supranational governing bodies.

Those who take a radically critical view on state sovereignty would argue against the possibility that national sovereignty can be reconciled with that of local communities (see also the debate about multiculturalism and indigenous autonomy in Mexico ).

Crisis of the peasantry? 
In its strong reassertion of rural and peasant identities, the food sovereignty movement has been read as a challenge to modernist narratives of inexorable urbanisation, industrialisation of agriculture, and de-peasantisation.  However, as part of ongoing debates over the contemporary relevance of agrarianism in classical Marxism, Henry Bernstein is critical of these accounts. He claims that such analyses tend to present the agrarian population as a unified, singular and world-historical social category, failing to account for:
 a population's vast internal social differentiation (North/South, gender and class positionalities);
 the conservative, cultural survivalist tendencies of a movement that has emerged as part of a backlash against the perceived homogenising forces of globalisation (Boyer discusses whether food sovereignty is a counter or anti-development narrative)  Berstein claims that these accounts cannot escape a certain agrarian populism (or agrarianism). For a response to Bernstein, see McMichael (2009).

See also 

 2007–2008 world food price crisis
 Land grabbing
 Permaculture
 United Nations Decade of Family Farming
 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Peasants

Footnotes

Literature 
 Annette Desmarais, Nettie Wiebe, and Hannah Wittman (2010). Food Sovereignty: Reconnecting Food, Nature and Community. Food First Books. 
 Choplin, Gérard; Strickner, Alexandra; Trouvé, Aurélie [Hg.] (2011). Food sovereignty - towards a new agricultural and food policy in Europe  (Ernährungssouveränität - Für eine andere Agrar- und Lebensmittelpolitik in Europa). Mandelbaum Verlag. 
 
 Five Acres and Independence

External links 
 European Forum for Food Sovereignty - Krems, Austria, August 2011
 Indigenous Food Systems Network 
 Native American Food Sovereignty Alliance  
 Nyéléni First International Forum for Food Sovereignty (Sélingué, Mali - February 2007) and International newsletter - voice of the movement for Food Sovereignty
 War on Want's Food Sovereignty programme
 "FOOD SOVEREIGNTY: towards democracy in localized food systems" by Michael Windfuhr and Jennie Jonsén, FIAN. ITDG Publishing - working paper. 64pp. 2005. Provides information on the Food Sovereignty Policy Framework. Links to many key statements and documents produced over the past decade. Downloadable PDF available.
 "International Planning Committee for Food Sovereignty". The International NGO/CSO Planning Committee - IPC is a global network of NGOs/CSOs concerned with food sovereignty issues and programs. The IPC serves as a  mechanism for diffusion of information on food sovereignty and food security issues.
 Food sovereignty and rural youth (MIJARC)
 Michel Pimbert, 2010. IIED. Towards Food Sovereignty. Reclaiming autonomous food systems
"What is food sovereignty?" - World Development Movement

 
Food security
Sovereignty