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Tad Mutersbaugh

Research Interests:
Product certification--Organic, fairtrade, biodiversity
Political Ecology
political economy
Commodity Chains and Networks
Latin America (with emphasis on Mexico and Central America)
Agrarian Studies
Marxist Cultural and Social Theory
Education

BA Antioch College, Yellow Springs

Graduate Training
MA Latin American Studies -- UC Berkeley PhD Geography -- UC Berkeley
peasant organic inspector loxicha oaxaca

Tad studies social, cultural, and political-economic geography in Oaxaca, Mexico. He is particularly interested in the socio-spatial economies of certification and ethical commodity production, and how these 'multi-quality networks' affect the everyday lives of peasant farmers. The photo below provides a glimpse of a few relevant issues:

peasant organic inspector loxicha oaxaca

issues:

Organic inspections create new opportunities for skilled labor, the villager here is using a cellphone platform to enter location, interview, survey, GPS, and photo data about this particular organic plot as a part of the inspections process. This can affect many aspects of life: gender relations are altered, often women prefer organic farming and may earn new rights and become organic inspectors; on the other hand, land may confront new commodification pressures as does communal service obligations.

Tad has also learned way more about coffee than he ever wanted to know. He has denuded tropical hillsides with a machete, been bit by untold numbers of insects, been sucked down mountain whirlpools, stabbed in the sternam by his own machete: and in short confounded his Oaxacan friends with his ability to survive -- and provide plenty of opportunities for merryment, at his expense.

Selected Publications:

 

Under Review

Lyon S, Mutersbaugh T, Worthen H,  Constructing the Female Coffee Farmer: Do corporate smart economic initiatives promote gender equity within agricultural value chains? Economic Anthropology

2017
 

Mutersbaugh T, Privatize Everything, Certify Everywhere: academic assessment and value transfers, In eds, S Chari, ANOTHER GEOGRAPHY IS POSSIBLE: THE INFLUENCES OF MICHAEL WATTS, Wiley-Blackwell

 

2016

Lyon S, Mutersbaugh T, Worthen H. The triple burden: the impact of time poverty on women’s participation in coffee producer organizational governance in Mexico Agriculture and Human Values, (), 1-15

 

 

 

2016

Mutersbaugh T, Environmental Certification and Ecolabeling, The International Encyclopedia of Geography Association of American Geographers

2015

book Chapter

Mutersbaugh T, Wilson B, ‘Fair Trade Certification, Performance and Practice’ In eds L Raynold and E Bennett, The Handbook of Research on Fair Trade, Edward Elger

2015

book chapter

Otto J, Mutersbaugh T, ‘Certified Political Ecology’, In eds T Perreault, G Bridge, JA McCarthy, Routledge Handbook of Political Ecology Routledge

2014

Mutersbaugh T, ‘Wainwright’s Geopiracy’ Dialogues in Human Geography, March 2014; vol. 4, 1: pp. 91-93.

2014

Bowen S, Mutersbaugh T. ‘Local or Localized? Anglo-American versus Franco-Mediterranean Conceptualizations of People and Place in Agro-Food Networks’, Agriculture and Human Values.

2012

Mutersbaugh T, Martin L, ‘Protocols and the dialectics of disassembly: heifer care, value and alienation in a village community’ Environment and Planning A 44(3): 723-740.

2012
Book chapter

Mutersbaugh T, Redes éticas: las organizaciones campesinas y la gobernanza de cualidades, In, Sistemas Agroalimentarios Localizados: Identidad territorial, construcción de capital social e instituciones. Eds, G Torres Salcido, RM Larroa, (México DF, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México) pp. 303-328.

2010
Special Issue Intro

Mutersbaugh T, Lyon S, ‘Ethical action: political and cultural economies of fairness’ Geoforum 41 (1): 27-32.

2010

 

Lyon S, Aranda Bezaury J, Mutersbaugh T, ‘Gender Equity in Fairtrade-Organic Coffee Producer Organizations: cases from Mesoamerica’ Geoforum 41 (1): 93-103.

2009
Book chapter

Mutersbaugh T, Klooster D, ‘Environmental Certification: standardization for diversity’ In Agriculture, biodiversity and markets: Livelihoods and agroecology in comparative perspective, eds, Lockie, Stewart and David Carpenter (London, Earthscan) pp. 155-174.

2008
Book chapter

Mutersbaugh T, 'The certification service economy: Coffee, Certification and work in Mexico' In, Confronting the Coffee Crisis: Sustaining Livelihoods and Ecosystems in Mexico and Central America, eds CM Bacon, VE Méndez, SR Gliessman, D Goodman, JA Fox (Cambridge MA, MIT Press) pp. 261-288.

2008

Mutersbaugh T, ‘Oaxaca: Terror and non-violent protest in a video age’ Antipode 40 (2): 205-210.

2006
Book chapter

Mutersbaugh T, ‘Certifying Biodiversity: Conservation networks, landscape connectivity, and certified agriculture in Southern Mexico’ In, Globalization & New Geographies of Conservation, ed., Karl Zimmerer (Chicago: University of Chicago Press) pp 49-70.

2006: conference proceeding

Mutersbaugh T, ‘Agricultura orgánica, certificación medioambiental y gobernanza rural: notas sobre transparencia y opacidad’, ‘Alimentación y Territorio’, Tercera Congreso Internacional, Red de Sistemas Integrados Agro-alimenatrio Localizados (ALTER 2006, Baeza Spain): Issued as CD and online papers.

2005
Special Issue Intro

Mutersbaugh T, Klooster D, Renard M-C, Taylor P. ‘Certifying rural spaces: Quality-certified products and rural governance’ Journal of Rural Studies 21 (4): 381-388.

2005

Mutersbaugh T, ‘Just-in-space: Certified rural products, labor of quality, and regulatory spaces’ Journal of Rural Studies 21 (4): 389-402.

2005

Tovar LG, Martin L, Cruz MAG, Mutersbaugh T. ‘Certified organic agriculture in Mexico: Market connections and certification practices in large and small producers’ Journal of Rural Studies 21 (4): 461-474.

2005

Mutersbaugh T. ‘Fighting standards with standards: Harmonization, rents, and social accountability in certified agrofood networks’ Environment and Planning A 37 (11): 2033-2051.

2004
Commentary

Mutersbaugh T, ‘Demographic Change, Commons Management, Migration’, Common Property Resource Digest 69: June 2004.

2004

Mutersbaugh T,  'To Serve and To Certify: Organic Coffee, Certification Services and Village Cargo Service ' Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 22 (4): 533 – 552.

2003

Mutersbaugh T, 'Ethical Trade and Certified Organic Coffee: The implications of agricultural product certification for Mexican producer households and villages' Transnational law and Contemporary Problems 12(1): 89-107.

2002

Mutersbaugh T, ‘Migration, Common Property, and Communal Labor: Cultural Politics and Agency in a Mexican Village’
Political Geography 21:473-494.

2002

Mutersbaugh T, ‘“The Number is the Beast”: A political economy of transnational certified organic coffee and producer unionism’ Environment and Planning A 34:1165-1184.

2002

Mutersbaugh T, ‘Building Co‑ops, Constructing Communality: Geographies of cooperative politics’ Annals of the Association of American Geographers 92 (4): 756-776