Re-peasantization of usi civici: Traditional socioecological strategies of territory management among shepherds in Baunei (Sardinia)

Abstract

Agrarian industrialization and new food regimes have radically changed so-cioecologies of local and global agrarian structures displacing traditional socioecological strategies of land use and management. This paper analyses this transformation from an agroecological perspective by raising the question of how the agrarian activities and the uses of commons have changed in the municipality of Baunei (Sardinia, Italy) with a special focus on livestock farming. Ethnographic research –through participant observation methods and open and semi-structured in-depth interviews– has enabled to reconstruct the traditional use of land and the strategies of its socioecological management as well as the changes produced by agricultural modernization and modernity at large, and finally, to unveil new perspectives of re-peasantization among Baunei’s shepherds to obtain more feasible and sustainable farms.This study highlights tendencies of re-peasantization in land management strategies and the seek for cooperative answers, including an internal reflection on the socioecological meaning of traditional strategies for managing the commons (in usi cicivi) and provides insights to the new potentials of such management and social cooperation practices together with new agricultural techniques and organizational structures in building more sustainable and just food and agricultural systems.