The ethics of consumption at Baltic Street Adventure Playground

Keywords: Food insecurity, Ethics of Consumption, Deprivation
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Monday
Session Start / End Time: 2/28/2022 08:00 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/28/2022 09:20 AM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 5

Abstract

Baltic Street Adventure Playground (BSAP) is based in the East End of Glasgow, in an area called Dalmarnock. Dalmarnock is situated in the top 5% on the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD, 2020), and had its historical deprivation compounded by contemporary attempts at ‘regeneration’ (Gray and Mooney, 2011; Mooney, McCall and Paton, 2015; Paton, 2018). The result of these decisions left the residents of Dalmarnock living in a ‘food desert’ (Shaw, et al., 2018), in so far that local shops and amenities were demolished and replaced by a coach car park (now disused and abandoned, bar its use as fly-tipping ground). There is no accessible food shop, with the only ‘formal’ (e.g., designated marketplace) shop being the petrol station (notorious for limited choice and high prices).


My PhD research works in collaboration with BSAP, and looks at how a community-led organisation responds to food insecurity prevalent in the area. The research challenges the dominant notions of ‘ethical consumption’, which can see ethics expressed through consumption choices focussed on ecological wellbeing. Instead, I am exploring the ethics of consumption (Hall, 2011, 2015) which examines the ethical notes present in everyday consumption choices. By looking at the ethical negotiations made by groups of people who are priced out of, and have no access to, purchasing particular goods (e.g., organic, Fair Trade, and local etc), the research aims to understand how deprivation impacts ethical priorities and what people care about in the face of urban poverty.