A call to action in an ongoing battle against industrial agriculture
From the early twentieth century and across generations to the present,
In the Struggle brings together the stories of eight politically
engaged scholars, documenting their opposition to industrial-scale
agribusiness in California. As the narrative unfolds, their previously
censored and suppressed research, together with personal accounts of
intimidation and subterfuge, is introduced into the public arena for the
first time.
In the Struggle lays out historic, subterranean confrontations over
water rights, labor organizing, and the corruption of democratic
principles and public institutions. As California's rural economy
increasingly consolidates into the hands of land barons and
corporations, the scholars' work shifts from analyzing problems and
formulating research methods to organizing resistance and building
community power. Throughout their engagement, they face intense
political blowback as powerful economic interests work to pollute and
undermine scientific inquiry and the civic purposes of public
universities.
The findings and the pressure put upon the work of these scholars--Paul
Taylor, Ernesto Galarza, and Isao Fujimoto among them--are a damning
indictment of the greed and corruption that flourish under
industrial-scale agriculture. After almost a century of empirical
evidence and published research, a definitive finding becomes clear:
land consolidation and economic monopoly are fundamentally detrimental
to democracy and the well-being of rural societies.
