Framing the Food System- a Review for Animal Advocates of FrameWorks Institute’s Foundational Study (Pax Fauna)

Pax Fauna: Framing the Food System: a Review for Animal Advocates of FrameWorks Institute’s Foundational Study

In 2006, FrameWorks published findings from a multi-staged investigation into the challenges of communicating with the public about food system change. While the report was not focused on animals, many of its insights into how the public relates to food are directly relevant for animal advocates wishing to see a change in the food system.

Across several diverse research methods, certain trends consistently emerged. The most important recurring themes animal advocates should take from FrameWorks’ report are:

The public is trapped in a cycle of ignorance regarding the food system. On one hand, the public is highly ignorant about the food supply chain except for the short distance between grocery store shelves and their kitchen. While they lack information, two counterproductive frames dominate their understanding of food and prevent them from learning new information. These are the consumer frame and the modernization frame. Lacking greater information about the system as a whole, the public is unable to form a new mental model of the system, keeping them trapped in a cycle of ignorance. Furthermore, they often choose to remain ignorant rather than risk the discomfort they experience when learning about the problems of the food system.
The consumer frame is the greatest obstacle to big-picture thinking. When Americans think about food, they think about their personal, direct experience with it. Because they spend so much time with food, they feel they have a complete mental model and do not feel they are lacking information about the larger system. Through this lens, strong values of personal choice, freedom, autonomy, and agency create resistance to any kind of systemic intervention. For instance, they oppose government policies to shape what food is available and are resistant to learning about the role government policy already plays in shaping their food choices.
The modernization frame creates further cynicism. When pressed, Americans can deduce that the bucolic images they have of farming are anachronistic, and they can make reasonably accurate (if often exaggerated) inferences about how the modern food system must work. However, through this lens, they are even more cynical about the possibility of systemic change, seeing modernization as an inevitable and necessary process that to oppose is naïve.
Advocates rely on vocabulary which is meaningless to the general public. Words like sustainability, social justice, food justice, and slow food appear often in advocate materials without any explanation. Yet these words mean almost nothing to the intended audience.
Health is a common concern about food, but it keeps people locked in counterproductive frames. Simple surveys show that health is the leading food-related concern. However, this doesn’t mean advocates should appeal to health. In fact, health appeals decreased public support for government intervention because views about health are closely tied to personal choice and responsibility. When researchers identified reframes that were able to focus attention on the system as a whole, including health language made these messages less effective. Advocates targeting systemic change should avoid appeals to consumer health.
The intermittent appearance of food issues in the media cements the perception that all is well. The public sees problems with the food system as following a regular pattern: advocates expose an issue, the media covers it, and the government steps in to solve it using existing laws. This narrative hinges on several cooperating assumptions, such as the belief that if the media moves on from a story, it is because the issue has been dealt with. However, it means that attempts by animal advocates to break into the media cycle with specific episodes of cruelty at specific locations are likely counterproductive to their goals.
The public has favorable views of food industry actors. Grocery stores, restaurants, and farms consistently rank among the industries with the highest favorability ratings. People trust these actors because they do not see any evidence of problems in their lived experience with food. They feel a degree of loyalty to food providers and can perceive criticism as disloyal. Keep in mind, however...
Small Family Farms (SFFs) and Large Industrial Farms (LIFs) are two completely distinct categories in the public imagination. When the public hears “farm” or “farmer,” they almost invariably picture SFFs. LIFs are usually not described as farms as all. The public prefers SFFs but does not see them as realistically capable of feeding the world. LIFs are seen as a necessary evil.
A strategic reframe immediately increased understanding and support from the public. Through their research, FrameWorks recommends a message appealing to the legacy frame (e.g. ‘leaving the world better than we found it’) and using the runaway food system metaphor. The runaway metaphor provides an image of the food system as a whole, a force that will cause unacceptable damage unless it is brought under control. Together, the legacy frame and the runaway metaphor inhibit the consumer and modernization frames and enable productive, systemic thinking about the food system. A message using these two elements performed strongly in a national survey and outperformed all other candidates.

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