Agencing farmers in the Philippine coffee actor-networks

This thesis examines how the agential capacities of disadvantaged market actors are developed interactively in the Philippine coffee actor-network. Substantial Market Studies research explores the role and expertise of marketing practitioners, academia, government and other actors in the organization of (good) markets. Yet, research on the agency of disadvantaged market actors and their role in constructing or shaping (good) markets remains underexplored.

Using ethnographic methods, this thesis explores the network of socioeconomic and socio-material relations that modify and attribute (new) agential capacities to Filipino coffee farmers. The study highlights the tensions that occur between farmers and community stakeholders, and the multiple lines of market action that farmers pursue as a result of agencing. Despite the best intentions and efforts of community stakeholders to help these farmers, the findings reveal a number of misfires, which partially disabled farmers’ agency and negatively affected their newly emerging market relations.

By highlighting the role of human and nonhuman actors in agencing processes, this study responds to the critique of current development strategies that portray agency (and the lack of it) as the individual capacity of the poor. The findings of this study advance research in the field of Market Studies by illuminating both the underemphasized human side of agencing and the obscured role of agenced, disadvantaged market actors in shaping markets.