Peasant economics in the twenty-first century: building a ”polis” in the wild

The structural features characteristic of presentday humans are the same as those of the line of 3.5 million year old hominids to which we belong. From the beginning of humankind, food has played a crucial role in creating communities. Indeed, the changes in the early hominids that made language possible relate to their history as social animals in closeknit interpersonal relationships associated with collecting and sharing food. Conversely, nowadays the food economy is the most evident symptom of human alienation. Thus, the basic assumption of this paper is that civic agriculture based on the economy of the commons needs to rediscover the original nature of food, namely an element of mutual cognition and community creation. We explore how a rethought peasant agriculture can be crucial to such a goal. Nevertheless, peasant economics does not appear feasible in urban society mainstream economics and this creates the paradox of sustainable development. The Solidarity Purchasing Group (SPG) experience in Marche Region, Italy, shows the main features of this paradox and offers an effective perspective to investigate the role of peasant agriculture in a post-industrial society.