Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Title: Governing Food Sharing in Barcelona, Milan and Utrecht File-URL: https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/12778 File-Format: text/html DOI: 10.17645/pag.12778 Journal: Politics and Governance Volume: 15 Year: 2027 Number: 12778 Author-Name: Oksana Mont Author-Workplace-Name: The International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics, Lund University, Sweden Author-Name: Vera Sadovska Author-Workplace-Name: The International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics, Lund University, Sweden Author-Name: Yuliya Voytenko Palgan Author-Workplace-Name: The International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics, Lund University, Sweden Author-Name: Andrius Plepys Author-Workplace-Name: The International Institute for Industrial Environmental Economics, Lund University, Sweden Abstract: Urban food governance is expected to address food insecurity, waste, social exclusion, and resilience. Food sharing initiatives (FSIs) can contribute to these goals, but their capacity to operate depends on the governance arrangements in which they are embedded. This article examines how governance modes shape the conditions under which FSIs operate, endure, and contribute to urban sustainability. Drawing on comparative qualitative case studies of Barcelona, Milan, and Utrecht, the analysis focuses on actors, power, and rules. Barcelona is characterised primarily by self-governance: civic autonomy, neighbourhood embeddedness, and local legitimacy support responses to vulnerability, but initiatives depend heavily on voluntary labour and insecure spaces. Milan reflects closed co-governance, where recognised coalitions, infrastructure, and municipal coordination support food redistribution and access but privilege initiatives aligned with policy and philanthropic priorities. Utrecht illustrates open co-governance across health, green space, circular economy, welfare and neighbourhood development, but fragmented support limits continuity. The article uses governance modes not only to classify arrangements but to evaluate how they shape the resources, recognition, and autonomy available to FSIs. Beyond 2030, urban authorities and their partners need to balance coordination, flexibility, and autonomy while recognising diverse forms of value, care, and participation. Keywords: cities; food sharing; governance modes; sustainability; urban governance Handle: RePEc:cog:poango:v15:y:2027:a:12778 Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Title: Was Covid‐19 a Game‐Changer? Inequality, Governance, and Urban Food Systems in Bengaluru, India File-URL: https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/12659 File-Format: text/html DOI: 10.17645/pag.12659 Journal: Politics and Governance Volume: 15 Year: 2027 Number: 12659 Author-Name: Sheetal Patil Author-Workplace-Name: School of Environment and Sustainability, Indian Institute for Human Settlements, India / Centre for Agroecology, Water and Resilience, Coventry University, UK Author-Name: Abha Joglekar Author-Workplace-Name: Centre for Environmental Policy, Imperial College London, UK / Nature Conservation Foundation, India Author-Name: Zareen Pervez Bharucha Author-Workplace-Name: Global Sustainability Institute, Anglia Ruskin University, UK Abstract: Game-changing crises have been explored as catalysts for transformative change towards sustainability. In this article, we examine the extent to which the Covid-19 pandemic acted as a game-changer, reshaping an urban food system in the Indian city of Bengaluru. Drawing on interview data with food system actors, we show that while Covid-19 generated a proliferation of adaptive initiatives and temporary shifts in practices, these were uneven and largely short-lived. Governance responses were biased with respect to classification of essential services, spatially differentiated enforcements, and institutional visibility. These responses systematically favoured organised, capitalised actors, while marginalising informal vendors and peri-urban producers. As a result, rather than catalysing longer-term transformation, the pandemic intensified existing inequalities and consolidated the position of dominant actors. We argue that game-changing crises did not inherently produce transformative change; instead, they acted as filters that revealed and deepened underlying power structures. Our findings highlight the need for justice-oriented urban food governance frameworks that can sustain alternative arrangements beyond moments of crisis. Keywords: Covid‐19; game‐changers; India; social innovation; urban food systems Handle: RePEc:cog:poango:v15:y:2027:a:12659 Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Title: Digital Food Justice: Equitable Governance of Food Platforms File-URL: https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/12764 File-Format: text/html DOI: 10.17645/pag.12764 Journal: Politics and Governance Volume: 15 Year: 2027 Number: 12764 Author-Name: Nevin Cohen Author-Workplace-Name: Graduate School of Public Health and Health Policy, City University of New York, USA Abstract: Platform-mediated food systems are changing how food is provisioned, marketed, delivered, and governed in cities. Yet major urban food governance frameworks, including the Milan Urban Food Policy Pact and the FAO Urban Food Agenda, were designed before digital platforms became central to food access, labor, marketing, pricing, and logistics. This article develops digital food justice as a framework for understanding how platforms reorganize food inequity and what this means for a post-2030 urban food agenda. It identifies four connected features of digital food injustice: temporal asymmetry between rapid platform change and slower public governance; spatial decoupling of food provisioning from the visible places urban food policy has traditionally addressed; behavioral data extraction with racially and economically uneven harms; and algorithmic opacity, which makes consequential platform decisions difficult to see, contest, and regulate. Drawing on a qualitative case study of New York City and New York State from 2020 through early 2026, the article examines labor standards, land-use rules, food safety disclosure, digital food access programs, child data protections, and public food data infrastructure. It finds that subnational governments can govern parts of platform-mediated food systems, but that single-domain interventions remain vulnerable to platform adaptation. Effective digital food governance requires enforceable rules, public data capacity, worker and community power, and coordination across governance scales. Keywords: algorithmic opacity; digital food justice; food justice; food platforms; platform governance; post‐2030 agenda; public data infrastructure; urban food governance Handle: RePEc:cog:poango:v15:y:2027:a:12764 Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Title: Beyond Governance Silos: Socio‐Ecological Indicators for Assessing Sustainable Urban Food Systems File-URL: https://www.cogitatiopress.com/politicsandgovernance/article/view/12584 File-Format: text/html DOI: 10.17645/pag.12584 Journal: Politics and Governance Volume: 15 Year: 2027 Number: 12584 Author-Name: Tanya Zerbian Author-Workplace-Name: Institute of Economics, Geography and Demography, Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), Spain Author-Name: Ana Moragues-Faus Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Economic History, Institutions, Politics and World Economy, University of Barcelona, Spain / Food Action and Research Observatory, University of Barcelona, Spain Abstract: Urban food systems are central to addressing today’s sustainability challenges. However, their assessment remains fragmented and often detached from broader urban dynamics, limiting the development of integrated approaches to urban food governance. This article advances these efforts by developing a comprehensive indicator set for diagnosing and evaluating urban food systems, grounded in a socio-ecological urban food systems framework that conceptualizes food systems as complex urban systems. The indicator set was developed through a combination of top-down and bottom-up methods. First, a systematic review identified potential indicators from existing urban sustainability and food assessment tools. Second, an applicability test in five cities assessed data availability and feasibility. Third, a modified Delphi process with experts validated the proposed indicators. The process yielded a set of 98 indicators, including 68 core and 30 aspirational indicators, which capture both food-specific and broader urban conditions such as governance, justice, health, and infrastructure. The proposed framework advances existing approaches by offering an indicator-based tool that integrates food and non-food dynamics to elevate the importance of food within urban sustainability, two critical areas to inform a post-2030 sustainability agenda. It complements and strengthens ongoing initiatives with the potential to enable benchmarking, comparability, and embedding of food system considerations within wider urban governance strategies. In doing so, it supports municipalities and actors in recognizing the reciprocal relationship between food and broader urban sustainability agendas, thereby avoiding the creation of a new urban food silo and strengthening pathways toward more resilient, equitable, and sustainable urban food governance. Keywords: cities; food; indicator set; socio‐ecological assessment; urban food governance; urban sustainability; urban systems Handle: RePEc:cog:poango:v15:y:2027:a:12584