How the World Eats

A Global Food Philosophy

Julian Baggini

From the bestselling author of How the World Thinks, an exploration of how we grow, make, buy and eat our food around the world—and a proposal for a global philosophy of food.

How we live is shaped by how we eat. You can see this in the vastly different approaches to growing, preparing and eating food around the world, such as the hunter-gatherer Hadza in Tanzania whose sustainable lifestyle is under threat in a crowded planet, or Western societies whose food is farmed or bred in vast intensive enterprises. And most of us now rely on a complex global food web of production, distribution, consumption and disposal, which is now contending with unprecedented challenges.

The need for a better understanding of how we feed ourselves has never been more urgent. In this wide-ranging and definitive book, philosopher Julian Baggini expertly delves into the best and worst food practises in a huge array of different societies, past and present. His exploration takes him from cutting-edge technologies, such as new farming methods, cultured meat, GM and astronaut food, to the ethics and health of ultra processed food and aquaculture, as he takes a forensic look at the effectiveness of our food governance, the difficulties of food wastage and the effects of commodification.

Extracting essential principles to guide how we eat in the future, How the World Eats is a thought-provoking and illuminating call for a pluralistic, humane, resourceful and equitable global food philosophy that will guide us towards a food system fit for the twenty-first century and beyond.

Julian Baggini's books include the internationally bestselling How the World Thinks; How to Think Like a Philosopher; The Virtues of the Table; and The Pig That Wants to be Eaten. He is the Academic Director of the Royal Institute of Philosophy and is a member of the Food Ethics Council. He is a regular columnist for The Guardian, Prospect magazine, Financial Times and a columnist and book reviewer for The Wall Street Journal. He has also written for New Humanist magazine, The Week, New Statesman, New York Times and Literary Review. Visit him at julianbaggini.com.

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Endorsements & Reviews

Praise for Julian Baggini

"There to fill the Sapiens-size hole in your life." The Observer (London)

”Such scope, and such lucid, lightly worn learning. Enlightening, perspective-shifting, mind-expanding - a superb tour through world philosophies with an erudite and friendly guide." Sarah Bakewell, author of How to Live and Humanly Possible

"This book is like the Sudoku of moral philosophy: apply your mind to any of its thought experiments and quickly be transported out of rush-hour hell." The New Statesman

"This bold fascinating book seeks to inhabit other philosophical traditions, with humility but without patronisingly exempting them from the critique he applies to ours. Deft and rigorous." The Financial Times