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This paper explores the role of community food spaces in processes of social change and reproduction. I investigate the mechanisms by which these groups reproduce, exacerbate, or dismantle power relations and socio‐environmental injustices. I systematically examine exclusion and inclusion dynamics and assess what shapes diversity of participation and representation. Contending that diversity is not a sufficient indicator of social equity and may overshadow forms of injustice, I unpack the interlocking workings of privilege and power in place and examine innovative ways of developing emancipatory food politics. Drawing upon activist ethnography among community gardens, people's kitchens, and co‐operative projects in Berlin, I expose the complex, dual nature of its food activist landscape, characterised by the coexistence of experienced, locally rooted, and openly political projects, and more recent, outsider‐led sustainability‐ and consumption‐orientated projects—together embodying the variegated and shifting politics of socio‐environmental change in the city and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The benefits of community-based, grassroots food practices, such as community gardens or kitchens, are widely acknowledged. However, they have also been shown to support neoliberal and exclusionary dynamics. This paper examines this contradiction on the ground by unpacking the processes and mechanisms through which these initiatives reproduce, reinforce or challenge social inequities and injustices in the city. It suggests the concept of community food space to look at the articulation of practices and intentions within these groups, and highlight emancipatory practices situated around food rather than simply about food. The paper draws upon an ongoing militant ethnography into community food spaces in Berlin, Germany. Exploring the complex and diverse landscape of Berlin food activism, it illuminates the ways in which food may be used to perpetuate unjust social configurations or, on the contrary, to advance social justice at both local and structural levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]