Regulation penetrating the countryside and the persistence of habitus: governance tensions and smallholder practices in the modernisation of the Enshi tea industry
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: This study examines a characteristic agricultural industry in an ethnic minority region of southwestern Hubei, China, exploring the structural tensions between state-led agricultural modernisation and the practices of smallholder farmers. Drawing on fieldwork conducted in Enshi City in 2023–2024, including semi-structured interviews with actors across the tea value chain and analysis of local gazetteers, policy documents and heritage archives, the study examines how GI standardisation is negotiated in cultivation, processing and marketing. The findings show that local governments have sought to incorporate traditional tea production into a modern governance framework through geographical indication certification, the standardisation of intangible cultural heritage techniques and the integration of production and marketing networks. These measures have aimed to construct a public branding regime centred on “varietal purity” and “technological orthodoxy,” embedding local tea production within a framework of institutional rationality. Drawing on their adaptive knowledge of mountainous ecologies, however, tea farmers have developed forms of selective compliance to standardised governance. These include mixed cultivation of local tea varieties, flexible adjustments to processing techniques and the reconstruction of rural relational networks. In cultivation, farmers retain local varieties to mitigate market risks and manage seasonal labour demands. In processing, they rely on embodied knowledge, making tea according to leaf conditions rather than mechanised parameters. In distribution, they preserve market flexibility through informal transaction practices, including relationship-based pre-sales and customised private-domain marketing. The study reveals that state-led policy penetration has improved short-term economic returns through brand premiums and industrial integration. Yet, by overlooking the role of local knowledge in ecological adaptation and cultural transmission, such governance has produced a structural mismatch between institutional provision and farmers’ practical needs. The case suggests that agricultural modernisation requires a dynamic balance between technical standardisation and ecological diversity, and between policy rigidity and practical flexibility. Only through adaptive shifts in governance paradigms can regulation and habitus achieve a more sustainable form of co-development.
Author: Yujue Wang
Institution: Minzu University of China
Language: English
Domain: Life Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $2,353
OpenAlex ID: W7223182265