Towards a Comparative Constructivist Approach: a Study of on Urban Agriculture in the Mediterranean

International comparison is subject to strong academic interest and to a growing social demand. However, conceptual and methodological issues of this demanding research practice are sometimes underestimated. This paper offers a reflexive analysis of a research program involving an international and interdisciplinary team. It demonstrates the advantages of a comparative constructivist approach that emerged in interaction with local actors, especially when the object of research is highly contextualized as it is often the case, when one deals with the relations of societies to their space. In the field of urban agriculture, dominated by case studies, the comparitive framework led to the deconstruction of national categories, to the combination of different levels of comparative analysis and to a transversal as well as transnational and interdisciplinary reading of the diversity of local situations.