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David M. Evans &#38; Josephine Mylan (2019)Economy and Society, 48:3, pp. 426-449 Abstract. The coordination of activity across sites and spaces of production and consumption is a key concern for economic analysis. Joining a revival in the application of convention theory to agro-food scholarship, this paper considers complementary insights – related principally to ‘the economy of qualities’ – that animate different aspects of e/valuation, competition and alignment. These understandings are extended by more thoroughly acknowledging contemporary developments in consumption scholarship. The arguments are advanced through a case study of the orange juice market, linking its current high-carbon trajectory to the commercial and cultural significance of freshness. The analysis offers new insights into distributed processes of qualification as well as the mechanisms through which conventions are assembled and sustained. Finally, a more integrated approach to food production and consumption is outlined."Our starting point is an interest in how conventions facilitate the  alignment of disparate economic actors (producers and consumers). It is  logical, then, to turn to convention theory (Boltanski &#38; Thévenot, 2006[1991]),  which has been particularly influential in the study of food and  agriculture. It was mobilized extensively between the late 1990s and  mid-2000s (see Murdoch &#38; Miele, 2004; Wilkinson, 1997)  to examine ‘alternative food networks, coordination and governance of  agro-food value chains, and the so-called “quality turn” in food  production and consumption’ (Ponte, 2016,  p. 12). Convention theory is now experiencing something of a resurgence  as new branches of agro-food research start to embrace it (including  consumption, see Stamer, 2018; Thorslund &#38; Lassen, 2017).  Increased engagement has been accompanied by a proliferation in the  ways that ‘convention’ and associated concepts of ‘quality’ and ‘orders  of worth’ are used. This gives occasion to reflect on what a convention  is and the analytical work it is expected to do. An initial aim of this  paper is to bring clarity to the various concepts that are at stake here  by considering their use within convention theory and related  approaches that deal more explicitly with qualities (notably Callon et al., 2002).  Convention theory and the economy of qualities perspective offer  complementary insights into different aspects valuation and evaluation  (cf. Lamont, 2012) as well as to economic competition and coordination (cf. Ponte &#38; Gibbon, 2005).  Our view in this paper is that there are clear benefits to integrating  these perspectives, however they do not – whether individually or in  combination – sufficiently conceptualize the role of consumption in the  phenomena that they interrogate."p. 427Link to the article (Open access)