Alfonso Morales

Position title: Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor, UW- Division of Extension, State Specialist, Food Systems, Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies Affiliate

Email: morales1@wisc.edu

Phone: (608) 263.4848

Address:
112A Music Hall

Degrees/Academics
Ford Foundation Post-Doctoral Fellow, American Bar Foundation Dissertation Fellow, PhD, Northwestern (Sociology), MS University of Chicago (Sociology), MS University of Texas at Dallas (Political Economy), BS/BA (Economics/Sociology) New Mexico State University

Campus Affiliations
UW-Extension State Specialist, Chican@/o Latin@/o Studies, Sociology, CIAS

Research Interests
Created farm2facts.org as an applied research program for farmers market managers, social theory, organizations, law, food systems, economic development

Biography

Alfonso Morales is originally from New Mexico where his family has farmed and ranched for more than 100 years. He is interested in applying science to support society and to help produce social goods. His research interests include social science theory and methods, organizations, food systems, public marketplaces, and street vendors. His applied research supports non-profit organizations and he co-created the farm2facts.org toolkit for farmers market managers.

He has been part of more than $50m of research grant activity, and his work is supported by the ICICLE NSF AI institute, USDA, NIH, Ford, and other agencies. On campus, he has worked with the School of Medicine, the College of Ag and Life Sciences, the School of Human Ecology, the Nelson Institute and the College of Letters and Science.

He writes for a variety of audiences, has published in the top journals of six disciplinary associations, and his work is discussed in numerous national and international media outlets.

A sampling of his invited lectures includes in 2024, being a Plenary speaker for the NSF Workshop on Sustainable Computing for Sustainability, and in 2023 co-organizing a Birds of A Feather Session on food systems for the Summit on Artificial Intelligence Leadership, in 2022 presenting Creating Artificial Intelligence enabled tools for Local Food Systems at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln (similar talks at Penn State and the University of South Carolina 2023, 2022), and in February of 2018 he was invited to deliver the Coss lecture to the Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy and in February of 2019 he delivered the keynote addresses to the Iowa Farmers Market Association. He delivers keynote lectures around the U.S. and internationally. Professor Morales initiated the Kaufman Lab for the Study and Design of Food Systems and Marketplaces in 2014.

Plenary speaker for the NSF Workshop on Sustainable Computing for Sustainability, in Alexandria, Va, on April 16 and 17. Remarks on Computing and Food and Agriculture Systems, and mediator of the break-out session after the plenary.

A few other audio or video recordings: Guest Appearances for Alfonso Morales on Wisconsin Public Radio (WPR)

He presented on October 7th, 2011 at the Power Conference at University of Michigan’s Tubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning.

Professor Morales was featured in the movie Cheat You Fair, which is about Chicago’s Maxwell Street Market.

Publications

Books

Raja, Samina, Brandon Born, Alfonso Morales, and Marcia Caton Campbell, eds. 2021. Under contract Springer, The Food System Scholarship of Jerome Kaufman.

Orozco, Marlene, Jerry Porras, Alfonso Morales, and Michael Pisani, eds. 2020. Achieving Our Ambitions: Latina/o-owned Businesses in Socioeconomic Context. West Lafayette, Purdue University Press.

Dawson, Julie and Alfonso Morales eds., 2016. Cities of Farmers: Problems, Possibilities and Processes of Producing Food in Cities. University of Iowa Press, (257 pages).

Butler, John S., Alfonso Morales and David Torres, eds. 2009. An American Story: Mexican-American Entrepreneurship & Wealth Creation. West Lafayette, Purdue University Press, (204 pages).

Cross, John and Alfonso Morales, eds. 2007. Street Entrepreneurs: People, place, and politics in local and global perspective. New York and Oxford, Routledge, (312 pages).

Morales, Alfonso, (editor). 2003. Renascent Pragmatism: Studies in Law and Social Science. Surrey: Ashgate, (278 pages).

Journal Articles

Pisani, Michael J. and Alfonso Morales. 2020. Informality and Latino-Owned Businesses: A National Portrait of Unregistered Latino-Owned Businesses. Social Science Quarterly. DOI: 10.1111/ssqu.12763.

Archambault, Steve., Philip M. Warsaw, Shaun Trivette, and Alfonso Morales. 2020. Factors that Influence Market Sales: A Case Study of the Williamsburg Farmers Market – 2002 – 2014. Journal of Agriculture Food Systems and Community Development, 9(3) TBD.

Huerta H, Morales A, Aguirre-Guzmán G (2019). Caracterización económico-productiva del sistema bovino doble propósito en tres regiones tropicales de.

México. (Characterizing the Economics of Dual-Purpose Bovine production in Three Tropical Regions of Mexico) ITEA-Información Técnica Económica Agraria 115(2): 134-148. https://doi.org/10.12706/itea.2018.028.

Witzling, Laura., Wilson, Marlie., Shaw, Brett., & Morales, Alfonso. 2019. Promoting farmers’ markets: Preferences of farmers’ market leaders. The Journal of Extension. June, 3FEA4.

Morales, Alfonso. Revise and Resubmit. What to Measure, How, and When? Integrating partners and projects in local foods measurement. Journal of Agriculture Food Systems and Community Development.

Suerth, Lauren and Alfonso Morales. Revise and Resubmit. Social Capital Supporting Social Purposes: A Useful Critique for Partnerships with Practitioners. Journal of Community Development.

Morales, Alfonso, 2019. Food Systems: (Im)practical Interactions. The Pluralist, 14:1 21-46. Delivered as the Coss Lecture to the Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy. Part III coauthored with Lauren Suerth.

Rogers-Montoya N. A., Martínez-Castañeda F. E., Herrera-Haro J. G., Villavicencio-Gutiérrez M.R., Ortega-Cerrilla M. E., Barcena-Gama J.R., and Morales A. (2024). Evaluation of the environmental impacts of the smallholder milk-production system in Central Mexico. Tropical Animal Health and Production 56:145 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11250-024-03996-y .

Khan, S., Morales, A., Plale, B. (2024). Democratization is a Process, Not a Destination: Operationalizing Ethics and Democratization in a Cyberinfrastructure for AI Project. Proceedings of the EAI 2nd International Conference on AI for People, Democratizing AI. Originally presented November 2023.

Bautista Martínez, Y., Martínez Castañeda, F. E., Morales, A., Herrera Haro, J. G., y Granados Rivera, L. D. (2023). Economic analysis of backyard agriculture and livestock farming in semi-urban areas of the central highlands of Mexico. Nova Scientia, 15(30), 1-11. doi.org/10.21640/ns.v15i30.3156.

He, Arden and Alfonso Morales, (2022), “Social embeddedness and food justice at farmers markets: the model farmers market program, International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, v 42 #7/8 640-655. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSSP-09-2021-0249 .

Tracy Harvey, Alfonso Morales, and Catherine H. Middlecamp. 2022 Defining Sustainability in Higher Education Institutions. Sustainability and Climate Change. Vol 15, no 3. pp 182-188. http://doi.org/10.1089/scc.2022.0011 selected to receive the 2023 AASHE Sustainability Award in the Campus Sustainability Research category.

DeMets, Catie and Alfonso Morales. 2022. Marketplace Measurement: Farmers, Farmers Markets, and Ecosystem Services. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy.

Warsaw, Phil, and Morales, Alfonso. (2022). Farm-to-hospital programs and public health: Leveraging local food for organizational and behavioral change. Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development11(2), 1-19.

Morales, Alfonso. 2021 On Farmers Markets and Wicked Opportunities. Sustainability. 13, 11:6108. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13116108.

Ledesma, Edna; He, Arden; Warsaw, Phillip; Suerth, Lauren; Morales, Alfonso; Rosenblum, Leah; Wiedenfeld, Brian. 2021. “Citizen Scientist: Farm 2 Facts Supporting Farmers Markets” Sustainability 13, 11:6162. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13116162.

Morales, Alfonso. 2021. Public Marketplaces Promoting Resilience and Sustainability. Sustainability 2021, 13, 6025. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13116025.

Petrovi´c, Marko D., Ledesma, Edna, Morales, Alfonso, Radovanovi´c, M.M., and Denda, S. 2021. The Analysis of Local Marketplace Business on the Selected Urban Case—Problems and Perspectives. Sustainability, 13, 3446. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13063446.

Warsaw, Phillip and Alfonso Morales. 2020. The Potential Impact of Hospital Cafeterias on Dietary Habits: A Case Study of the University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics. Wisconsin Medical Journal 119(2):122-125.

Comments in this journal on this article:

Heldke, Lisa. Title TBD.

Orosco, Jose Antonio. Ethos, Resilience, and Democratic Struggle in the Markets of the Americas.

Stehn, Alex. Barbarians, the Unseen, and the Unknown: A Response to Alfonso Morales’s Research on Street and Farmers Markets

Response:

Morales, Alfonso, 2019. Episteme:Techne:Kosmopolites – Basic and Applied Philosophy in Reciprocal Interaction. The Pluralist, 14:1 71-77.

Wilson, M., Witzling, L., Shaw, B., and Morales, A. 2018. Contextualizing Farmers’ Market Needs: Assessing the Impact of Community Type on Market Management. Journal of Food Distribution Research. 49:2, 1-18.

Mahbubur Meenar, Alfonso Morales & Leonard Bonarek 2017. Regulatory Practices of Urban Agriculture: A Connection to Planning and Policy, Journal of

the American Planning Association, 83:4, 389-403. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2017.1369359

Watson, Phillip, David Kay, Gregory Alward, Stephen Cooke, and Alfonso Morales 2017. “Evaluating the Extent and Economic Contribution of a Local Food System through an Import Substitution Framework.” Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, 42(2):180-194.

Sarmiento, Carolina S., J. Revel Sims & Alfonso Morales 2017: Little Free Libraries: an examination of micro-urbanist interventions, Journal of Urbanism: International Research on Placemaking and Urban Sustainability, DOI: 10.1080/17549175.2017.1387588

Bautista, Yuridia & Haro, José & Antonio Espinosa García, José & Martinez-Castaneda, Francisco & Vaquera, Humberto & Ricardo Bárcena Gamma, José & Morales, Alfonso. (2017). Relación entre las prácticas tecnológicas de manejo, la producción y su asociación con las épocas del año en el sistema de doble propósito del trópico mexicano. Nova Scientia. 9. 154. 10.21640/ns.v9i19.986.

Lakind, Alexandra, Lihlani Skipper and Alfonso Morales, 2016. “Fostering Multiple Goals with Farm to School.” Gastronomica, 16(3):58-65.

Roubal, Anne M., Alfonso Morales, Karen Timberlake, and Ana Martinez-Donate, 2016. Examining

Barriers to Implementation of Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) in Farmers Markets: Perspectives from Market Managers. Journal of Agriculture Food Systems and Community Development, 6(3):141-61.

Spahr C, Wells A, Christens BD, Pollard E, LaGro Jr J, Morales, Alfonso, Dennis Jr S, Hilgendorf A, Meinen A, Korth A, Gaddis J, Schoeller D, Tomayko E, Carrel A, and Adams A, 2016. Developing a strategy menu and framework for dissemination and implementation of community-level obesity prevention interventions. Wisconsin Medical Journal, 115(5):264-268.

Carroll, Kathryn, Sean Basinski, and Alfonso Morales, 2016. Fining the Hand that Feeds You: Overcoming Unfair Fines for Vendors in New York City and Further Analysis of Factors Influencing Street Vendor Default-in-Payment.” Cityscape, 18(1):95-113.

Quintana, Maclovia and Alfonso Morales, 2015. Learning from Listservs: Informal Knowledge Exchange and the Formation of Distributed Leadership for Farmers’ markets and the Food Movement. Studies in the Education of Adults. 47(2):160-75.

Greenstein, Rosalind, Meredith Coulson, Amanda Jacobson, and Alfonso Morales. 2015. “Teaching Food System Planning: Curricular Developments of the Last Decade. Journal of Planning Education and Research. 34(3):489-500.

Suerth, Lauren and Alfonso Morales. 2014. “Composting.” Zoning Practice. 31(9): 1-8.

Huerta, Alvaro and Alfonso Morales. 2014. “Formation of a Latino Grassroots Movement: The Association of Latin American Gardeners of Los Angeles Challenge City Hall.” Aztlan: A Journal of Chicana/o Studies. volume 39(2): 65-93. UCLA’s Chicano Studies Research Center held a symposium May 13, 2015 based on this article to examine a grassroots social movement by Latino immigrants that helped reform a city law that banned the private use of leaf blowers and negatively affected immigrant gardeners in the city.

Pfantz, Megan and Alfonso Morales. 2013. Increasing the Healthiness of Consumers Through Farmers Markets. Journal of Extension. August 2013 // Volume 51 // Number 4 // 4IAW5.

Pfantz, Megan and Alfonso Morales. 2013. Starting a Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program: Information for Integrating SNAP/EBT Benefits into Farmers Markets. Journal of Extension. February, 51 (1): 1TOT5.

Day Farnsworth, Lindsay and Alfonso Morales. 2011. Scaling up for Regional Food Distribution. Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems and Community Development. 2(1): 1-21.

Morales, Alfonso. 2011. “Public Markets: Prospects for Social, Economic, and Political Development.” Journal of Planning Literature. 26(3): 3-17.

Morales, Alfonso. 2010. “Planning and the Self-Organization of Marketplaces.” Journal of Planning Education and Research. 30(2): 182-197.

Morales, Alfonso and Mukherji Nina, 2010. “Zoning for Urban Agriculture.” Zoning Practice. 26(3): 1-8.

Morales, Alfonso and Gregg Kettles. 2009. “Healthy Food Outside: Farmers’ Markets, Taco Trucks, and Sidewalk Fruit Vendors.” Journal of Contemporary Health Law and Policy. 26(1): 20-48.

Grant, Don, Alfonso Morales and Jeff Sallaz. 2009. “Pathways to Meaning: A New Approach to Studying Emotions at Work.” American Journal of Sociology. 115(2): 327-364.

Morales, Alfonso. 2009. “Public Markets as Community Development Tools.” Journal of Planning Education and Research. 28(4): 426-440.

Morales, Alfonso. 2009. “A Social Currency Approach to Improving the Health Related Quality of Life for Migrant Workers.” Journal of Southern Rural Sociology. 24(1): 92-112.

Morales, Alfonso, and Gregg Kettles. 2009. “Zoning for Public Markets and Street Vendors.” Zoning Practice. 25(2): 1-8.

Fernandez, Leticia and Alfonso Morales. 2007. “Language and Use of Cancer Screening Services among Border and Non-Border Hispanic Texas Women.” Ethnicity and Health. 12(3): 245-63.

Morales, Alfonso. 2003. “A Pragmatist Position on (Re)Constructing Latin American Socio-Legal Studies.” Beyond Law. 9: 169-190.

Morales, Alfonso. 2002. “Radio Mercado: Station Format and Alternative Models of the Audience in the U.S.-Mexico Border Region.” Journal of Borderlands Studies. 17(1): 79-102.

Morales, Alfonso. 2001. “Policy from Theory: A Critical Reconstruction of Theory on the ‘Informal’ Economy.” Sociological Imagination. 38(3): 190-203.

Morales, Alfonso. 2000. “Peddling Policy: Street Vending in Historical and Contemporary Context.” International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy. 20(3/4): 76-99.

Balkin, Steve and Alfonso Morales. 2000. “Linking Street Vendors to the Internet.” International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy. 20(3/4) 99-122.

Morales, Alfonso. 1998. “Income Tax Compliance and Alternative Views of Ethics and Human Nature.” Journal of Accounting, Ethics and Public Policy. 1(3): 380-400.

Morales, Alfonso. 1997. “Epistemic Reflections on the Informal Economy.” The International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy. 17(3/4): 1-17.

Morales, Alfonso. 1997. “Uncertainty and the Organization of Street Vending Business.” The International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy. 17(3/4): 191-212.

Morales, Alfonso, Steve Balkin and Joe Persky. 1995. “The Value of Benefits of a Public Street Market: The Case of Maxwell Street.” Economic Development Quarterly. 9(4): 304-320.

Debate in this journal over this paper:

Rhonda Halperin, “The Use of Economic Anthropology in Economic Development.” Economic Development Quarterly. 9(4): 321-322.

Wim Wiewel, “The Use of Economic Analysis in Public Policy.” Economic Development Quarterly. 9(4): 324-326.

Morales, Alfonso, Steve Balkin and Joe Persky. 1995. “Contradictions and Irony in Policy Research on the Informal Economy: A Reply.” Economic Development Quarterly. 9(4): 327-330.

Projects

You can read more about the Kaufman Lab, but the best thing to do is give me a call, send me an email or drop by to visit!

Teaching

I teach a variety of graduate and undergraduate courses, Research Design, Central City Planning, Food Systems and Marketplaces, Strategies for Effective Planning, etc.