Along with the organic food market development, two directions within the industry has appeared, the traditional organic farming and the biodynamic organic farming. The thesis aimed to derive at which organic certification of organic food in the Swedish food market is most appropriate to the organic movement, based on customer perceptions of Swedish University students. The thesis looked at KRAV, a certifier of traditional organic farming, and Demeter, a certifier of biodynamic organic farming. A quantitative method was used to gain a deeper understanding of the consumer perceptions of organic certification standards and the comparison of KRAV and Demeter, and which certification consumers preferred. A survey was distributed in order to find out the consumer perceptions. The findings of the thesis were split into two parts, each answering one research question. The first part showed that people adhered to the standards of Demeter, with average means skewed towards their side of the scale. The second part identified five hypotheses to be tested against each other, and found customer confusion to be the main impacting factor of consumer perceptions of organic food standards.

Depuis une perspective théorique au croisement de la sociologie économique et de la sociologie de la connaissance, cette thèse a pour objectif d’examiner les mécanismes sociaux à l’œuvre au moment de la conversion vers l’agriculture biologique. Sur la base de l’étude empirique et de l’analyse d'un réseau complet qui révèle les interdépendances entre plus de 60 viticulteurs certifiés ou en cours de certification à l'agriculture biologique en Côte de Beaune, sont analysés les processus d’apprentissage collectifs sur lesquels s’appuie cette transition. Cette thèse montre l’existence de deux processus-Type d’apprentissage qui se définissent en fonction des frontières des groupes de référence (ou niches sociales) ; elle analyse le rôle des pionniers du milieu étudié comme pivot de l’action collective dans ces deux processus d’apprentissage, et explore enfin les régularités qui structurent les échanges au sein du milieu. Ces régularités permettent de constater que les viticulteurs intègrent dans leur raisonnement des aspects identitaires qui différencient les viticulteurs bio « de la première heure » des novices, au-Delà d'aspects économiques liés à une tendance à la « coopétition ». / This PhD dissertation combines the approaches of economic sociology and sociology of knowledge in order to analyze the social mechanisms underlying the conversion into organic farming. Based on an empirical study and analysis of a complete social network describing the interdependencies among over 60 wine producers certified in organic farming or in the process of getting the official certification in French Côte de Beaune, this research analyzes the collective learning process on which this transition relies. The thesis proves the existence of two types of learning process, which are defined by the social borders of reference groups (or social niches); it analyzes the key role of pioneers of the social milieu in both learning processes and studies the regularities structuring social exchanges. These regularities allow us to confirm that wine producers take into account in their reasoning both the identity aspect related to their conversion to organic farming and their economic position, in a trend towards “coopetition”.