Perhaps nowhere is globalization viewed with more suspicion than in France. But while some nations fear the whittling down of their sovereignty, what often appears to most trouble the French about globalization is the danger it poses at the dinner table.

The French sense of identity is, of course, directly linked to the stomach, so McDonald's, genetically modified crops, standardized agricultural practices and other such trends seem to pose a mortal threat to their gastronomic heritage.

One of the cornerstones, physical and philosophical, of that heritage is the idea of terroir, a term for which there is no exact English equivalent. Loosely translated, it means ''place'' or ''sense of place.'' In practice, it refers to the natural environment in which an agricultural product is grown, as well as any cultural and historical influences that contribute to the process. For terroir's most ardent promoters, it is axiomatic that the finest fruits and vegetables are those truest to their roots; those whose taste reflects the interplay of soil, climate, topography and ritual. For them, centuries of trial and error -- identifying the choicest sites, experimenting with different methods of cultivation -- have taught the French how to achieve this connection between food and the land. But now, that connection is supposedly under assault by Le Big Mac and all that it represents.

As a result, terroir has become a rallying cry in the French backlash against globalization. José Bové, the sheep farmer-turned-activist who shot to fame two years ago when he helped raze a local McDonald's, travels the world these days touting terroir's virtues. French ministers routinely cite the sanctity of terroir in defending their agricultural interests against the meddlesome arm of the European Union. Many chefs have also thrown their weight behind the cause: menus de terroir are increasingly fashionable in French restaurants.

Continue reading the main story

Naturally, all this has made terroir an object of derision in some non-French quarters. ''Terroir is a concept which originated in France,'' Jake Hancock of London's Imperial College, a geologist, observed recently in the Journal of Wine Research. ''It is difficult to think of another country where it could have started, since it has features so characteristic of second-class French thinkers: a combination of the obvious (the quality of a plant depends on where you plant it) and the mystical.'' Yet terroir is an idea taken seriously by many scholars, who are eager to determine whether it really exists and, if so, just how important it is.

Terroir is most frequently invoked with reference to wine. If the concept has a spiritual home, it is the Burgundy region of France. There, in the 13th century, Cistercian monks undertook the first rigorous assessment of vineyards, exploring the compatibility of various wine grapes to the environment and carving up the land in such a way as to reflect differences in the caliber of the wines yielded from one parcel to the next. By the 17th century, the rationalization had spread to other parts of France. Visiting Bordeaux in 1678, John Locke compared the majestic wines of Château Haut-Brion with the less exalted ones of neighboring estates and expressed astonishment that such contrasting quality could emerge from vineyards separated only by a ''ditch between.''

The notion of terroir is at the heart of the Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée system, which administers every wine region in France and also sets the rules by which numerous other foodstuffs are produced. These stringent rules, supposedly the culmination of the quest for the right combination of plant and plot, dictate which grape varieties may be grown in what areas and establishes the boundaries that split ordinary vineyards from ones said to display the finest terroir. For example, the Clos-de-Tart vineyard in the Burgundian village of Morey-St.-Denis is believed to have exceptional terroir and is designated a grand cru site, while the vineyard directly across the road, Les Ruchots, isn't considered quite as good and is thus only a premier cru.

Terroir has long been controversial among wine connoisseurs, pitting the terroirists against a group that could be called the modernists in an argument that mirrors the broader debate about France and globalization. The former maintain that terroir is the critical factor in the making of fine wine and that profit should take a back seat to tradition.

The modernists do not deny the existence of terroir but believe it to be just one of many ingredients -- like the winemaker's touch -- that go into a bottle. Wine, they say, is now a global, entrepreneurial business. Small, ultra-modern wineries in California, Australia, Italy and Spain have become international pacesetters, turning out cabernets and chardonnays that are just as coveted as the top French wines. To stay competitive, the modernists contend, the French must be less beholden to the past and abandon outdated rules that thwart innovation like the limitations on the grapes that can be planted in a given area.

As the battle between terroirists and modernists rumbles on, a more sober discussion of terroir is taking place within the scientific community. In the first English-language book on the topic, ''Terroir: The Role of Geology, Climate and Culture in the Making of French Wines'' (University of California Press, 1999), James Wilson, a geologist, offers a detailed look at the physical endowments of France's wine-producing regions.

Other scholars, however, are not willing to give terroir the starring role. Numerous studies have been done to pinpoint the exact links between land and wine; to date, the results have been maddeningly inconclusive, says Mark Matthews, a professor of viticulture at the University of California, Davis. ''This kind of research is very challenging,'' he said, ''The flavor compounds are so low in concentration that they are very difficult to analyze.''

Some scientists dismiss the terroirist argument as claptrap. John Dickenson, a retired professor of geology at Liverpool University in England, frames the terroir controversy in the context of a broader debate over which is decisive, the environment or human effort.

As Mr. Dickenson sees it, the fact that many of France's most celebrated vineyards have been heavily manipulated -- through the use of fertilizers, changes in drainage and other such modifications -- ''pulls the plug on the terroir argument.''

And yet, even if they have been tampered with, those vineyards long ago singled out as exceptional -- Haut-Brion, Romanée-Conti, Le Montrachet -- continue to produce what are generally considered the world's distinctive wines. Roger Bohmrich, a wine expert, says the fact that the personality and quality of the wines emerging from these vineyards have defied replication for so many centuries is a powerful indication that the site is critical.

Still, he concedes that, for now at least, the debate over terroir is unsolvable: ''It appears impossible to separate, with any scientific precision, the characteristics of wine derived from nature and those derived from the winemaking process.''

Continue reading the main story