Neoliberal origins of anti-GM protest in Europe

Levidow, Les (2015). Neoliberal origins of anti-GM protest in Europe. In: Macnaghten, Phil and Carro-Ripalda, Susana eds. Governing Agricultural Sustainability: Global Lessons from GM Crops. Pathways to Sustainability. London: Routledge, pp. 179–185.

URL: https://www.routledge.com/products/9781138891821

Abstract

As the context for this article, the GMFuturos study analyses how the GM crop controversy symbolised a struggle against unwanted forms of neoliberal globalisation in three countries (India, Brazil and Mexico). This article likewise situates the European GM controversy within a long-standing European political agenda of neoliberal policymaking. A biotechnological vision of further industrialising European agriculture was promoted as an overall solution to the problem of European competitiveness. Through various policy and legislative frameworks, these institutional commitments foreclosed European futures, thus provoking conflicts over democratic accountability. As a main lesson to be drawn, political-economic contexts always define the nature of a technology, in turn as the basis for contextualising public responses.

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