Toward a Political Economy of Opinion Formation on ...

Toward a Political Economy of Opinion Formation on Genetically Modified Foods Author(s): Peter M. Rosset Source: Medical Anthropology Quarterly, New Series, Vol. 15, No. 1 (Mar., 2001), pp. 22-25 Published by: Blackwell Publishing on behalf of the American Anthropological Association Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/649624 Accessed: 19/10/2010 11:00 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=black. Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed page of such transmission. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

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PETERM. ROSSET

Toward a Political Economy of Opinion Formation on Genetically Modified Foods "Ifthequestionis havewe learnedanythinginrecentmonthsin thesociology, themediaorientation, yes we have learnedsomething."

tion of what I have called "a new international food movement" (Rosset 2000a).

-Robert B. Shapiro,Monsanto CEO, The Web of Self-Interest

TheNew YorkTimes,12 November 1999

n developing a "consideredsociology" of public beliefs aboutgenetically modified(GM)foods (Murcott, this issue), thereis a crying need for an approach rooted firmly in political economy.While it is certainlytempting to make the goal of such a sociology to go beyond "simple 'pro' and 'anti' alignments,"it may be more useful to understandwhy the public debate and people's beliefs areindeedso polarized. Although, in this issue, Murcott presents us with an interestingdiscussion of professional/expertand lay/popular knowledge and opinions, I prefera call to researchersto ask whatpoliticaleconomic forces have shapedboth and divided each into highly conflictive opposinggroups? I have my own hypotheses, of course, though space does not permita thorough analysis here. But I think thereareat least threekey variables:(1) the complex web of self-interestin the highly interconnectedand increasingly concentrated agrifood industry involved in the GM food commodity chain, (2) the astronomicalamountinvested both by individualcompaniesin their own advertisingand public relations campaigns and in industry-wide PR consortia,and (3) the power of the GM food issue to speed the agglutina-

A brief review of a recent GM food scare in the United States serves to highlight the natureof self-interest in whatmight be called the "anatomyof a gene spill."On Monday,September18, 2000, a coalition of biotech critics announced laboratorytests detecting the presence of GM corn, of a variety not approved for human consumption, in Taco Bell brandtaco shells. The StarLink corn varietyin questionproduces a Bt insecticide protein called Cry9C, which is a potentialhumanfood allergen because it is not broken down by digestiveprocesses.Laterthe same day, Aventis CropScience,the biotech giant that producesStarLinkseeds, responded with a press release challenging the credibilityof Genetic ID, the independentlaboratorythathad foundthe illicit presence of the variety. On September 22, Kraft,which sells the taco shells under the Taco Bell brand,issued a press release announcingtheir recall, while tryingto shift blame to lax government regulations that permit corn not approved for human consumption to be grown for animal feed, despite inadequate safeguardsto prevent their mixing in the food supply(Rosset 2000b). In studyingthis case, I am struckby the dense networkof transnationalcorporations(TNC) involved and the relationshipsamong them. At the centerof

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attentionwas a food processor (Kraft) owned by a tobacco company (Phillip Morris), paying a licensing fee to the world's largest fast food corporation (TriconGlobal, which owns Taco Bell, KFC, and Pizza Hut), itself a spin-off from PepsiCo, which boughtthe actual taco shells from a Mexican direct subsidiary of Pepsi (Sabritas), which bought the flour from the company (Gruma)that producesover half of the tortillas consumed in the world and is partially owned by America's largest grain processor (Archer Daniels Midland). Gruma,in turn, bought the corn fromfarmerswho boughtthe seed from a biotech conglomerate(Aventis CropScience) formed by the merger of two chemical companies (AgrEvo and Rh6ne-Poulenc),one of which (AgrEvo) was itself the product of the previous merger of the Hoechst and Schering pharmaceutical and pesticide giants (Rosset 2000b). This corporateagglomerationimmediately began damage controldesigned to place the blame on anyonebut itself: on consumerand environmentalgroups, on lax governmentregulatorsor regulations that are too strict, and so on (Rosset 2000b; see Miller 2000 for an example). In doing so, ample use was made of the growing pubic relationsindustryspecializing in selling GM food to the public, that is, dedicatedto shaping public beliefs. This raises questions about the new kinds of monopolistic and oligopolistic relationshipsand behaviorthathave arisenandtheirsignificancein thisdebate(see Krebs 1999 and Heffernan1999), as well as the role of the PR industry.

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theirconsortiaare devoting to molding public perceptionsof GM food, but we can be surethey areenormous.According to one industry press release, "A multi-year, industry-led public information programbegins today to share informationabout agriculturalbiotechnology in the UnitedStatesandCanada. The program,sponsoredby the Council for BiotechnologyInformation,will include a web site, toll-free consumer number,informationmaterialsandtelevision and print advertising" (BIO 2000). The council includes Aventis CropScience, BASF, Dow Chemical, DuPont, Monsanto, Novartis, Zeneca, and the Biotechnology Industry Organization.According to the St. Louis Post Dispatch (2000), while only one of several such efforts, the council has U.S. $250 million in resources to use over five years. Membersof various probiotechalliances are financing "scientific" research, organizing forums, lobbying legislators,regulators,andfarmorganizations,andretainingmajorpublicrelations firms (Barboza 1999). As Monsanto's CEO noted in the quote that opened this piece, the private sector is constructingits own sociology of public beliefs and adjustingits tactics as a result. Currentstrategyemphasizesusing "credible" scientists, academics, andfarmersto put forthproindustrypositions, instead of company spokespeople who, it turns out, the public doesn't believe (Barboza1999; see Altieri and Rosset 1999a, 1999b and McGloughlin 1999 to see how this might play out). It is indeed hardtoday to find probiotechscientistswho do not receive some sort of industryfunding The Public Relations Machinery (Science Friday 2000). The way in It may neverbe possible for us to de- whichthe privatesectoris using its conterminethe full extent of the resources siderablefinancialresourcesto act on its that individual biotech companies and "consideredsociology" absolutelymust

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be examinedin detail in any more academic "consideredsociology."

In order to understand, then, public beliefs about GM foods, we must integrate questions of economic concentration, strategies of and investments in A New InternationalFood Movement public relations, and social movement formation and impact. Polarization of The other side of the polarization beliefs, I believe, is strongly driven by equationsurelylies in the way the issue industry PR on the one hand, and by the of GM food has served to catalyze the issue itself becoming a historic catalyst discontentof diverse sectorsof national of social movement formation on the and internationalcivil societies around other.

food issues. At the startof the millennium, food, like no otherissue, has the ability to draw together actors who, ratherthan stand together in the past, have more often than not been at each other's throats.At the WorldTradeOrganization (WTO) protests in Seattle, we saw American farmers marching with Third World farmers, who they once saw as competitorsbut now see as companionsin struggle.Said one Wisconsin farmer,"TheWTO fight in Seattle woke a lot of Americanfarmersup to the fact that their fight isn't with farmersin Franceor India.The fight's with agribusinessand the whole corporate vision of forcing small farmersoff the land" (Rosset 2000a:136). American farmersalso marchedwith environmentalists,in the past set against each otherby the productionistmyth of food andjobs versus the environment.Their common anger over GM crops brought these strange bedfellows together, farmersbecause they can't sell theiraltered grain and feel that industrysold them a bill of goods, and environmentalistsbecauseof the risksthese new organisms present. Consumer groups marchedon GM food issues as wellwhile other food and agriculture"fellow travelers"in protestof a food system that is increasingly perceived as meeting few people's needs included farmworkers,landlesspeasants'groups, andwelfarerightsorganizationsprotesting cutbacksin food stamps.

References Cited Altieri,Miguel A., andPeterRosset 1999a Ten Reasons Why Biotechnology Will Not Ensure Food Security, Protect the Environmentand Reduce Povertyin the Developing World.AgBioForum2(3-4):155-162. Electronic document, http://www.agbioforum. org/vol2no34/altieri.htm. 1999b Strengtheningthe Case for Why BiotechnologyWill Not HelptheDeveloping World:Response to McGloughlin. AgBioForum 2(3-4): 226-236. Electronic document, http://www. agbioforum.org/vol2no34/altierireply. htm. Barboza,David 1999 Biotech CompaniesTake on Critics of Gene-AlteredFood. New York Times,November12. BiotechnologyIndustryOrganization 2000 Public Information Program on Biotechnology Begins April 3. Washington,DC; Pressrelease,April3. Heffernan,William 1999 Consolidation in the Food and AgricultureSystem:Reportto the National FarmersUnion. Columbia:Universityof Missouri. Krebs,A. V. 1999 CorporateAgribusiness:Economic Concentrationis Thy Name. The Agribusiness ExaminerNo. 55, November 17, 1999. Electronicdocument,http:// www.eal.com/CARP/agbiz/agex-55.html. McGloughlin,Martina 1999 Ten Reasons Why Biotechnology Will Be Importantto the Developing

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Food? Institutefor Food and DevelopWorld. AgBioForum2(3-4):163-174. ment Policy, Food FirstBackgrounder Electronic document, http://www. vol. 6, no. 4. Electronic document, agbioforum.org/vol2no34/mcgloughli. htm. http://www.foodfirst.org. Science Friday Miller,HenryI. 2000 Promise and Pitfalls of Using 2000 A Much Higher Standard for GeneticallyModified Crops in DevelGene-Spliced Foods. San Diego Union-Tribune,October5. oping Countries. Washington, DC: NationalPublic Radio, April 14. ElecRosset, Peter tronicdocument,http://www.foodfirst. 2000a A New Food Movement Comes of Age in Seattle. In Globalize This! org/media/interviews/2000/scifri4-00. html. The Battle Against the World Trade Organization and Corporate Rule. St. Louis Post Dispatch 2000 Biotech Rivals Team Up in Effort Kevin Danaher and Roger Burbach, to Sell Altered Food. St. Louis Post eds. Pp. 135- 140. Monroe,ME:Common CouragePress. Dispatch,April4. 2000b Anatomyof a Gene Spill:Do We Really Need Genetically Engineered

CHAIA HET,I,ER

From Risk to Globalization: Discursive Shifts in the French Debate about GMOs nne Murcott calls for a "considered sociology" of GM foods that recognizes the political economy of their production, consumption, and public reception. Elaborating on this, I propose an inquiry into the political economy of discourses surrounding GM foods: discourses emerging out of an economistic risk-benefit framework that is reproduced and normalized by such powerful institutions as biotechnology corporations, public relations firms, risk institutes, and national and international science regulatory bodies. My research concerns the French debate over GM foods and explores the role of powerful institutions in producing normative risk framings that often clash with competing framings presented by various sectors of civil soci-

ety (Heller and Escobar in press).1 The risk rationality that dominates discussions about GM foods is a product of riskification: the social production of beliefs, practices, and discourses that recast "natural" and institution-driven dangers as a set of statistically calculable, insurable harms assumed necessary for social progress. Through riskification, actors come to regard categories of self, nature, and society as fields of potential liabilities and benefits to be understood through cost benefit analysis. Stepping outside the parameters of a "risk rationality," particular publics within French society have framed science questions within a "rationality of sociality" that evaluates them in relation to potential impact on social fabrics, meanings, and quality of life (rather than on potential risks/benefits).