Social Science Research Council

"Transgenic Crops and Transnational Activism: Controversies over Mexican Maize and Canadian Canola"

This dissertation seeks to understand the relationship between science and transnational activism in movements against genetically modified (GM) crops. Scientific debates over the potential effects of "transgene flow"--the cross-pollination of GM crops with their unmodified crop relatives--have recently erupted into intense public controversies. Two of the most prominent of these controversies revolve around the genetic "contamination" of Mexican maize and Canadian canola. The debates raise crucial questions about transformations in the global food system and the rights of farmers and consumers to protect their livelihoods and food traditions. In both cases, activists have participated in scientific debates and used scientific data to identify grievances and mobilize movement participants. These movements are linked to each other through a transnational network of activists and organizations. Through ethnographic research, including interviews with farmers, scientists and activists, this project will expand and refine sociological theories of the cognitive dimensions of social movements and the flow of information in transnational activist networks. I will explore three dimensions of the relationship between science and activism: 1) How do movement participants evaluate the claims of scientists and develop beliefs about the occurrence and effects of transgene flow? 2) Under what circumstances do movement participants contribute to or transform scientific debates about transgene flow? How do their opponents attempt to exclude them? 3) Do social relations within the activist network reproduce global power relations and a conventional lay-expert divide, or does the network challenge those power relations? Comparing the Mexican and Canadian movements--two nodes in a transnational activist network--will enable me to identify the ways that cultural and economic context affects the strategies of social movements against GM crops as well as their abilities to define the problem of transgene flow and find solutions for it.