Biotechnology and the Politics of Truth : From the Green Revolution to an Evergreen Revolution

This paper investigates why and how issues around the diffusion of GM technologies and products to developing countries have become so central to a debate which has shifted away from technical issues of cost-benefit optimisation in a context of uniform mass production and consumption in the North, to the moral case for GM crops to feed the hungry and aid ‘development’ in the South. Using comparison between agricultural biotechnology and the ‘Green Revolution’ as a cross cutting theme, the contributions of this paper are threefold. Firstly, by analysing biotechnology as a set of overlapping frames within a discursive formation, four frames are identified which summarise key challenges presented by biotechnology era. Secondly, the use of Foucault's concept of bio-power to synthesise key themes from the frame analysis illuminates the ‘revolutionary’ nature of the biotech revolution. Thirdly, the potential of actor-network theory to provide a tools for the empirical study of processes of (re)negotiation of nature/society relations in the context of agricultural biotechnology controversies is explored

From working collections to the World Germplasm Project: agricultural modernization and genetic conservation at the Rockefeller Foundation

This paper charts the history of the Rockefeller Foundation’s participation in the collection and long-term preservation of genetic diversity in crop plants from the 1940s through the 1970s. In the decades following the launch of its agricultural program in Mexico in 1943, the Rockefeller Foundation figured prominently in the creation of world collections of key economic crops. Through the efforts of its administrators and staff, the foundation subsequently parlayed this experience into a leadership role in international efforts to conserve so-called plant genetic resources. Previous accounts of the Rockefeller Foundation’s interventions in international agricultural development have focused on the outcomes prioritized by foundation staff and administrators as they launched assistance programs and especially their characterization of the peoples and ‘‘problems’’ they encountered abroad. This paper highlights instead how foundation administrators and staff responded to a newly emergent international agricultural concern—the loss of crop genetic diversity. Charting the foundation’s responses to this concern, which developed only after agricultural modernization had begun and was understood to be produced by the successes of the foundation’s own agricultural assistance programs, allows for greater interrogation of how the foundation understood and projected its central position in international agricultural research activities by the 1970s.Research for this article was supported in part by a grant-in-aid from the Rockefeller Archive Center

Die Begründer der Hamburgischen Wissenschaftlichen Stiftung

According to a senior citizen of a trading company in Hamburg, if “he is too stupid for sugar, let him study," Obviously, such an environment did not particularly appreciate science. Nevertheless, Senator Werner von Melle succeeded in collecting a sum of almost four million marks from many foresighted Hamburg citizens, so that the Hamburgische Wissenschaftliche Stiftung (Hamburg Scientific Foundation) was able to come into being on 12 April 1907. This first volume of the series "Patrons for Science" honours in short biographies all personalities who have been involved in the foundation's founding phase, either financially or through their participation on the board of trustees. Many of them have become well-known far beyond Hamburg, others have been completely forgotten. The book is introduced by the essay "Current Past" which embeds the founders of the foundation in the cultural and scientific-political context of Hamburg around the turn of the century

Keeping secrets from parents: Advantages and disadvantages of secrecy in adolescence.

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Multi-decadal shoreline changes in Eastern Ghana—natural dynamics versus human interventions

Human infrastructures, such as dams, seawalls, and ports, can affect both the sedimentary budget and nearshore hydrodynamics, enhancing and accelerating the loss or gain of coastal sediments. Understanding the processes and factors controlling beach morphodynamics is essential for implementing adequate adaptation strategies in coastal areas, particularly in those regions where coastal protection measures are scarce. This study analyzes shoreline changes in the Keta Municipal District, located in southeastern Ghana (West Africa). This area is characterized by the sedimentary input of the Volta River, forming a river delta situated to the west, i.e., updrift, of our study site. Following the construction of two dams (Akosombo and Kpong) on the Volta River in 1965 and 1982, groins and revetments have been built along the coast between 2005 and 2015 to reduce the high rates of coastal erosion in this area. Here, we explore the influence of these dams and the hard protection constructions on beach morphodynamics using historical maps and satellite images complemented by a shoreline survey undertaken with a differential GNSS in 2015. The multi-decadal evolution between 1913 and 2015 reconstructed for 90 km of shoreline suggests that local erosion rates in the region predate the construction of the two dams on the Volta River, indicating that these structures might not be the primary driver of coastal erosion in this area, as previously suggested. We emphasize that delta dynamics under conditions of high-energy longshore drift, modified by anthropogenic drivers such as sand mining, play a key role in the long-term evolution of this coast. Our results also show that the infrastructures built to halt coastal erosion result in localized erosion and accretion down-current along the coastline towards the border with Togo, highlighting the need for a transnational perspective in addressing the problems caused by coastal erosion

Environmental movements in space-time: the Czech and Slovak republics from Stalinism to post-socialism

To demonstrate the role of space and time in social movements, the paper analyses the evolution and context of the environmental movement in the Czech and Slovak republics from 1948 to 1998. It shows that the movement's identity was formed under socialism and that political opportunity and resource availability changed markedly over time, as did its organisational and spatial structure. The movement played a significant part in the collapse of the socialist regime, but in the 1990s was marginalised in the interests of building a market economy and an independent Slovakia. Nevertheless a diverse and flexible range of groups existed by the late 1990s. The successive space-times allow analysis of the multiple and changing variables that influence the geography of social movements

Das Soziale und die Differenz. Zur (De-)Thematisierung von Differenz in der Sozialpädagogik

Die Autorin geht der Frage der Thematisierung von Differenz in der Sozialpädagogik nach, wobei sie sich insbesondere auf die Momente konzentriert, „in denen Differenz (insbesondere deren Konfliktdimension) aus der gesellschaftlichen Wahrnehmung verschwindet bzw. zum Verschwinden gebracht wird – womöglich unter Zutun der Sozialpädagogik“. So zeigt sie zunächst an einer historischen Skizze (1. „Das Soziale und die Differenz“ in historischer und systematischer Betrachtung“), „wie die sich um 1900 herausbildende moderne Sozialarbeit bzw. Sozialpädagogik ihre Aufgabenstellungen an unterschiedlichen Dimensionen von „Differenzen“ entwickelte“. Dass eine „Ent-Stigmatisierung von Differenz durch Normalisierung (so in der Heimerziehung)“ aber auch „zur Verdeckung von Differenz und ihrer potentiellen Konfliktdimension führen“ kann, ist eine vor allem aus der geschlechterpolitischen Analyse gewonnene Beobachtung (3. „Politisierung der Differenz am Beispiel feministischer Sozialpädagogik“), die schließlich als „Ausgangspunkt für die Kennzeichnung der paradoxen Dynamik von Differenz als Spannungsfeld von Hierarchisierung, Skandalisierung, Normalisierung, Relativierung und De-Thematisierung“ (4. „Die Dynamik von Thematisierung und De-Thematisierung“) dient. „Der allgemeine Gedankengang“ bezieht sich dabei auf die „Machtanalytik Michel Foucaults“, dessen Denken „auch für eine geschlechtertheoretische Perspektive“ „produktiv zu nutzen“ ist. Im Ausblick (5.) fragt die Autorin schließlich „nach möglichem „Werkzeug zur Demontage“, zur Kritik und Reflexion von Machtverhältnissen, gerade im Feld – und im Medium - der Sozialpädagogik.“ (DIPF/ ssch