6th Global Conference
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Monday 2nd July - Thursday 5th
July 2007
Mansfield College, Oxford
Session 6: Morals, GM and Market Growth
Chair: Joanna Burch Brown
Dianoetic Virtues in Addressing a Morally Correct Treatment of GM
Rafaela
Hillerbrand
Future of Humanity Institute, Faculty of Philosophy, University of
Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
The ecological problems involved in new
technologies such as Genetic Modification do not necessitate to turn
away from traditional anthropocentric ethics. A recourse on existing
ethical conceptions will be shown to be advantageous as they can meet
the requirements of a reflective equilibrium. As neither the costs nor
the benefits of genetic engineering stop at country’ frontiers,
a cultural-independent justification of the moral norms which tell the
moral agent of how to address issues in the context of GM are necessary.
Not only does a reflective equilibrium
provide a suitable way of developing norms which can in principle be
accepted by all the person concerned. But a reflective is equilibrium
seems also indispensable for developing norms which meet some intuitive
feelings of justice.
The main part of the paper argues that in order to
meet the complexity of dealing with GM in real life situations, a syntheses
of a formal ethics inspired by Kant and a material utilitarian
account has to be supplemented by a virtue ethics approach. While within
this syncretistic account, matters of justice are addressed within the
Kantian framework, the virtue ethic account is primarily comprising dianoetic
virtues. It is argued that the formal concept of an antique wisdom, the
Aristotelian phronesis, is one way of enabling the political and economic
agents to implement the demands of justice. This approach is distinguished
form others by its flexibility to adjust to new challenges posed by new
technological developments.
The challenges which an antique phronesis
is bound to solve nowadays will be detailed along the problems GM poses
for individuals. A way of `communicating’ the dianoetic virtue
of wisdom and the way of how to apply it to environmental issues will
be adumbrated.
Can the Peasantry Decide? : A Sociological Study
of the Adoption and Impact of Genetically Modified Seeds in Warangal,
India
Ashok
Kumbamu
Department of Sociology,
University of Alberta, Edmonton,
Alberta, Canada T6G
Biotechnology is an innovative technology that could
potentially contribute to development. Yet, the consequences – opportunities
and risks – of
the technology are still unknown. Proponents of agricultural biotechnology
celebrate its virtues and propose it as an alternative to feed a hungry
world drawing upon the Malthusian logic (i.e., hunger is due to a gap
between food production and human population growth rate) that was used
by the proponents of the “Green Revolution”. Critics of this
technology reject the Malthusian claims and note that there is sufficient
food in the system, but food distribution is uneven, or many people are
too poor to buy food. They further argue that with the advent of biotechnology
and the new patent regime, there has been a growing trend of the commodification
of both agricultural inputs and output, the consolidation of the seed
industry, and monopolization of research and development. Thus the new
technologies have been used as an instrument to reproduce inequalities
in a society and dependency relations between the countries that develop
and the countries that adopt them.
In recent years, several studies have
examined the potential implications of genetically modified (GM) crops
for the peasantry in developing countries in general, and in India in
particular, but few have focused beyond economic cost/benefit analysis.
Issues related to the socio-economic and cultural aspects of farmers’ decision
making in the adoption of GM seeds, information gap between laboratory and the
peasant-farmer, and institutional support to farm management, and its impact
on the socio-ecological conditions of production have not yet been significantly
addressed. Considering this gap in the existing literature, this paper examines
and analyzes how the socio-economic (such as kinship, landlord-tenant relationships,
merchant-farmer relationships, identities, ethnicity, gender relations) and cultural
(such as media advertisements, seed companies’ mobile campaigns, billboards,
farmer-to-farmer advocacy) factors influence farmers to adopt or not adopt GM
seeds. Also, since farm management is crucial in GM cropping system, this paper
examines the role of agricultural extension support, and the flow and quality
of information about the specific cropping methods (such as “refuge mechanism”)
of the new seeds to the peasantry. Also examines the farmers’ receptivity
to the new cropping methods and its impact on crop productivity and the farm
environment.
This paper is based primarily on findings from field research conducted
on the adoption process and the socio-economic impact of GM cotton (Bt cotton)
in Warangal district in the State of Andhra Pradesh, India, in 2006. The main
reason for the selection of Warangal district is: In this district for the last
30 years there has been a noticeable agricultural land use change predominantly
from paddy to cotton. This led to rapid increase in the use of pesticides and
insecticides as well as unregulated digging of bore wells. Consequently, all
these activities resulted in deep socio-ecological crises, which have manifested
in the form of peasant-farmer suicides. In the past ten years, more than 1500
cotton farmers have committed suicide in the district. But, farmers in the district
are still overwhelmingly growing cotton with the hope that one good crop may
help them to come out of the debt trap. Against this background of crop failure
and farmer suicides, Bt cotton seeds were introduced into Warangal district by
Mahyco-Monsanto in 2002 with a premise that Bt cotton would increase productivity
and reduce dependency on pesticides, thereby alleviating economic and environmental
problems.
In this context it is very important to examine and analyze the adoption
process of Bt cotton and its socio-ecological implications for the peasant-farmers
in the district. Both agricultural ethnographic and village survey methodologies
were used to collect primary data, and secondary data were collected from various
government and non-government institutions. The analysis of my field research
will be presented in both descriptive and analytic forms.
The Market of GM between Economic Growth and Ecological
Development
Nicoleta
Dospinescu
Faculty of Economics and Business Administration at the "Alexandru Ioan Cuza" University, Iasi, Romania
The market of genetic modified products is the subject
of some polemic debates, because the technical-economic progress imposes
the promoting of GMO (Genetic Modified Organism), while the ecologic
development disagrees with this tendency. At the world level it is recorded
a spectacular evolution of the GMO’s market, the cultivated areas
with such plants increasingly developing, a fact that leads to obtaining
larger and larger productions.
On the other hand, the specialists consider
that, through a long-term alimentation with unnatural products, the human
health will suffer and the future generations can be put in danger.
The
aim of this paper is to take in consideration the problem of developing
the GM market. We put face to face the economic growth because of the
GMO and the ecological future of our planet. We choose the method of
argumentative analisys to point out the benefit and disadvantage of using
GMO. The case study on the Romanian country shows the imperfection of
implementing it and the risks that was genetared.
