Professor McGiffen Gives a Talk on GMOs in Agriculture at the European Commission

On 15th December Professor Steve McGiffen gave a talk to an invited group of officials at the European Commission in Brussels, on the subject of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) in agriculture. Professor McGiffen was the guest of European Commissioner for Social Affairs László Andor. The author of Biotechnology: Corporate Power versus the Public Interest (Pluto Press, 2006), McGiffen spoke about the political and economic aspects of the issue.

“I’m not a scientist,” he says “but I’m something of a science nut, and in order to explore this subject I have had to learn a lot of biology. However, my focus is on the way in which, in my view, a false consensus has been generated by powerful biotech corporations. This relates to the IR theoretical idea of ‘epistemic communities’, transnational networks of experts who act as advisors to elected and appointed decision-makers. What I believe we have here, and also in for example economic policy, are what I have called co-opted or embedded epistemic communities. Governments are receiving the same advice, and ignoring the views of many scientists who are just as qualified to comment. When I spoke at the Commission, I was able to go beyond theory – which is very important when you get outside academe to the sharp end of politics – and recommend some actual scientists who are critical of the use of GMOs in agriculture.”

Professor McGiffen, who worked at the European Parliament before taking up his post at the American Graduate School in Paris, says that “knowing the European institutional culture helped in being taken seriously. One of the people attending was my counterpart in the conservative group when I was environmental advisor to the left, during which time I worked on the present legislative framework governing the use of GMOs in European agriculture. Despite our political differences we’d got on well, but when he agreed to attend the talk he didn’t realize it was his old sparring partner, so that was a pleasant surprise.”

To request a copy of McGiffen’s talk, youcan contact him on steve.mcgiffen@ags.edu