Steve McGiffen

Professor Steve McGiffen gave a talk on "Genetically Modified Organisms: Unsustainable, Undesirable and Unnecessary" at New York University's Paris campus on November 24.

Professor McGiffen has done extensive research on the subject; he is the author of Biotechnology: Corporate Power versus the Public Interest (Pluto Press, 2005)

"My researches demontrated to me that the introduction of GMOs into agriculture is the latest stage of an attempt by a small number of major corporations to exert control over the global food supply at the same time that their power is making it more and more difficult for democratically elected governments, parliaments, and public institutions in general to control their activities. As a near self-sufficient food producer myself, I understand that seed-saving and cross-breeding are at the heart of successful small-scale agriculture. GMOs make this form of agriculture impossible. As a relatively prosperous citizen of a Western society, I am always aware that should my crops fail, I have alternatives. Most small farmers do not have this luxury and this transformation of agriculture which is being imposed takes their fate out of their own hands. I think this is indeed an issue which goes to the heart of the reality of modern international relations."

Dr. Steve McGiffen authored a paper entitled: "The European Union as 'Universalist' Project: Developing a Critical Left Response", in Politika Annual Journal 2009, published by the Politics and Public Administration Association of Hong Kong University.

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Dr. Steve McGiffen will address a workshop in Stockholm (Sweden) about European politics and the current condition of the left in government and opposition. The workshop is organized by the Swedish Labour Education Association on Saturday November 28th.

Dr. McGiffen's contribution is entitled 'Swimming Against the Tide: the Success of the Dutch Socialist Party in the First Decade of the 21st Century'. A paper with the same title will be published at the same time in Swedish translation by the Swedish journal Socialistisk Debatt.

Pluto Press (London) has released Dr. Steve McGiffen's book about the European Union and water privatization: Poisoned Spring: The EU and Water Privatisation, which he co-authored with EU Parliament member Kartika Liotard, of the Socialist Party of the Netherlands.

The authors' hypothesis is that European corporations, aided and abetted by the European Commission, are conducting a drive for privatization of water supply in developing countries which is exacerbating the problems associated with this essential service and jeopardizing the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.

Dr. Steve McGiffen participated in an international conference about rail privatization in Europe, hosted in London last June by the British Transport Labor Union RMT. The conference was attended by over 100 labor unionists from around the Eurasian continent, including Turkey and Latvia. Dr McGiffen spoke on the ideology driving the current privatization and its international roots.