Description

PROMPT: Chaia Heller, in her book Food, Farms & Solidarity: French Farmers Challenge Industrial Agriculture and Genetically Modified Crops(2013)[1]describes and analyzes the struggle of the French farmers union, Confédération Paysanne, against the introduction of genetically modified crops in France, and the challenge by small farmers and the Confédération Paysanne to industrial/postindustrial agriculture. First, briefly describe the founding of the Confédération, and the emergence of its leadership in rural France. (By the way, its leaders include farmers that produce the world-famous Roquefort cheese.) Second, describe its challenge in French law courts, scientific circles, and public media to the rights of transnational corporations to introduce genetically modified plants (and their associated pesticides) in France. Be sure to explain the argument for the French small farmers’ case against genetically modified organisms in terms of a “rationality of solidarity” in opposition to  corporate “instrumental rationality.”  Third, how did the later stages of Confédération Paysanne’s  campaign against GMO’s move “from risk to globalization,”  as in its appearance in the protests against the WTO in Seattle in 1999? Finally, discuss how Heller incorporates 2 of the 5 following theoretical approaches she mentions on pages 58-67 into her analysis of the anti-GMO campaign of Confédération Paysanne: poststructuralist political ecology, the approach of “alternative production rationalities,” applied science studies, actor network theory (ANT), and social movement theory. ADDITIONAL INSTRUCTIONS: 4 SOURCES MUST BE PEER-REVIEWED ARTICLES. 1 MUST BE HELLER’S BOOK. 1 CAN BE A BOOK, MAGAZINE, ARTICLE, WEBSITE, ETC.