The postings on Monsanto and now the genetic engineered foods reminds me to ask if anyone knows of a book, studies, or essays on what I think of as the emerging biotech-argibiz-medical-genetics complex. Say what?
This is a combination of companies, government agencies and policies, university labs, and a general economic convergence of bio-technology companies who seem to form (at least in my mind) a new biological science base 'military-industrial complex'--if not yet in fact, at least by default.
The articles on Monsanto are exactly the kind of thing that occurred to me as a potential about four years ago as I was getting laid off from working in a plant science lab. We used a lot of specialized seed much of it produced by private seed companies, in addition to seed stock from other labs. We also depended on a large variety of commercial specialized bio-chemical compounds produced by another whole set of mostly smaller companies. Also, some mutants and their associated bio-chemical compounds (hormones, growth promoters, and special cultures) were supplied by the same company who produced the mutant seed lines. This combination of genetic materials and their bio-chemical associates form a basic store for the bio-tech industry. Now there is a much larger and more diverse set of both of these associated with animal studies (like live stock), and of course the medical, drug, and health industries and labs.
In one of my paranoid, grumbling moods over the state of the world, it occurred to me that all of these biotech institutions (education, corporations, and government agencies) could be put together as a new bio-tech industrial complex that strongly resembled the mutually supportive power cronyism that characterized the military-industrial-education-complex of the 40s-80s.
Then as I contemplated this 'synergistic' nightmare surrounding the biological sciences I thought, that such a complex could then with the addition of predatory capitalism, rule entire
human populations through food production, health and medical delivery systems, and of course reproduction through the economics of the same biotech-agricultural-complex. In other words form a bio-terror imperium. What makes this vision at least a possibility is the presence of megacorps like Monsanto, Chevron, and DuPont and their agricultural and related chemical product lines.
I am not sure if the article on Monsanto and cotton seed mentioned it or not, but it is possible to produce seed lines that are genetically engineered to be resistant to the effects of highly specific herbicides and insecticides, and which are otherwise non-viable (don't reproduce). So if you imagine how this works, it amounts to an agricultural 'system' built on genetically engineered plants and the particular fertilizer, hormones, growth promoters, herbicides, and insecticides that only work with that particular custom engineered species. This keeps production within a particular company and its patented product lines in a horizontal interlocking system. In principle, the same interdependent genetically engineered system can be used for live stock. Similar or related methods and applications follow for human health, medicine and reproduction.
The point here is not the moral question of whether we should have or buy genius children and eat superwheaties from Monsanto or Chevron--I am sure we will all have consumer choice. The point is that the development, application, and directed use of this suite of genetic and molecular technologies will be primarily driven by market capitalism and follow whatever that means, irrespective of the consequences beyond those of a concentration of profit and power.
So, has anybody seen or know of more studies or work along these lines?
It is nice to know that the sick thoughts of an unemployed and depressed mind of four years ago, are merely the bright promise of business facts of today. In my nightmare scenario, it was the NIH, the State and Commerce Departments who functioned as the synergistic centers of policy and funding--I was obviously privileging animal and human molecular genetics. How could I have been so stupid as to forget the Department of Agriculture and the forces of international trade and finance?
Chuck Grimes