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This book provides a sociological analysis of the controversy surrounding GM crops in Telangana, India. There is much debate as to whether GM technology holds the key to improving the welfare of poor farmers globally or serves primarily to increase the profits of multinational corporations while enhancing cultivator risk. Desmond's study is located in the economically vulnerable and politically volatile district of Warangal in Telangana, a context associated with high numbers of farmer suicides. Uniquely foregrounding the perspectives of cultivators and the landless, Desmond explores how GM crops are variously legitimated and delegitimated in three Warangal villages by those whose livelihoods are at stake in the debate, but whose voices are rarely heard within it. This book will be significant for those with an interest in GM crops, power and knowledge and their relation to understandings of development, democracy and risk management worldwide.
List of contents
Chapter One: Introduction - Legitimation and Genetically Modified Crops in a World at Risk.- Chapter Two: The Legitimation of Risk in the Villages.- Chapter Three: Bt Cotton and the Legitimation of Democracy.- Chapter Four: The Legitimation of Risk and Democracy in Telangana.- Chapter Five: Methodology: Legitimation and Ethics in Risk Research.- Chapter Six: Analysis I: Risk, Power and Bt Cotton in the Villages.- Chapter Seven:Analysis II: Democracy and State Legitimacy in the Villages.- Chapter Eight: Legitimation in a World at Risk: Lessons from the Villages.- Chapter Nine: Conclusion: Science, Power and the Struggle for Legitimation.
About the author
E.L. Desmond is a sociologist affiliated with the Centre for South Asian Studies at Cambridge University, UK and the Ireland-India Institute at Dublin City University, Ireland.
Summary
This book provides a sociological analysis of the controversy surrounding GM crops in Telangana, India. There is much debate as to whether GM technology holds the key to improving the welfare of poor farmers globally or serves primarily to increase the profits of multinational corporations while enhancing cultivator risk. Desmond’s study is located in the economically vulnerable and politically volatile district of Warangal in Telangana, a context associated with high numbers of farmer suicides. Uniquely foregrounding the perspectives of cultivators and the landless, Desmond explores how GM crops are variously legitimated and delegitimated in three Warangal villages by those whose livelihoods are at stake in the debate, but whose voices are rarely heard within it. This book will be significant for those with an interest in GM crops, power and knowledge and their relation to understandings of development, democracy and risk management worldwide.
Additional text
“Legitimation in a World at Risk: The Case of Genetically Modified Crops in India by
E. L. Desmond, brings to light the views of farmers on Bt cotton, the only genetically modified crop currently cultivated in India, in the context of legitimation of risk. … the author has produced a thoughtprovoking work that navigates this controversial topic with a new lens, by digging deep into politics and society in village India.” (Anitha Ramanna-Pathak, American Journalof Sociology, Vol. 124, May, 2019)
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"Legitimation in a World at Risk: The Case of Genetically Modified Crops in India by
E. L. Desmond, brings to light the views of farmers on Bt cotton, the only genetically modified crop currently cultivated in India, in the context of legitimation of risk. ... the author has produced a thoughtprovoking work that navigates this controversial topic with a new lens, by digging deep into politics and society in village India." (Anitha Ramanna-Pathak, American Journalof Sociology, Vol. 124, May, 2019)
