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In Seeding Empire, Aaron Eddens rewrites an enduring story about the past—and future—of global agriculture. Eddens connects today's efforts to cultivate a "Green Revolution in Africa" to a history of American projects that introduced capitalist agriculture across the Global South. Expansive in scope, this book draws on archival records of the earliest Green Revolution projects in Mexico in the 1940s and 1950s, as well as interviews at development institutions and agribusinesses working to deliver genetically modified crops to millions of small-scale farmers across Africa. From the offices of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to the halls of the world's largest agricultural biotechnology companies to field trials of hybrid maize in Kenya, Eddens shows how the Green Revolution fails to address global inequalities. Seeding Empire insists that eradicating hunger in a world of climate crisis demands thinking beyond the Green Revolution.
Price: $85.00
Pages: 206
Publisher: University of California Press
Imprint: University of California Press
Publication Date:
26 March 2024
Trim Size: 9.00 X 6.00 in
ISBN: 9780520395299
Format: Hardcover
"American scholar Aaron Eddens covers a wide swath of history and geography to let in a sliver of light, revealing how the African Green Revolution still carries the blight of the old one."
"A welcomed contribution to alternative histories of the Green Revolution."
"Seeding Empire is a deftly written intellectual history on how racial and imperial discourses can evolve from the opening moments of the Green Revolution to the present. It would be especially useful for graduate courses on development."
"Eddens offers both an unusually accessible entrée for readers new to this topic, and a trenchant analysis of the Green Revolution as discourse. In so doing, Eddens directs readers to the power wielded by stories."
"[Eddens] makes a crucial contribution to scholarship on agrarian change in contemporary Africa, which—despite many other angles of important critique—has often ignored less-than-overt dynamics of race and racialization. Even scholars less interested in the specifics of the New Green Revolution in Africa will find value in Edden’s efforts to trace these logics and examine their shifting manifestations. . . . He examines beneath the soil, probing roots and continuities, while laying groundwork for other scholars who may seek to examine the fruits of this empire."
"Eddens’s rather top-down analysis of the driving logics of Green Revolution memory makes an excellent case for the importance of bottom-up perspectives in development."
"A welcomed contribution to alternative histories of the Green Revolution."
"Seeding Empire is a deftly written intellectual history on how racial and imperial discourses can evolve from the opening moments of the Green Revolution to the present. It would be especially useful for graduate courses on development."
"Eddens offers both an unusually accessible entrée for readers new to this topic, and a trenchant analysis of the Green Revolution as discourse. In so doing, Eddens directs readers to the power wielded by stories."
"[Eddens] makes a crucial contribution to scholarship on agrarian change in contemporary Africa, which—despite many other angles of important critique—has often ignored less-than-overt dynamics of race and racialization. Even scholars less interested in the specifics of the New Green Revolution in Africa will find value in Edden’s efforts to trace these logics and examine their shifting manifestations. . . . He examines beneath the soil, probing roots and continuities, while laying groundwork for other scholars who may seek to examine the fruits of this empire."
"Eddens’s rather top-down analysis of the driving logics of Green Revolution memory makes an excellent case for the importance of bottom-up perspectives in development."
“A masterful study of ongoing Green Revolution initiatives in Africa. . . .Compellingly and concisely narrated.”
“An empirically rich historical account of twentieth and twenty-first century agricultural scientists working to transform Mexicans and maize through modern science.”
“Fascinating and well-researched.”
"A critical narrative through-line that helps readers understand the integrated and durable set of logics that motivate philanthrocapitalism.”
Aaron Eddens is an American Studies scholar and Assistant Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Grand Valley State University.
Contents
List of Figures
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Biotech Agriculture’s Final Frontier
1. How We Remember the Green Revolution
2. “A Green Revolution, This Time for Africa”
3. “The Landraces Are in the Hybrids”
4. Seeing Like a Seed Company
5. Securitizing Smallholder Farmers on the Front Lines of the Climate Crisis
Conclusion: What Can the Green Revolution Teach Us about Climate Change?
Notes
Bibliography
Index
List of Figures
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Biotech Agriculture’s Final Frontier
1. How We Remember the Green Revolution
2. “A Green Revolution, This Time for Africa”
3. “The Landraces Are in the Hybrids”
4. Seeing Like a Seed Company
5. Securitizing Smallholder Farmers on the Front Lines of the Climate Crisis
Conclusion: What Can the Green Revolution Teach Us about Climate Change?
Notes
Bibliography
Index