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Food, genetics and knowledge politics

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posted on 2018-01-01, 00:00 authored by Reece WaltersReece Walters
The Routledge International Handbook of Food Studies is arguably the most comprehensive cross disciplinary expose’ of food in contemporary social life. Interestingly, its 34 chapters from internationally recognised scholars do not mention nor address issues relating to crime or genetic technologies (Albala, 2013). This is perhaps unsurprising given the relatively recent advent of ‘food crime’ and the rapid advances in agro-technologies. Indeed, Criminology’s interest in global debates of food insecurity is relatively new and even less interest, from a criminological standpoint, has been devoted to food and technology (Johnson and Walters, 2014). This is surprising given the links between corporate greed, governmental negligence and human starvation (Raghib, 2013). This edited book seeks to redress this oversight with a dedicated collection devoted to food crime and associated harms. As previous chapters have already alluded to, the World Food Programme reports that there are 795 million people worldwide who are undernourished (UNWFP, 2017). The fact that ten percent of the world’s population lives in a daily state of starvation and food insecurity, is an international crisis that Criminology can no longer ignore nor remain silent. As a discipline devoted to inter alia, exposing and examining behaviours and actions that cause social harm, human suffering, dislocation and disadvantage, it is imperative that issues of world hunger are critiqued through a pervasive lens of state and corporate power (Coleman, et al, 2010; Tombs and Whyte, 2015). In doing so, this chapter will draw on innovative discourses in green criminology to explore the issues of genetic technologies and the politics and power of food production and distribution. It argues that food crime must also be understood within the discourses, debates and contestations surrounding ‘knowledge’ and its application to food security, distribution and consumption. Those in positions of state and corporate power that have the means to shape the contours of global food trade, notably what is safe to eat and what is not, requires an examination of the ways in which ‘knowledge politics’ plays a crucial role in shaping public discourse and influences political debate. In doing so, this chapter extends definitions of ‘food crime’ to include a political economy analysis of food production, distribution and consumption and the ways in which ‘knowledge’ becomes imperatives in a global politics of power and profit.

History

Title of book

A handbook of food crime: immoral and illegal practices in the food industry and what to do about them

Chapter number

16

Pagination

265 - 280

Publisher

Policy Press

Place of publication

Bristol, Eng.

ISBN-13

9781447336020

ISBN-10

144733602X

Language

eng

Publication classification

B1 Book chapter

Copyright notice

2018, Policy Press

Extent

24

Editor/Contributor(s)

Allison Gray, Ronald Hinch

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