Doctoral Dissertation Research in Political Science: Regulation of Genetically Modified Seeds in Developing Countries

本研究的目的是了解发展中国家如何制定有关转基因种子监管的政策。进行这项研究是为了了解发展中国家在管理农业生物技术发展所带来的机会和风险方面的政策选择。自1996年开始使用的转基因（GM）农业种子品种有望通过提高农业生产力来增加福利。转基因作物的广泛应用被认为是在有限的可耕地条件下满足不断增长的世界人口对粮食需求的唯一最佳解决方案，在一些国家，转基因品种已经完全占领了某些重要作物的种子品种组合。另一方面，还有一些国家出于卫生、环境和社会经济方面的考虑，甚至把向环境释放转基因种子定为刑事犯罪。虽然规范性的论点主导了辩论，但我们没有对这些截然不同的政策进行令人满意的比较研究，分析它们存在的原因以及它们如何构建农业最基本投入的种子市场。这个项目的智力价值在于它努力填补我们对这些政策理解上的空白。这项研究将局限于三种具有重要商业意义的作物——棉花、玉米和大豆——的商品链，并在两个层面上进行设计。首先是对阿根廷、巴西、印度、墨西哥和土耳其这五个国家从1996年至今的发展轨迹进行结构化比较。第二是对阿根廷和巴西的案例进行更详细的研究，在这两个国家，这些种子被广泛使用，但在知识产权保护和其他政策挑战方面采取了不同的方法。这个项目应该提高我们对以下问题的理解：为什么面临大致相似的国际制度和市场约束的发展中国家最终采取了不同的政策来管理转基因种子的挑战，以及这些政策是否按照政策利益相关者所期望的方式对种子市场产生了影响。这项研究将证明，在限制各国行为的共同国际制度（管理转基因种子和食品的各个方面的协定）的背景下，发展中国家可以有政策变化的余地。它还将大胆探索产生在国家一级观察到的宏观行为的微观基础。在阿根廷和巴西，通过采访各种利益攸关方（政治家和官僚、科学家、有影响力的私营部门和民间社会代表），联合倡议将收集有关在制定国家政策方面发挥决定性作用的考虑因素和利益的数据。通过将这些信息与公共政策文件、行业报告、农艺和经济专家的研究以及其他二手文献一起评估，该项目将提高我们对上述考虑和利益如何被政策所服务的理解。更广泛的影响与对一个尚未受到审查的重要政策领域的研究有关。这项研究将使我们能够更好地理解复杂和不确定条件下的政策形成，并有助于政治经济学的辩论；国际环境政治；科学、技术与社会（STS）研究。它还将为商业团体、决策者和对农业生物技术管理感兴趣的民间社会团体提供信息。

The purpose of this study is to understand how policies regarding the regulation of genetically modified seeds are made in developing countries. The research is being conducted to understand the policy options available to developing countries in managing the opportunities and risks arising from developments in agricultural biotechnology.Genetically modified (GM) agricultural seed varieties, which are in use since 1996, promise welfare increases through agricultural productivity enhancement. Their widespread adaption is advocated as the single best solution to meet the food demand of a growing world population with finite arable land, and GM varieties have already completely colonized the seed variety portfolio for certain important crops in some countries. On the other hand, there are other countries that went as far as making the release of GM seeds to the environment a criminal offense, moved by sanitary, environmental, socioeconomic concerns. While normative arguments dominate the debates, we do not have satisfactory comparative studies of such dramatically divergent policies, analyzing why they exist and how they structure the market for seeds, the most essential input for agriculture. The intellectual merit of this project is connected with its efforts to fill the gap in our understanding of these policies. The research will be confined to the commodity chains of three commercially significant crops - cotton, maize, soy - and is designed in two levels. First is a structured comparison of five countries' trajectories from 1996 to the present: Argentina, Brazil, India, Mexico, and Turkey. The second is the more detailed study of the Argentinean and Brazilian cases, where these seeds have been used extensively, but with different approaches to intellectual property rights protection and other policy challenges involved. The project should improve our understanding of why developing countries facing broadly similar international regime and market constraints end up with different policies for administering the challenge of GM seeds, and whether these policies have been consequential for the seed market in ways intended by the policy stakeholders. The research will demonstrate the latitude for policy variation available to developing countries in the context of a common international regime (agreements regulating various aspects of GM seeds and food products) constraining the behavior of countries. It will also venture to explore the micro-foundations that create the macro behavior observed at the country level. In Argentina and Brazil, by interviewing various stakeholders (politicians and bureaucrats, scientists, influential private sector and civil society representatives) the co-PI will gather data on the considerations and interests that have played decisive roles in shaping national policy. By evaluating this information together with public policy documents, industry reports, studies by agronomic and economic specialists and other secondary literature the project should improve our understanding of how said considerations and interests have been served by policy.The broader impacts are connected with the study of an important policy area that has not been subjected to scrutiny. The study will enable us to better understand policy-formation under conditions of complexity and uncertainty, and contribute to debates in political economy; international environmental politics; science, technology and society (STS) studies. It will also inform commercial groups, policy-makers, and monitoring civil society groups interested in the regulation of agricultural biotechnology.