Biotech in Bangalore

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Biotech in Bangalore

• The contested politics of technology

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Contexts

• Rapid economic growth and technology-led
  industrialisation (notably IT sector)
• Competition between Indian states and Chief
  Ministers - for foreign investment
• Bangalore pitched as a knowledge hub for
  biotechnology, linking public and private science
• Civil society opposition to GM crops protests,
  crop burnings etc.

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Key questions

• How do debates about (agri) biotechnology
  frame/co-construct broader visions of
  development?
• How does the politics of Indias (Karnataka
  states) new knowledge economy define the role
  of (bio)technology?
• What alternative spaces for debate about
  technology and the politics of knowledge are
  there, and what impact do they have?

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Biotech in Bangalore two narratives

• From IT to BT. State support for new investments
  in biotech industry (mostly small start-ups doing
  contract research for US/European biotech
  companies)
• From the Green Revolution to the Gene
  Revolution. GM crops (Bt cotton) to help solve
  the cost constraint problems of agriculture.
  Joint public-private efforts, including State Ag
  University, Monsanto etc.

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Network politics Karnatakas Millennium Biotech
Policy

• 1999 New state government, under tech-savvy
  CM, S.M. Krishna key advice networks from the
  IT/business world
• 2000 Biotech Vision Group formed, chaired by
  biotech entrepreneur, Kiran Muzumdar-Shaw and
  steered by IT and BT Secretary (elite
  public/private expertise with direct route to CM
  hailed as a new way of doing business/policy)
• 2001 Policy launched with much fanfare by core
  network, focusing on IT-BT narratives -
  commitments to tax breaks, biotech park, ibab,
  state biotech devt council. And some research
  infrastructure for GM crop research (in Dharwad),
  a concession GR narrative
• 2002-04 Persistence of network
• 2004-06 Upsets and confusions.

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A stable discourse coalition?

• The Biotech Vision Group network including
  cooption of the ag science community
• Basic political platform of State government
  tech led growth, at all costs
• International accolades and backing from Monsanto
  to Tony Blair
• Core media support the Bangalore/India success
  story
• Dissent accommodated, marginalised, ignored
• A vision of development based on technology/the
  knowledge economy, premised on competing in
  global economy, with trickle down benefits to the
  poor. The states main focus should be to
  facilitate this and not fall behind.

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But.other voices, other actions

• Resentments of Vision Group approach/leadership
  (reluctant cooption by (public sector) ag
  scientists who wanted more of a GM crops focus)
• NGO campaigns KRRS protests, Citizen Juries,
  court cases etc, with media profile keeping the
  GM crop issue alive
• Electoral politics... IT/BT vs the rural poor
  became a key part of election discourse in 2004
  and since (with 2 changes in state government
  resulting)
• Farmers who planted GM Bt cotton in large
  quantities over this period
• Conflicting and confusing opposition to the
  policy framework neither coherent nor
  convincing, and fairly easily dismissed

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Lessons.

• Core discourse coalition and associated vision
  of development - remains strong, despite setbacks
  .Why?
• Narratives in neo-liberal world, technology is
  seen as a means capturing efficiency gains/global
  comparative advantage and so generating economic
  growth. A good thing.
• Actors/Networks influential elite actors
  promote the narrative line, and are have
  interests (commercial, political etc.) aligned
  with it
• Politics/interests Wider political economy,
  inc.. a combination of the particular (Indian)
  trajectories of capitalist development under
  globalisation, the reality of large investment
  flows, and emergent political configurations
  locally and globally.
• Alternatives - views are fragmented, often
  poorly articulated and not strategically focused.
  Little space to debate technology and the
  politics of knowledge in the new India setting
  closing down, not opening up.

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Implications?

• Science and technology central to development
  debates must go beyond the pretence of
  rational, scientific approaches to
  policymaking to an appreciation of wider politics
  and values.
• Choices about technology are about fundamental
  (political, societal) choices for the future, and
  should not be left to the expert/elite machinery
  of policymaking.
• Biotech requires a new style of politics and
  policymaking. Requires opening up new spaces for
  debate about the politics of knowledge and
  technology, and bringing these firmly into the
  mainstream of contemporary political debate
• Is this the old debate about democratising
  science and technology or more than this?

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