Abstract
In this work, we examine the debate over thecommodification of agricultural germplasm in Mexico using aneo-Marxist theoretical framework. Specifically, we examine Mexico's movement away from a ``Farmers' Rights'' framework, whichtreats germplasm as a ``common good'' towards the passage of theMexican Federal Law on Plant Varieties, which sees germplasm as acommodity. In order to understand this legal change, the recenthistory of this discourse in Mexico is examined. Usingtheoretical insights based in an analysis of this discourse, weexamine the ideological elements of this debate. It is arguedthat an international hegemonic bloc has arisen to address thisissue, superceding the bounds of any single state entity andfunctioning through the international bodies of free trade.Taking the Mexican state to be relatively autonomous fromcapital, we argue that the hegemonic bloc influenced the changein Mexican policy. We conclude with a discussion of the possibleeffects of this legal change in Mexico.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Albrow, M. (1996). The Global Age. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Althusser, L. (1979). For Marx. London: Verso.
Buttel, F. H., O. F. Larson, G. W. Gillespie, and Rural Sociological Society (1990). The Sociology of Agriculture. New York: Greenwood Press.
Calva, J. L. (1995). “Razones y principios de una política agrícola integral incluyente de los campesinos.” In E. Moreno, F. Torres, and I. Chong (eds.), El sistema pos-cosecha de granos a nivel rural, problemática y propuestas. Mexico City: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México: Programa Universitario de Alimentos, p. 90.
Constance, D. H. and A. Bonanno (1999). “Contested terrain of the global fisheries: ‘Dolphin-Safe’ tuna, The Panama Declaration, and the Marine Stewardship Council.” Rural Sociology 64(4): 597-623.
Cullenberg, S. (1999). “Overdetermination, totality, and institutions: A genealogy of a Marxist institutionalist economics.” Journal of Economic Issues 33(4): 801-834.
Diario de Debates de la Cámara de Diputados del Congreso de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos (1996). Primer Período Ordinario. LVI Año III. No. 7.24, September, pp. 350-362.
Diario de Debates de la Cámara de Senadores del Congreso de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos (1996). Año III. Primer Período Ordinario. LVI Legislatura. No. 8 Thursday, October 3, pp. 7-26.
Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). (1989). Report of the Commission on Plant Genetic Resources. Rome: FAO.
Foucault, M. (1992). Genealogía del Racismo: de las guerras de las razas al racismo del Estado (translated by Alfredo Tzveibely). Madrid: Las Ediciones de la Piqueta.
Fowler C. (1994). Unnatural Selection. Technology, Politics and Plant Evolution. Switzerland: Gordon and Breach Science Publishers S.A.
Glenna, L. (1999). “Systemic constraints to ecological wellbeing: The case of the 1985 Food Security Act.” Rural Sociology 64(1): 133-157.
Gómez M. R. (1987). Vida Política Contemporánea. Cartas de Marte R. Gómez. Mexico City: Fondo de Cultura Económica.
Hall, S. (1996). “Race, articulation, and societies structured in dominance.” In H. A. Baker, Jr., M. Diawara, and R. H. Lindeborg (eds.), Black British Cultural Studies (pp. 16-60). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Kloppenburg, J. R. (1988). First the Seed: The Political Economy of Plant Biotechnology 1492-2000. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
McNally, R. and P.Wheale (1996). “Biopatenting and biodiversity: Comparative advantages in the new global order.” The Ecologist 26: 222-229.
Martínez G. F. (2000). La Globalización en la Agricultura: Las Negociaciones Internacionales en torno al Germoplasma Agrícola. Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico: Universidad de Guadalajara, Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social. Ph.D. thesis, Social Sciences.
Martínez G. F., G. Torres González, and G. Aboites Manrique (1998). “La Globalización el la Agricultura: El caso de la Ley Federal de Variedades Vegetales de México.” Unpublished manuscript, quoted with permission.
Marx, K. (1992). Marx's Capital (edited and introduced by C. J. Arthur). London: Lawrence and Wishart.
Nugent, D. and A. M. Alonso (1994). “Multiple selective traditions in agrarian reform and agrarian struggle: Popular culture and state formation in the Ejido of Namiquipa, Chihuahua.” In G. M. Joseph and D. Nugent (eds.), Everyday Forms of State Formation: Revolution and the Negotiation of Rule inModern Mexico (pp. 209-246). Durham: Duke University Press.
Patel, R. and R. Torres (1998). “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee: Monsanto, Hegemony, and the transgenic crops debate.” Paper presented at the 61st Annual Conference of the Rural Sociological Society, Portland, Oregon, August. Quoted with permission.
Polanyi, K. (1957). The Great Transformation. Boston: Beacon Press.
Poulantzas, N. (1976). “The capitalist state: A reply to Milliband and Laclau.” New Left Review 95: 63-83.
Rifkin, J. (1998). The Biotech Century. New York: Tarcher/Putnam.
Roseberry, W. (1996). “Hegemony and the language of contention.” In G. M. Joseph and D. Nugent (eds.), Everyday Forms of State Formation: Revolution and the Negotiation of Rule in Modern Mexico (pp. 355-366) Durham: Duke University Press.
SAGAR (1996). National Report. Mexico. Paper created for the International Technical Conference on Plant Genetic Resources, Leipzig, Germany, June.
Shiva, V. (1993). “Biodiversity and intellectual property rights.” In The Case Against Free Trade: GATT, NAFTA, and the Globalization of Corporate Power (pp. 109-120). San Francisco: Earth Island Press.
Torres, B. (1985). “Las Plantas Útiles del México antiguo segÚn las fuentes del siglo XVI.” In T. R. Rabiela and W. T. Sanders (eds.), Historia de la Agricultura: Epoca prehispánica Siglo XVI (pp. 65-67). Mexico City: Instituto Nacional de Antropopogía e Historia.
Weatherwax, P. (1954). Indian Corn in Old America. NewYork: McMillan Company.
WEDO (1995). Who Owns Knowledge? Who Owns the Earth? Intellectual Property Rights and Biodiversity under the New GATT and World Trade Organization. New York: WEDO.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Gómez, F.M., Torres, R. Hegemony, commodification, and the state: Mexico's shifting discourse on agricultural germplasm. Agriculture and Human Values 18, 285–294 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1011957308864
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1011957308864