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Localizing control: Mendocino County and the ban on GMOs

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Abstract

In March, 2004, the rural northern California county of Mendocino voted to ban the propagation of all genetically modified organisms (GMOs). This county was the first, and only, U.S. region to adopt such a ban despite widespread activism against biotechnology. Using a civic agriculture perspective, this article explores how local actors in this small county were able to take on the agri-biotechnology industry. I argue that by localizing the issue, the citizens of Mendocino County were able to ignite a highly effective, decentralized and grassroots social movement against which powerful, and well-funded, pro-biotechnology entities were unable to compete. The social problem of biotechnology was embedded in issues of mass concern to Mendocino County residents, such as democracy, equity, distribution of power, and corporate control over local life. The campaign was an arena for “local problem-solving activities organized around food and agriculture” (Lyson 2004, p. 103). However, though localizing this issue was key for generating a successful ban against the propagation of GMOs at the county level, the local orientation of the No to GMOs movement created a barrier for scaling-up and transferring this success to the wider anti-biotechnology movement.

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Notes

  1. See http://www.census.gov. There are undocumented Latinos in Mendocino County and these data, from the official 2000 Census count, likely underestimate this population.

  2. The entire text of the proposed ordinance is available at http://www.gmofreemendo.com.

  3. Cooperrider et al. (2004).

  4. Data available at http://www.co.mendocino.ca.us.

  5. None of these other battles were successful. In fact, in the months and years after Measure H became law in Mendocino, a number of states passed laws making it illegal to limit the propagation of genetically engineered crops—making local-level attempts like those in Mendocino County futile.

  6. This term is from Goode and Ben-Yehuda (1994).

  7. Abel and Stephan (2000) make this point in relation to civic environmentalism.

  8. As the county is quite small, these individuals and their professional and educational backgrounds, or at least their reputations, are quite well known.

  9. See the website for the Center for Ethics and Toxics, where Lappé was Executive Director until his death in 2005, for more information at http://www.cetos.org.

  10. This information comes from my interviews with a local resident who claimed to know of two people that were paid to attend such meetings. I was unable to confirm this from them directly.

  11. Not all agriculturalists were so inclined; the county Farm Bureau did not support Measure H.

Abbreviations

GMO:

Genetically modified organism

GM:

Genetically modified

DNA:

Deoxyribonucleic acid

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Acknowledgements

A preliminary draft of this article was written for a course given by Tom Lyson on Genomics, Agriculture, Food Systems and Development in the Department of Development Sociology at Cornell University. Thanks go to Tom Lyson, Max Pfeffer, and two anonymous reviewers for comments made on earlier drafts.

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  1. Department of Development Sociology, Cornell University, 119 Warren Hall, Ithaca, NY, 14850, USA

    Marygold Walsh-Dilley

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Correspondence to Marygold Walsh-Dilley.

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Walsh-Dilley, M. Localizing control: Mendocino County and the ban on GMOs. Agric Hum Values 26, 95–105 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-008-9176-3

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