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From Green Revolution to Green Evolution: a Critique of the Political Myth of Averted Famine

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From Green Revolution to Green Evolution: a Critique of the Political Myth of Averted Famine From Green Revolution to Green Evolution: A Critique of the Political Myth of Averted Famine Roger Jr. Pielke and Björn-Ola Linnér The self-archived postprint version of this journal article is available at Linköping University Institutional Repository (DiVA): http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:liu:diva-160605 N.B.: When citing this work, cite the original publication. The original publication is available at www.springerlink.com: Pielke, R. J., Linnér, B., (2019), From Green Revolution to Green Evolution: A Critique of the Political Myth of Averted Famine, Minerva, 57(3), 265-291. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11024-019-09372-7 Original publication available at: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11024-019-09372-7 Copyright: Springer Verlag (Germany) http://www.springerlink.com/?MUD=MP Post print version– 1 March 2019 From Green Revolution to Green Evolution: A Critique of the Political Myth of Averted Famine Roger Pielke Jr. University of Colorado and Björn-Ola Linnér Linköping University 1 March 2019 Abstract This paper critiques the so-called “Green Revolution” as a political myth of averted famine., A “political myth,” among other functions, reflects a narrative structure that characterizes understandings of causality between policy action and outcome. As such, the details of a particular political myth elevate certain policy options (and families of policy options) over others. One important narrative strand of the political myths of the Green Revolution is a story of averted famine: in the 1950s and 1960s scientists predicted a global crisis to emerge in the 1970s and beyond, created by a rapidly growing global population that would cause global famine as food supplies would not keep up with demand. The narrative posits that an intense period of technological innovation in agricultural productivity led to increasing crop yields which led to more food being produced, and the predicted crisis thus being averted. The fact that the world did not experience a global famine in the 1970s is cited as evidence in support of the narrative. Political myths need not necessarily be supported by evidence, but to the extent that they shape understandings of cause and effect in policy making, political myths which are not grounded in evidence risk misleading policy makers and the public. We argue a political myth of the Green Revolution focused on averted famine is not well grounded in evidence and thus has potential to mislead to the extent it guides thinking and action related to technological innovation. We recommend an alternative narrative: The Green Evolution, in which sustain improvements in agricultural productivity did not necessarily avert a global famine, but nonetheless profoundly shaped the modern world. More broadly, we argue that one of the key functions of the practice of technology assessment is to critique and to help create the political myths that accompany technologies in society. 1 Post print version– 1 March 2019 Introduction In recent decades the calls for a “new Green Revolution” or “second Green Revolution” have surged.1 A simple Google search for the two phrases gives more than 170,000 results.2 Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates are among those who have called for a “second Green Revolution.”3 To understand what is implied in calls for this much- anticipated second Green Revolution it is important to understand what meaning is embodied by the notion of the first Green Revolution. When we look closely at the many calls for a new or second Green Revolution, we see vastly different hopes and expectations conveyed by the phrase. For instance, some anticipate new technologies of agricultural biotechnology necessary to feed the world.4 Others envision a more sustainable or equitable approach to agricultural production.5 Still others see the need for a Green Revolution through the lens of growing global population or climate change.6 In this paper we argue one of the leading stories that we tell about the Green Revolution – what it was or is and what it signifies for the future – is an example of “political myth,” which shapes not just how we view history, but how we associate the lessons of that history with contemporary policy action. Political myth is a long-standing, theoretical concept of the social sciences. Political myths are central to collective action, as they shape how issues are framed, and in particular, they provide a narrative basis for explaining in simple terms the cause and effect relationships that comprise policy. The narrative underlying a political myth provides a social group an account of past, present, and anticipated political events (Flood 2002, Clark 2002). The concept of political myth is thus useful to making sense of the simplified stories that we tell about history and its significance 1 See for example: https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=second+green+revolution%2C+new+green+revolution&y ear_start=1960&year_end=2008&corpus=15&smoothing=5&share=&direct_url=t1%3B%2Csecond%20gree n%20revolution%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Cnew%20green%20revolution%3B%2Cc0 2 www.google.com, search terms ”new Green Revolution” and ”second Green Revolution”, 25 September 2017. 3 http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/patna/Modi-presses-for-second-green-revolution-in- Bihar/articleshow/7612745.cms, 4 http://www.wsj.com/articles/growing-a-second-green-revolution-1416613158 5 http://www.thehindu.com/business/budget/aim-a-second-green-revolution/article6198871.ece 6 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/men/thinking-man/11216988/Population-growth-is-clearly-our-planets- number-one-problem.html 2 Post print version– 1 March 2019 for policy in the present and future. In particular, the details of a particular political myth serve to elevate certain policy options (and families of policy options) over others. As such, we argue that the construction and critique of political myth is a particularly important aspect of technology assessment. Our analysis proceeds in five parts. Part one provides an overview of the concept of “political myth” as a theoretical heuristic underpinning the subsequent analysis. Part two documents the emergence of the Green Revolution as a potent political myth focused on a brief period of agricultural innovation in the 1950s and 1960s as a central causal factor in averting a looming global catastrophe, expected in the 1970s. Part three critiques that political myth, arguing that the narrative of averted famine does not have strong grounding in evidence. Part four explores the mechanisms of political myth making in this instance, to explain factors underlying the Green Revolution’s political myth of averted famine. Part five concludes the paper by suggesting a remaking of the political mythology of the Green Revolution towards one more consistent with both history and contemporary understandings of innovation policies. Political Myth as a Theoretical Heuristic Political myth, and specifically the conception that we utilize in this analysis (Lasswell and Kaplan 1950, Lasswell et al. 1952), provides a systematic lens through which to understand the stories that we tell ourselves about historical occurrences. Such stories shape how we think about not only the past, but also the present and the future. The political myths of the Green Revolution encapsulate many different stories, having to do with issues of power, of science and of course, of food. One important element of the political mythology of the Green Revolution, and the focus of our analysis, is reflected in an oft-told story of averted famine: in the 1950s and 1960s scientists identified a looming catastrophe due to runaway population growth that would soon outstrip food supply. But then, based on this foreknowledge, the world took action to avert disaster – resulting in the Green Revolution -- and then obviously succeeded, as the predicted global famine did not happen. The Green Revolution thus provides a readily comprehensible narrative for the role of science-based technological innovation to avert crisis. That narrative -- focusing on a predicted 3 Post print version– 1 March 2019 apocalypse, that require intense technological innovation to be averted -- places scientists at the center of policy making as agents of warning, discovery and implementation. As we will see, this story is not well supported by historical evidence. Instead, evidence suggests that although malnutrition was a serious global challenge (and which remains a challenge today), the world was not facing unprecedented global famine in the 1960s. The Green Revolution was less of an intervention to prevent famine, and more the inexorable consequence of accelerated incremental (and ultimately highly significant) gains in agricultural productivity based on processes of continuous innovation, that continued for decades after the 1960s. The Green Revolution was a decades-long acceleration of the pace of agricultural productivity after the 1950s and 1960s that reshaped global agriculture, economies and, in some cases, entire societies. Scientists (in particular) helped to advance a political myth of the Green Revolution that emphasized rapidly averted famine that was not only self-serving, but also has developed into a narrative of the role of technology in society that continues to shape broader thinking about innovation. Our exploration of this particular political mythology of the Green Revolution is grounded in almost a century of research on the role of symbols in politics (cf., Pielke 2012). Lasswell and Kaplan (1950) posited that political myth can be usefully characterized into three parts: • doctrine (comprised of core beliefs) • formula (representing preferred actions) • miranda (the symbols that manifest core beliefs and preferred actions) Using this language, our focus is on the miranda of political myth in the case of the Green Revolution. In plain English, we are focused on stories that have come to be told that simplify the highly complex set of experiences that have come to be known simply as the “Green Revolution,” and set the stage for beliefs and actions in contemporary technology policies in agriculture and beyond.
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