On visions and new approaches Case studies of organisational forms in organic plant breeding and seed production

The report is an exploratory study of the social, financial and legal organisation, and technology applied in five initiatives in the sector of biological seed production and plant breeding in the Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland. The experiences of the studied initiatives are relevant in a period in which interest for organic seed and plant breeding is increasing. A number of the actors in the organic sector consider organic breeding a guarantee the availability of suitable seeds and varieties for the organic sector in terms of agronomic and quality traits. An important requirement is that seeds are produced and developed with technologies that are accepted in the organic sector. In addition, the organic sector is interested in breeding strategies that aim not only at economic, but also at social sustainability

A State of the Art of Self Help Groups in India

This paper considers the strategies of self help group for micro-enterprise development in rural areas. It seeks to answer the question of whether and under which conditions self help groups are an effective vehicle for organizing and representing local people in the development of community based micro-enterprises. Focusing particularly on examples from India in the context of food as a local resource, special attention is paid to success and failure factors of self help groups. While self help group strategies have been applied in the past as a blind replication of success models without considering the intricacies involved in group formation, success of self help groups is based on a thorough understanding of local conditions and possibilities to intervene

Exploring Possibilities to Enhance Food Sovereignty within the Cowpea Production-Consumption Network in Northern Ghana

Over the last years an important focus in the combat of hunger and malnutrition,particularly in Africa has been food security. This article explores possibilities for enhancing food sovereignty, as an alternative concept to food security and an alternative strategy for reversing hunger and malnutrition trends in developing countries. A combination of literature review, participatory appraisal and conventional survey methodologies are used to investigate the relevance of local cowpea (Vigna unguiculata) network regarding its importance vis-à-vis other crops, varietal choice, and consumption patterns in Northern Ghana from food sovereignty perspective. Findings reveal how people in poverty-stricken and hunger- hot- spot communities strive to conserve their biodiversity and production-consumption networks for posterity. Local cowpea varietal preferences are investigated for participatory breeding considerations to improve on seed access for sustainable production. Promotion of origin-based foods in the current fast growing globalised markets is recommended as a possibility to enhance food sovereignty for sustainable development in Afric

Articulating alternatives: Biotechnology and genomics development within crititcal constructivist framework

This paper explores critical and constructivist theories of technology, and discusses the political and ideological nature of (bio)technology development. The importance of a conceptualization of technologies as value-laden `socio-technical ensembles¿ is discussed, rather than as value-neutral objects, or tools. These conceptualizations are then used to sketch a continuum of development approaches which extends from their relation to a `transfer of technology approach¿, to an `endogenous technology development approach¿. This continuum inspires a rethinking of the possibilities to reconstruct biotechnologies and to tailor them to processes of endogenous development. In doing so, the value of participatory methodologies in coming to a contextualized biotechnology development is re-evaluated

Reassembling the Political: The PKK and the project of Radical Democracy

One of the most important secular political movements in the Middle East, the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) underwent a profound transformation in the 2000s. What the PKK has experienced in this period was a comprehensive restructuration of its organization, ideology and political-military struggle, changing its course towards a project of radical democracy. In this article we explore the content of this new project, and its practical implications. Through this discussion, our study addresses a gap in Turkish and Kurdish studies. Only few studies deal explicitly with the political ideology of the PKK. The data for this article has been collected through a study of Öcalan’s defence texts and his ‘prison notes’, along with key PKK documents, such as congress reports, formal decisions and the writings of its cadre, such as Mustafa Karasu. We conclude that the project for radical democracy is based on the conception of ‘politics beyond the state, political organisation beyond the party, and political subjectivity beyond class’ and can have the opportunity to change the centralist tradition in Turkish political system as well as the statist and class reductionist political thought in the Left in Turkey

Understanding today’s Kurdish movement: Leftist heritage, martyrdom, democracy and gender

Though an important political actor in Turkey, and also in Syria, Iraq and Iran, there are few detailed socio-political accounts of the Kurdish movement’s main political actor in Turkey, the Partiya Karkêren Kurdistan (Kurdistan Workers’ Party or PKK). This may be considered an important demerit of not only Kurdish and Turkish Studies but social and political sciences in general. In this special issue, we aim to address what may be less a gap in the literature than an academic blind-spot. Wit..

The Kurdistan Workers Party and a New Left in Turkey: Analysis of the revolutionary movement in Turkey through the PKK’s memorial text on Haki Karer

One of the banners the left had been marching behind in the 1970s was that of a ‘Fully Independent Turkey!’ – and yet, while these radical voices evaluated Turkey’s status as that of a semi-colony (of Western capitalist imperialism), it had turned a blind eye to Turkey’s own role as itself a colonizing country, vis-à-vis Kurdistan. In this article, we will discuss the contentious relationship between the PKK and the left, and the critique of the PKK on the left in Turkey (i.e. the perception of the PKK as Kurdish nationalist left by the Turkish nationalist left). We will argue that the PKK, itself emerging from the revolutionary left in Turkey sought for an ideological and political transformation of radical politics in Turkey, one that would free the left from the blind-spot of what was called ‘social-chauvinism’, an attitude in which there was only Turkey, no Kurdistan. We think such a study is of interest for those who want to understand the nature of the political struggle of the PKK. Data for this article has been collected by means of interviews and literature study