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The public inquiry as acontested political technology:GM crop moratorium reviews inAustraliaRichard Hindmarsh a & Anne Parkinson aa School of Environment, Griffith University , Nathan ,Brisbane , AustraliaPublished online: 27 Jun 2012.

To cite this article: Richard Hindmarsh & Anne Parkinson (2013) The public inquiry as acontested political technology: GM crop moratorium reviews in Australia, EnvironmentalPolitics, 22:2, 293-311, DOI: 10.1080/09644016.2012.698882

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The public inquiry as a contested political technology: GM crop

moratorium reviews in Australia

Richard Hindmarsh* and Anne Parkinson

School of Environment, Griffith University, Nathan, Brisbane, Australia

In 2007, the Australian states of Victoria and New South Wales heldreviews of their moratoriums on the commercial release of geneticallymodified (GM) food crops. The public inquiry form of review selectedoffered the best strategic pathway to amend these moratoriums to allowcommercial release. As such, the reviews represented ‘political technolo-gies’. This proposition is informed by: their formation within a policycontext of pro-GM development, which saw ‘stacked’ pro-GM reviewpanels, narrow terms of reference, and outcomes favouring a narrowcoalition of agbiotechnology interests; the critical literature on publicinquiries; and other evidences that suggest the underlying purpose of thepublic inquiries was to reach the inescapable conclusion that themoratoriums should be changed. While contributing to the literature onthe public inquiry, particularly in relation to science, technology andenvironmental governance, these findings also invite the suggestion of newdeliberative forms of the public inquiry to more adequately addresslegitimacy and policy effectiveness.

Keywords: the public inquiry; political technology; GM crops;agbiotechnology; public participation, legitimacy, policy effectiveness

Introduction

The environmental release of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) inAustralia, like many places worldwide, has found intense opposition andcontroversy since the early 1980s with the proposed US release of transgenicfrost-resistant bacteria (e.g. Jukes 1986, Hatchwell 1989). Contested knowl-edges about environmental release abound within science itself and acrossscience/non-science boundaries. These knowledges are found in scientificreviews, technology and risk assessments, economic and social analyses, mediareportage, policy and non-governmental organisation (NGO) documents, and

*Corresponding author. Email: r.hindmarsh@griffith.edu.au

Environmental Politics, 2013Vol. 22, No. 2, 293–311, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09644016.2012.698882

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public inquiries and their submissions. Such knowledge contestation revealsconsiderable uncertainty and disagreement about the development, environ-mental impacts and social usefulness of GMOs. But influencing any attainmentof certainty is where different ‘epistemic cultures’ have been found to result in‘a new strategic scope . . . for actors who have special discursive or economicpower in the field of knowledge policy’ (Boschen 2009, p. 517). Attempts todefuse contestation in this way, however, typically yield outcomes that lacklegitimacy and policy effectiveness, which often remain contested until closureof controversy can be attained (e.g. Beder 1991).

In early 2008, two controversial genetically modified (GM) knowledgepolicy outcomes that indicated such political contexts occurred in theAustralian states of Victoria and New South Wales (NSW). At that time,these states, after carrying out reviews on their moratoriums on the commercialrelease of GM food crops as normal governmental policy obligations,1

diverged from the status-quo of all Australian canola-growing states havingmoratoriums of this type. Victoria let its moratorium expire and NSWmodified its moratorium to allow the exemption of GM crops for commercialrelease (that held such approval from the federal Office of the Gene TechnologyRegulator (OGTR)). That these decisions were controversial was marked by ahigh number of submissions to the reviews (as public inquiries), the topic ofinquiry itself, and strong media, commentator and public attention.

Following our analysis of the reviews (hereafter, moratorium reviews), aspresented below, we posit they significantly expanded the role of Australian‘GM’ public inquiries as a policy conduit for empowering GM proponents (e.g.Hindmarsh 2008, Parkinson 2009).2 Like prior inquiries,3 it is clear they wereformed within a broader policy context of pro-GM development, regulationand review (e.g. Tranter 2003, Hindmarsh 2005, 2008, Salleh 2006, Lawson andHindmarsh 2006, Parkinson 2009, Reynolds 2009, Dibden et al. 2011).4 Suchcontext and bias suggests these reviews as ‘political technologies’ (followingFoucault 1990),5 as a form of ‘non-decision-making’, which suppresses orthwarts a latent or manifest challenge to the values or interests of the decision-maker, and ‘consciously or unconsciously creates or reinforces barriers to thepublic airing of policy conflicts’ (Bachrach and Baratz 1962, p. 949), and hence,contesting knowledge claims (also Latour 1987, Bourdieu 2004).

The moratorium reviews significantly expanded the role of the GM publicinquiry as a facilitative but questionable conduit for GM development. This isbecause they posed new heights of controversy in relation to lack of fairness,legitimacy and policy effectiveness around the public inquiry on science andtechnology, emphasised by such a contentious issue as the commercial releaseof GM food crops. They not only featured narrow terms of reference, butselected ‘pro-GM’ review panels from the non-governmental sphere incomparison to prior GM inquiries conducted in the parliamentary arena. Inthis context, we raise the following questions: Why were public reviews held aspart of normal government practice of reviewing these moratoriums? Why andhow did the outcomes unfold as they did, and what does this mean in terms of

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legitimacy, public participation and policy effectiveness?, and, Why does thisform of the public inquiry suggest or invite participatory redesign according tothe thrust of new modes of science, technology and environmental governance(e.g. Backstrand et al. 2010)?

In addressing these questions, we first discuss the ‘political’ nature ofthe public inquiry. We then provide a background of the lead-up period to theapproval for commercial GM crops in Australia in 2003, and then to theVictorian and NSW moratoria reviews in mid-2007. We then deconstruct (orunpack) these reviews as multidimensional discourses of power/knowledge,involving analysis of ‘social context’ (the form of the review panels), the‘discursive field’ (the terms of reference and the submissions), and the ‘text’ (thereview reports, their announcements and outcomes) (following Fairclough1992, see also Rogers-Hayden and Hindmarsh 2002). In concluding, wehighlight issues of public exclusion from decision-making, particularly forfarmers as key stakeholders in agri-food production and any adoption of GMcrops. To address such issues, we advance participatory redesign of the publicinquiry for better environmental governance of controversial science andtechnology. Overall, the paper contributes to how knowledge ‘management’and agenda control can be socially constructed through the public inquiry, asparticularly relevant to the projection of benefit claims of science andtechnology such as GM crops (see van Lente 2000). This highlights the roleof the public inquiry as an important aspect of science, technology andenvironmental governance, and why it merits special attention in contexts oflegitimacy, public participation and policy effectiveness.

The ‘political’ nature of public inquiries

Many reasons exist to hold a public inquiry (Kemp et al. 1984, Prasser 1985,Brown 2003). Public inquiries include royal commissions, task forces,committees, reviews, and working parties (Prasser 1985, also Wynne 2011).They have ‘no formal constitutional basis for their existence; rather, theirappointment, terms of reference, and resources are made at the discretion ofgovernment’, and they ‘normally have no role in implementing theirrecommendations – that role remains with government’ (Prasser 1985, p. 1).Public inquiries are undertaken in liberal democracies as a distinctive part ofthe political system and policymaking process, the explicit aim being thecollection of evidence generally for policy learning and to provide ‘a statutoryright for citizens to be heard’ (Elliot and McGuinness 2002, p. 15).

In the case of the moratorium reviews, the Premier of Victoria, SteveBracks, in announcing the reviews stated, ‘the three-person panel, to be chairedby Professor Sir Gustav Nossal, was the next step in the Government’s carefuland considered approach to the use of gene technology . . . as a cautiousapproach towards commercialisation of GM canola’.6 In turn, the NSWgovernment stated it was, ‘keen to canvas all the possible options andstakeholder opinions before making a decision on the future of GM crops’

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(New South Wales, Department of Primary Industries 2007). These statementswhile elaborating little on the intent of Victoria and NSW to hold the reviews,align to normative intentions of public inclusivessness and several reasons tohold public inquiries.

A primary reason is to resolve a highly contentious issue that has attractedsignificant distrust in government. An associated one is to help governmentmanage complex technological systems (Elliot and McGuinness 2002, alsoAshforth 1990). These two reasons are particularly applicable with respect tocontroversial science and technology (S&T) areas, such as new genetics,nuclear and renewable energy, or electromagnetic fields. To resolve a highlycontentious issue, as Prasser (1985, p. 3) outlined, invariably ‘a group ofoutsiders in the form of an inquiry is needed to absolve the innocent and judgethe guilty’; where the notion is that inquiries are ‘independent and fair’.

Another reason to hold an inquiry can be to depoliticise the issue underquestion (Brown 2003), and remove government from possible blame about theoutcome/s. This, in turn, can aim to invite perceptions of governmentalneutrality, in turn, legitimacy, and the regaining of public trust. Similarly,Habermas (1977, cited in Brown 2003, p. 108) advanced that public inquiriescan be held to investigate problems threatening the state with a legitimationdeficit, with the aim to re-establish and justify state authority.

However, critical appraisal of public inquiries has also highlightedquestions of legitimacy and policy effectiveness regarding knowledge claims,public engagement and outcomes. In this regard, science and technologyinquiries have featured well (e.g. Baker 1988, O’Riordan 1988, Mercer 2002,Ankeny and Dodds 2008, Hindmarsh 2010, Wynne 2011). Marking a lack ofpolicy effectiveness is the often significant divergence between a review’sfindings and the views of many or a majority of its submissions, resulting inbroad non-acceptance of the findings (Besley 2010). Such outcomes oftenreflect the more manipulative intent of non-decision-making, when publicinquiries can be held to appease the discontent of public interest groups withpotentially sufficient power to destabilise industrial development programmessupported by the state; and/or to maximise gains for favoured key interests(Ashforth 1990).

Following this line of argument, Burton and Carlen (1979, p. 8) suggestedthat inquiries may also represent ‘a system of intellectual collusion . . . toreplenish official arguments with both established and novel modes of knowingand forms of reasoning’. This outcome reflects what Rogers-Hayden andHindmarsh (2002) found with regard to the outcomes of New Zealand’s 2000–2001 Royal Commission on Genetic Modification; also what Hindmarsh andHulsman (2004) found with the report of the Australian government’s inquiryinto genetically modified organisms (1990–1992). Concerning the latter, forexample, while public interest submissions (47% of the 167 submissions)advocated inclusive public participation at all stages of GMO policy andresearch and development assessment, the inquiry only recommended publiccomment on proposed GM releases if considered ‘desirable’ by the regulatory

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authority, and that only the responsible minister have discretional power toorder public hearings (Hindmarsh 2008, pp. 191–192).

Background to the GM moratorium reviews

During 2000–2002, global issues around GM ‘contamination’ became pivotal incrystallising concerns about the risks of commercial GM crops, particularly fromfarmer, consumer and environmentalist standpoints. Priming these concerns wasthe US ‘StarLink’ corn contamination incident of October 2000. Traces ofStarLink, an Aventis GM corn, had appeared in taco shells throughout theUnited States, even though unapproved for human consumption. Later, in a 2003settlement, StarLink Logistics and Advanta USA agreed to pay US$110 millionplus interest to farmers whose crops were tainted with StarLink corn, or who hadsuffered from a drop in corn prices due to the resistance of consumers and retailoutlets to StarLink corn (Uchtmann 2002, Arasu 2003).

Closer to home, in 2000, continuing regulatory breaches of GM canola fieldtrials saw the state of Tasmania introduce a three-year moratorium on GMfood crops to protect the marketability of its produce (Tasmania 2001, p. 5).Under its Plant Quarantine Act, guidelines sought to minimise proliferation ofGM crops undergoing field trials through potential cross-pollination with wildrelatives. Journalist Geoffrey Lean of the UK Independent wrote: ‘[This] willblow a hole in the pro-GM policy of the Australian government which hasbeen perhaps the US administration’s closest ally in pushing the technology’(Lean 2000). In addition, a number of local councils throughout Australiadeclared their jurisdictions as GM-free zones, as also occurred in neighbouringNew Zealand (Rogers-Hayden and Hindmarsh 2002). The activist Network ofConcerned Farmers (NCF) also emerged to foster increased farmer awarenessand action about GM issues, which were seen as interrelated economically,socially and environmentally, and to canvass for more effective and broaderregulation.

In following these developments, and informed by notions of technologyrisk and trust (e.g. Beck 1992), Parkinson interviewed 54 NSW canola farmersin mid-2002 about GM canola cropping (Parkinson 2009, also, Parkinson andHindmarsh 2003). Parkinson found the farmers held three primary andinterrelated concerns of livelihood, environment and technological depen-dency. First, maintaining markets for non-GM products, as export marketsmight reject GM (contaminated) produce. Second, that the GM herbicide-tolerance trait might also outcross and contaminate weeds, making weeds moredifficult to control and thereby stimulate increased herbicide application (whichwould also contradict the promise of GM crops to reduce herbicide usage).Third, that increasing corporate ownership of agricultural technology wouldreduce farmers’ autonomy to choose cropping pathways.

The marketability argument was supported by commodity dealersincluding the Australian Wheat Board, which, in 2003, had found a third ofits customers held zero tolerance for GM grain (Hemphill 2003). On the

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environmental and consumer front, Greenpeace Australia, the AustralianGenethics Network, Friends of the Earth, the Australian Consumers Associa-tion, the Biological Farmers of Australia, and the Tasmanian and NSWGreenspressured for ‘responsible regulation’ of GMOs. In response to such argumentsand pressures, and in anticipating that the Office of the Gene TechnologyRegulator (OGTR) would soon approve commercial cultivation of GM canola,Western Australia, NSW, the Australian Capital Territory and South Australiaplaced moratoriums on the commercial release of GM food crops on grounds ofmarketability. Economic grounds were the only ones that states could opt out ofreleasing GMOs according to the mirror federal and state legislation of the GeneTechnology Act 2000 (Tranter 2003, Dibden et al. 2011). In addition, Victoriaplaced a one-year moratorium specifically on GM canola (extended in 2004),and Tasmania extended its existing moratorium to June 2008.

These policy turns climaxed during the public comment period of theOGTR’s risk assessment of the proposed commercial release of BayerCropScience’s herbicide-resistant canola. The 256 written submissions, 531campaign letters and five petitions (OGTR 2003, p. 150) far exceeded publiccomment on previous proposals to release GMOs, even though the submissionprocess represented a weak form of public participation with little decisionalinfluence (e.g. Tranter 2003, p. 255).

On 25 July 2003, the OGTR approved Bayer CropScience’s GM canola forcommercial release. Notably, in announcing the approval the Regulator,‘encourage[d] farmers and the public to become fully informed about all aspectsof GM crops’ (OGTR 2003). This comment seemed to imply that ‘farmers andthe community [were] uninformed about crucial aspects of biotechnology’(Schibeci et al. 2006, p. 437); that they had a cognitive deficit for legitimateknowledge or meaningful policy input even though farmers, for example, werethe main risk bearers and users in any adoption of GM crops. But there was alsothe suggestion that such comment – from an appointed regulator widely seen inenvironmental circles as strongly pro-biotechnology7 – aimed to delegitimisedissenting farmer (and other public) knowledges and views. It was notable themonth after the OGTR’s approval that Biotechnology Australia (2003) – thefederal agency with prime responsibility for the development of gene technology –released the findings of an Australia-wide survey of 500 farmers’ attitudes to GMcrops, which found 49% of farmers opposed GM crops.

Nevertheless, three months later, on 2 October 2003, the OGTR also issuedin-principle approval for Monsanto’s application for commercial cultivation ofits GM canola. In response, a Network of Concerned Farmers (2003b) pressrelease titled: ‘Why trust the regulatory process?’ called for a review of the GeneTechnology Act 2000 and of the role of the OGTR on grounds of neglect inevaluation. The NCF argued a strong bias in favour of GM crops had led tothe Regulator ignoring its legislated responsibilities to protect the environment(NCF 2003a, also Tranter 2003, Lawson and Hindmarsh 2006). Followingmany earlier regulatory breaches involving ‘gene escapes’ from Australian trialsites, this claim seemed validated only a month later when flowering canola

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plants again escaped from a (Bayer CropScience) trial plot into a neighbouringfield (Hindmarsh 2008, pp. 256–257).

Conversely, for those favouring GM development, the state moratoriapresented a significant barrier. Pro-GM interests soon mobilised and began tointensively campaign to collapse the moratoria, despite issues that keptsurfacing, which questioned the operation of the OGTR and any collapse ofthe moratoria. For example, in 2004,

it became public knowledge . . . that the Australian Government was notattending to a report by the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial ResearchOrganisation (CSIRO), which pointed to some 150 aspects of uncertaintysurrounding GM crop development, three-quarters of them not regularly lookedat by the OGTR. (Salleh 2006, pp. 404–405)

Other expert appraisals followed. For example, in 2005, Kiyork’s (2005, p. 152)summation of the Gene Technology Act 2000, and approval of MonsantoAustralia’s Roundup Ready canola, found ‘limited scope for public participa-tion and lack of emphasis on the precautionary principle also demonstrate[d]the inability of the scheme to adequately meet its objective of protecting theenvironment against the risks associated with biotechnology’.

Soon thereafter, Lawson and Hindmarsh (2006, pp. 42–44) analysed theRegulator’s risk assessment of, and license granted to, the GM canolaapplication of Bayer CropScience (2002). These authors’ found an absence ofquantitative data about the GMOs (and GM products) for which the licensewas sought; a failure to identify, acknowledge or address inherent valuejudgements in the assessment of risks; a failure to assess long-term orintergenerational assessment of potential impacts, particularly the degree ofenvironmental risks; the non-disclosure of data and information from earliertrials of (Aventis CropScience) GM canola; and acceptance of supporting data(some unpublished) from the applicant (Bayer CropScience). Such question-able assessment suggested the need for stronger public participation, as well asexpert pluralism (for example, the inclusion of ecologists) to ensure moreresponsibility in the decision-making of the OGTR on environmental release.

Also questioning the capacity of the OGTR to assess risk was Ariel Salleh –Associate Professor of Social Ecology at the University of Western Sydney,who served on the inaugural ethics committee of the OGTR in 2001–2004.Salleh (2006, p. 400) reflected:

as the Gene Technology Act 2000 stands, bureaucratic compartmentalism, anoutmoded model of genomics, a naıve concept of ‘value free’ risk assessment,result in intricate methodological dilemmas being treated reductively, and thusinaccurately, as routine aspects of scientific management. In each case, the intentis technocratic control, but the unintended effect is a kind of ‘organizedirresponsibility’.

Organised irresponsibility seemed pronounced with the OGTR ethicscommittee invited to address the interplay of values and risks of GMOs,

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but procedurally isolated from decisional influence for environmentalrelease. Decisional influence was only held by the technical committeedominated by laboratory-based bioscientists, a long tradition in Australia’sGMO regulation (Hindmarsh 2008). In addition, both the ethics andcommunity committees were disallowed by the OGTR from inviting publicparticipation in their deliberations on the risks of releasing GMOs (Salleh2006).

Despite the critical appraisals, the manoeuvres of the pro-GM coalitionstrengthened as the moratoriums continued. An influential narrative was thatcommercial GM canola growing would allow farmers to compete on worldmarkets (Foster and French 2007, O’Neill 2007). Coalescing around thisnarrative of ‘potentially missing out’ was a discourse coalition that fostered aburgeoning portfolio of positive GM reports and studies.8 This promotion,which targeted government, heralded a concerted effort by bioscience andindustry to challenge the moratoria. It climaxed prior to the Victorian andNSW reviews of their moratoriums, which began in May and July 2007respectively (with both moratoriums due to expire in February and March2008, respectively).

The moratorium review panels and processes

The Victorian inquiry stated that: ‘The Panel came to the task with an openmind’.9 Likewise the NSW inquiry cast its exercise as ‘independent’. Suchmessages project images of neutrality, fairness and inclusion (Prasser 1985). Itthen seemed contradictory that only limited profiles of the panel members wereplaced on the reviews’ respective websites inviting submissions. Both websitesomitted that four of the six reviewers from both state reviews had biologicalscience and agricultural research or farming backgrounds supportive of GM.10

Furthermore, that two of the key reviewers were directly associated with newgenetics research, with one of the latter and two other reviewers associated (inholding important positions) with organisations undertaking GM research.Also unmentioned was that the chair of the Victorian review panel had longpromoted transgenic crops in a book series (Nossal 1984, Nossal and Coppel1989, 2002). In addition, some reviewers had overlapping organisationalmembership.11

For both reviews, the terms of reference reflected the narrow regulatoryarrangement established by the Gene Technology Act 2000, which hadinformed the implementation of the moratoria in the first place. Toreiterate, this specified marketability (or economic) grounds as the onlygrounds allowed for states and territories to opt-out of field trialling orgrowing GM food crops if they so chose (Tranter 2003, Reynolds 2009,Dibden et al. 2011). The arrangement, which disregarded environmental riskgrounds, was devised by federal and state bureaucrats from departmentssupporting GM development who had formulated the Act (Hindmarsh 2008,pp. 225–226).

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Accordingly, the Victorian review focused on assessing ‘economic impacts’while NSW focused on ‘marketing, trade and investment’ issues, with regard tothe consideration of extending or lifting the GM moratoriums. Human healthand safety issues and environmental impacts, were excluded, as being beyondthe scope of mirror state gene technology legislation. This posed a dilemma forconcerned farmers and other stakeholders raising interrelated social, economicand environmental concerns. The narrowness and non-representation of whatfarmers considered as everyday practical realities, as well as other short-comings presented by the review processes, prompted the following criticismfrom Greenpeace Australia anti-GM campaigner Jeremy Tager (2007, p. 1):

Once again, the public is presented with a sham process. Rather than beingprovided with a proper, public, accountable and transparent ParliamentaryInquiry, we are faced with review panels that are unrepresentative, biased, subjectto direct political pressure and with procedures that are neither adequate norappropriate. Comment periods are too short. Lack of full communityconsultation is inexcusable. Time frames for reports are too short to allow thekind of inquiry that needs to be done. There is no representative of NGOs,organic growers, concerned marketers etc. The process is not accountable. Theextent of consultation, the manner in which testimony is heard, issuesinvestigated, conclusions [are] reached is not public.

Nevertheless, the NSW review received 1365 submissions and the Victorianreview 1178. Excluding pro-forma ones of anti-GM campaigns, the NSW reviewreceived some 200 submissions and the Victorian review 248, which representedfar more than the submissions received for each prior GM public inquiry.

The submissions

Submissions in favour of lifting the moratoriums came from agbiotechnologydevelopment interests (government, corporate and research and developmentorganisations) with support from major farmer organisations, the NationalFarmers Federation (NFF), the NSW Farmers Association (NSWFA), and theVictorian Farmers Federation (VFF). Supportive of extending the morator-iums were submissions from organic and biological farmer organisations aswell as the Network of Concerned Farmers; the food retail industry;environment and consumer groups; and some 20 individual farmers fromeach state (DPI NSW 2007, DPI Victoria 2007). Some of the latter – alsomembers of the NFF, NSWFA and VFF – stated their farming organisationsdid not represent the views of members accurately about GMOs. Studies (e.g.Halpin and Martin 1999) and media reports had also found deep divisions inthe ranks of these farmer organisations (e.g. Brennan 2003), particularly overthe lifting of the GM moratoria in NSW and Victoria (Leung and Guerrera2007, Perriam 2007, Chandler 2008).

Such diverse views within the farming sector questioned the justification ofboth reviews’ recommendations to amend or lift the moratoria, particularly inrelation to ‘strong industry support’ for an industry managed segregation plan

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to address contamination issues (DPI NSW 2007, DPI Victoria 2007).Challenging that view had been those of individual farmers and other farmerorganisations (e.g. the NCF and organic and biological farmer associations),which consistently raised issues that questioned co-existence with regard tocontamination affecting market access and price premiums for non-GMcanola, and liability for contamination of non-GM produce. Nevertheless, thereviews adopted the view that segregation was manageable, and that liabilityconcerns could be effectively managed under redress to common law, as anearlier review of the Gene Technology Act 2000 had recommended.

The outcomes

On 27 November 2007, Victoria and NSW announced simultaneously theirintentions to alter the status of their moratoriums. Victoria announced itsmoratorium would expire in February 2008, after which all federally-approvedGM food crops could be commercially released unless an order banning theircultivation was made under the Control of Genetically Modified Crops Act 2004(Vic) (Dawson 2008). Ten days later, the NSW government amended its GeneTechnology (GM Crop Moratorium) Act 2003,12 which was extended until July2011 (and later until 2021). The GM canola specific moratorium orders wereamended by a blanket moratorium on all GM food crops (see AgrifoodAwareness Australia n.d.), with powers of exemption.13 The power to exemptany GM food crop (holding OGTR approval) began with a new NSW ExpertCommittee (comprised of representatives of the food plant industries),provided advice on:

whether an industry is prepared and capable of segregating GM and non-GMfood crops . . . [where] the Minister will have the power to refuse approval tocultivate a specific crop if an industry fails to meet the criteria imposed by theexpert committee.14

Soon after these amendments, the NSW Expert Committee assessed a long-standing 2007 application for commercial release of GM canola. On 14 March2008, approval was granted (DPI NSW 2008). This development suggestedalignment to the announcement of the NSW government about the modificationof its moratorium: ‘NSW farmers will be given the choice to grow the type ofcanola crop they want, putting them on a level playing field with overseasfarmers for the first time’. In turn, this reflected the drive for internationalcompetitiveness, a key ongoing tenet of Australian agricultural policy, and,again, the ‘fear of missing out’ narrative (see Dibden et al. 2011, pp. 111/117).Such framing of ‘future benefits’ for GM technology development also precededthe Australian House of Representatives 1999 Inquiry into Primary ProducerAccess to Gene Technology.15 Announcing this inquiry, committee chairpersonVictorian Liberal MP Fran Bailey (1999) stated: ‘Gene Technology will be thenext great worldwide revolution after the industrial and the informationtechnology revolution . . . We cannot afford to be left behind in this debate.’

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Providing further insights of how the reviews suggested politicaltechnologies were revealing features of Victoria’s review report, the announce-ment of the expiry of its moratorium, and the reaction to that.

Victoria’s report and announcement

A key problematic with regard to fairness of representation concerningVictoria’s terms of reference was presented by an ambiguity in the inquiryreport. The terms of reference referred to economic grounds only. But theinquiry report drew substantively on the report of its consultant ACILTasman, which at one point stated:

A continuation of the moratorium would also deny Victorian farmers thepotential use of a range of next generation GM canola traits such asenvironmental stress tolerance, improved oil qualities and high value newindustrial and human health traits. (ACIL Tasman 2007, p. vii)

Explicit interrelationships between economic, social and environmental aspectsof GM crops were thus projected, in contradiction to the terms of reference.Conversely, interrelationships of contamination and farmers’ livelihoods raisedin the submissions that tended to confront the desired stand-alone economicargument were downplayed.

Also undoubtedly vexing for concerned farmers and other interests werea number of questionable statements – with regard to legitimacy andeffective policymaking – made in Victoria’s announcement to end itsmoratorium, which featured Premier John Brumby and review panel chairGustav Nossal. Brumby made the argument that when the moratoriumswere put in place:

a range of farmer groups had mixed views about the use of GM canola, and whatthe Review Panel has found . . . is that there are now huge supporters of GMcanola . . . the Victorian Farmers’ Federation, the Australian Grains Council, theAustralian Diary Industry Council, the Australian Oilseeds Federation, ABBGrain, the Australian Food and Grocery Council, the Birchip Cropping Group,Crop Life Australia and Graincorp. (Premier of Victoria 2007, p. 2)

Following on, Nossal stated: ‘The industry, four years ago, was very doubtfulabout these technologies, now, with a couple of notable exceptions, 90 per centof the industry is for the lifting of the moratorium, and for giving farmers thechoice’ (Premier of Victoria 2007, p. 3). Yet, most industry players mentionedrepresented the agribusiness lobby canvassing the end of the moratoriums, withCrop Life Australia – the peak body of corporate developers – a leading one.As for the claim of 90% of the industry in favour, this figure was not cited inthe Victorian review panel report (DPI Victoria 2007). Another misrepresenta-tion was in regard to the cited support of the Australian Food and GroceryCouncil (AFGC). This was because the day before the review announcements,Goodman Fielder, Australia’s largest food company and a key member of the

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AFGC, and 250 other food companies ‘call[ed] on the governments to extendtheir bans on GE food crops’ (see Food Processing 2007).

Turning to ‘independent’ representation of inquiry, Nossal also sought tojustify the selection of the reviewers to make credible judgements:

I said [to former premier Steve Bracks] you will know that I’m a strong believer ingenetic science and that, as a general point, I’m for GM science. That’s not to saythat I’m necessarily for, before I go in and look at the evidence, not continuing themoratorium – they’re two very different things. (Premier of Victoria 2007, p. 9)

Amongst many criticisms of such claimed independence, the view of VictorianLabor MP Tammy Lobato – a backbencher in Brumby’s government, whorepresented the large rural district of Gembrook – was notable. Lobatoquestioned the independence of Nossal, ‘branding as ‘‘seriously compromised’’his government-appointed panel’, as journalist David Rood (2007, p. 5) ofThe Age further reported:

‘In 2002, Gus Nossal saw the issue of adoption of GM as merely a public relationsbattle that had to be won. His stance was so entrenched that (multi-nationalcompany) Monsanto used his statements in their own marketing,’ she said. In anABC radio interview last year, Sir Gus said the ban on GM crops was ‘crasspopulism’ and bad policy and politics.

The Victorian Local Government Association was also unconvinced (ABCNews 2007), as was the Australian Grain Harvesters Association, which‘expressed dismay that the moratorium had been lifted without granting itsmembers legal protection from court action over contamination’ (Truman2007). Also notable was that in the month the Victorian moratorium expired, aRural Press Marketing Survey found that 54% of Victoria’s grain growers didnot support Victoria lifting its moratorium (Thompson 2008).

Conclusions

From this excursion into the politics of the reviews of the GM moratoriums inVictoria and New South Wales, our conclusion is that the reviews constitute themost recent key policy ‘event’ in Australian GM regulation aiming to facilitateagbiotechnology development.16 In this case, to introduce GM food crops intoAustralia on a commercial basis for widespread adoption. In these discursivepolicy turns, the concerns and dissent of farmers (as well as consumers, key foodcompanies and retailers, environmentalists, and concerned scientists) were largelyconfined or ignored as key stakeholders in any adoption of new agrigeneticstechnologies. Consequently, biocommercialisation was introduced and madeeasier in the biopolitical struggle over the intense social, economic andenvironmental contestation of the perceived risks, costs and benefits of GM crops.

Clearly, the moratorium reviews represented a key conduit to furtherentrench large agbiotechnology and pro-GM farming interests. Alternatively,to disempower dissenting views with potential to destabilise bioindustrial

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development programmes supported by the state and bioindustry. Theselection of review panel members and their terms of references signalledthis, as did the review announcements and reports which replenished officialarguments about the promise of GM and potential investment. Concomitantly,the ACIL Tasman consultancy report for Victoria’s review revealed animportant ambiguity in relation to the terms of reference as solely economic. Itdid this by referring to interrelated health, environmental and economicaspects, clearly believing they were relevant, seemingly inseparable, whichfarmers (and other contesting interests) had consistently argued in vain.

What the moratorium review findings then point to is that both reviews andcurrent regulation were proactively ‘shaped by the political context in which aparticular investment proposal is conceived and born’ (Kemp et al. 1984, p.478), through the use of the public inquiry, which indicated its application as apolitical technology. Overall, the reviews appeared as a largely remedialprocess to re-establish and extend legitimation of dominant (corporate andstate) institutions and their investment (following Ashforth 1990, Gephart1992, p. 131). Applying this form of non-decision-making as a strategy ofpower, contesting interpretations, claims, rationalities or logics, particularlythose of public interests and farmers, were undermined or suppressed. AsBachrach and Baratz (1970, p. 17) argue, those exercising such non-decision-making become ‘placed in a preferred position to defend and promote theirvested interests and, more often than not, are the ‘‘status quo defenders’’ of aminority or elite group within the population in question’. As Besley (2010)pointed out, such decision-making defines or highlights policy ineffectiveness.

The indication then is that the underlying purpose of the reviews was toreach the inescapable conclusion that the moratoriums should be modified orexpired. A framing of ‘independent’ scientific, environmental and farmingexpert authority, as well as economic authority (that is, of ACIL Tasman in thecase of Victoria), was essential to the making of such a conclusion for closure(although unsuccessful) of the socially and environmentally risky controversysurrounding the commercial release of GM food crops.17 The selection of thepublic inquiry mode of review thus presented the most strategically legitimatepathway to alter the status of these moratoriums to allow commercial releaseof GM food crops. Arguably, if the review had been conducted internally bygovernment, such alteration would likely have attracted far more publicattention and dissent.

What thus appeared most hidden to the public eye in these reviews was lackof ‘procedural fairness guaranteeing both private rights and (various) publicinterests’, a criterion that Kemp et al. (1984, p. 480) posited is essential to thelegitimacy of the political, as well as to the legal and administrative models ofthe public inquiry. In turn, such findings reflect key criticisms of public inquiryprocess (Elliott and McGuiness 2002, p. 16). First, the reviews were notimpartial. Second, the process was not thorough as the terms of reference wereambiguous or contradictory, in not allowing for interrelated economic, health,and/or environmental issues to be raised through submissions although hired

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inquiry consultants were apparently able to through endorsement of the reportby the inquiry. Third, the underlying purpose was clearly not to remedy theconcerns of all parties but more so limited interests in favour of ending themoratoriums, that is, a coalition of gene technology development interests.Such findings do not inspire confidence in the Victorian and NSW GMmoratorium reviews as legitimate procedures and practices of fair andtrustworthy governments or governance.

Instead, in contested knowledge contexts of legitimacy, arguably inreflecting a ‘crisis of legitimation’, and of environmental and agri-foodsustainability, the review procedures and practices invite further criticalreflection and investigation as to the validity of their recommendations. Inaddition, with regard to engaging citizens and diverse stakeholders in processesthat reflect sufficient inclusion to satisfy the intent of the public inquiry toprovide ‘a statutory right for citizens to be heard’ in contexts of policy learning(Elliot and McGuinness 2002, p. 15).

But perhaps such inclusion can only be satisfied through new forms of publicengagement that redesign these ‘passive’, limited or technocratic examples orforms of the traditional public inquiry? Limitations include inquiry terms ofreference decided upon by elites in non-transparent and narrow representativeprocedures of formulation; the selection of reviewers which exclude citizenrepresentatives and include obviously biased ones; and where the major form ofpublic participation is submissions placed in a ‘black box’ for consideration orthat invite their strategic selection for decisional influence.

With the stakes high for society in choosing the best pathways forsustainability transitions and food security, the biased manner in which theVictorian and NSW GM crop moratoriums were lifted and modified,respectively, to allow commercial release of GM food crops, highlights theneed to pay close attention to the public inquiry as an important policy tool. Inthe form of the GM moratorium reviews held by Victoria and NSW – whichappears to typify the thrust of many other public inquiry constructs as politicaltechnologies in the context of non-decision-making – the place of the traditionalpublic inquiry in transitional times of governance (e.g. Jasanoff 2004), or inrealising the participatory claim of the public inquiry, is thus highly questionable.Arguably, a new deliberative public inquiry approach (e.g. Horlick-Jones et al.2006, Rogers-Hayden and Pigeon 2007, Ankeny and Dodds 2008, Hindmarsh2010), along the lines of new participatory modes of science, technology andenvironmental governance (Backstrand et al. 2010), is a more promising optionfor such highly contested knowledge controversies in terms of ensuring adequatelegitimacy, public participation, and policy effectiveness.

Notes

1. For Victoria, see: http://www.dpi.vic.gov.au/agriculture/science-and-research/biotechnology/genetically-modified-crops/moratorium/review [Accessed 3 December2011]. For NSW, see: http://www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/agriculture/field/field-crops/oilseeds/canola/gm [Accessed 3 December 2011].

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2. For example, see the reports of the 1992 House of Representatives StandingCommittee on Science and Technology Inquiry into Genetically ModifiedOrganisms; and the 1999 House of Representatives Standing Committee onPrimary Industries and Regional Services Inquiry into Primary Producer Access toGene Technology. See also the government senators’ dissenting report issued inresponse to the 2000 Senate Inquiry into the Gene Technology Bill 2000.

3. The one exception was a Senate Inquiry (Senate Committee 2000) into theGene Technology Bill 2000. The inquiry report made a point of stating thatgovernment needed to ‘listen to the community, to explain developments in therapidly evolving gene technology area and to have regard to community concernsin this area’.

4. For the wider international context, see, e.g. Gottweis (1998), Rogers-Hayden andHindmarsh (2002), Andree (2002, 2011), Krimsky (2005), and Walters (2011).

5. Political technologies can include discourses, techniques, devices, interventions,apparatuses, procedures and strategies deployed to secure favourable outcomes forthose who construct and use them.

6. News Archive: Aus – Victoria announces review of GM canola moratorium.Available from: http://www.afaa.com.au/news/n_news-2025.asp [Accessed 26December 2011].

7. For example, Bob Phelps of the Australian Genethics Network, cited inHindmarsh and Hulsman (2004, p. 61).

8. Examples include Focus, the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences andEngineering’s (ATSE) magazine, which ran a special GM issue in 2006; theCSIRO, which ran a special pro-GM feature in ECOS magazine in 2007 (O’Neill,2007); and the Australian Institute of Agricultural Science and Technology withtwo pro-GM journal editions in 2007.

9. See: http://www.dpi.vic.gov.au/DPI/nrenfa.nsf/LinkView/5477226A88881F86CA2572E300074EEF89E6C67B468BD2A7CA256FB70001BAB8#comp [Accessed20 April 2010].

10. One reviewer was vice president and member of the pro-GM Victorian FarmersFederation Grains Council. Another was a member of Food Science Australia,with research programmes on functional foods, also involving GM crops. See:http://www.foodscience.csiro.au/ [Accessed 27 April 2010].

11. For example, the Grains Research and Development Corporation, whichprioritised GM crop R&D from the early 1990s (Grains R&D Corporation1993); and the Board of the Future Farm Industries Cooperative ResearchCentre. Among the programmes of the latter is the development of salt-tolerantrecombinant crop lines, one involving a CIMMYT Mexico researcher (seeMullen et al. 2009). Notably, CIMMYT have long been involved with thedevelopment and promotion of GM crops internationally and work closely withagribusiness and biotechnology corporations (Hindmarsh 2008), for example,Syngenta.

12. The 2003 Act was amended by the Gene Technology (GM Crop Moratorium)Amendment Act 2007 No 86, assented to 7 December 2007.

13. Since then the date has been extended to July 2021; see http://www.legislation.nsw.gov.au/viewtop/inforce/actþ12þ2003þFIRSTþ0þN/ [Accessed 2 January2012].

14. See: http://www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/archive/news-releases/agriculture/2007/choice-given-to-nsw-farmers [Accessed 10 May 2010].

15. See note 2.16. For a detailed analysis of other (prior) events in Australian GM regulation that

aimed to facilitate agbiotechnology development, see Hindmarsh (2008).17. For an excellent exposition of closure of controversy as a strategy of power, see

Beder (1991).

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