“Bean-stalker” heads ‘Down Under’

February 14, 2011

Several months ago, I applied for and was awarded Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia (ASSA) funding to conduct research on private-public partnerships in pulse research in Australia and Canada.  This research proposal grew out of work we (Phillips, Boland and Ryan) conducted on global public-private pulse research networks (see related blog entry: http://doccami.posterous.com/global-networks-of-actors-in-plant-genetic-re).  We discovered that of all countries in the world, Australia seems to be doing something right.  The network is well-connected and also well linked to global sources.  Canada, on the other hand, is a bit more fragmented.  So, what lessons can Canada learn from Australia?

The ASSA funding and my partnership with co-investigator, Dr. K. Siddique of the University of Western Australia, will enable me to explore this Australian pulse network a bit more.  I leave Thursday for ‘Down Under’ where, for three weeks, I will have the opportunity to interview folks connected to various institutions conducting pulse research and breeding (lentil, chick peas, beans etc).  All in all, it looks to be an interesting ride!  I will spend the first leg of my journey in Perth, at the University of Western Australia where I will meet with folks and attend the Western Australia Agribusiness Crop Update meetings on the 23rd and 24th.  Then I will head to Adelaide where the Pulse Breeding Australia meetings are scheduled for March 1st to the 3rd.  Pulse breeders across Australia will be in attendance. I will head to Canberra on the 3rd for meetings there and, finally, will end my journey in Melbourne (which will include a stop at LaTrobe University).  I will head home to Alberta on the 9th.

I look forward to keeping you posted as to how things transpire.  I hear that the fires are a-burning in Perth and that I may witness some of the effects of recent floodings in the Melbourne area.  I guess we shall see…

Excerpt from our work:

“This system consists of the major export countries of Canada, the USA and Australia along with two Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research Centres (CGIAR), ICARDA and ICRISAT and some individual research centres in France, India and South Africa. Institutionally, this system is composed of 17 P3s (26%), 22 universities (33%) and 27 government research centres (41%). There is a discernable absence of private firms. With one notable exception P3s dominate the three measures of influence. There are three P3s with total degree centrality measures of two or more standard deviations above mean, the Crop Development Centre/Saskatchewan Pulse Growers (CDC/SPG) of Canada and the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) and the Centre for Legumes in a Mediterranean Area (CLIMA), both of Australia.This indicates that these organizations are engaged in a higher level of network activity than other network institutions. Both the GRDC and CLIMA are the top ranked eigenvector actors according to their measures of two standard deviations above average (see table: 6.2 below), suggesting these are the only two actors with significant power rankings in this network.  In table: 6.3, the CDC/SPG with a measure six standard deviations above mean and the US Government research centre at Pullman, Washington with a measure of two standard deviations above mean both act as gatekeepers, controlling the flow of information, while experiencing a level of independence  due to multiple sources of new information. The CDC/SPG in particular, due to the magnitude of its betweeness measure, may occupy a unique position in this network regarding its ability to structure the flow of new information.”

Export_systems_p3s

 

 

 

The Wizardry of ‘Oz’ – a peek behind the curtain of the anti-GM movement

UPDATE (October 17, 2012): Dr. Oz aired yet another episode warning of the dangers of GM foods on October 16, 2012.  I am not a fan of Dr. Oz.  And I haven’t been for years.  The airing of this episode is not a random event.  It comes on the heels of the Séralini study (more here), the publication of Séralini’s book, the release of Jeffrey Smith’s latest video (coincidentally, it is narrated by Lisa Oz) and the forthcoming food labeling referendum in California, Prop 37. Dr. Don Huber has been ‘on the road’, too, spinning his pathogenic tale in the EU.

Dr. Oz Show: Ratings + Bias = YEP.

“This episode of the Dr. Oz Show is brought to you by Séralini, Smith and the Say YES to Prop 37 initiative.”

ORIGINAL POST December 10, 2010: Last year when the whole Triffid (flax) issue came to light, I did some research on Genetic ID, the lab/firm behind the discovery of Triffid in the EU food supply chain. The main question that I had was – what’s the incentive for this particular lab to sniff out a de-registered, never commercially produced transgenic flax cultivar? (when the potential for rents would be limited (one would think, anyway))

Earlier this year, I took the initiative to mine some publicly available information on the internet and uncovered some interesting linkages amongst Genetic ID, the Maharishi Institute, the Natural Law Party and other anti-GM/GE individuals, organizations and firms.  See the network below.  The connections illustrated within the network represent a variety of linkages from board positions, organizational memberships, funding connections, fiscal interests in firms/companies, attendance at common events or like-sponsorship activities.  This data set, and the network, is – by no means – complete.  But the graph certainly sheds an interesting light on the interconnectedness amongst actors in this anti-GM/GE context.

Genetic ID and its questionable connections...

Genetic ID is at the centre of the network but I would like to draw your attention to another node: Jeffrey Smith.  You will recall that Smith got the lion’s share of airtime and the accolades (relative to Dr. Pam Ronald*) on the Dr. Oz episode earlier this week on Genetic Engineering and GM Food (- to view the episode, follow this link: http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/genetically-modified-foods-pt-1).  Jeffrey Smith is the VP of Communications for Genetic ID.  He also has close connections to the Natural Law Party and, although I was unable to find a documented or direct connection to it, the Maharishi Institute.  The Maharishi – a Transcendental Meditation “TM” yogi – and his legacy of affiliated interests and institutions are also central. Most of the organizations and several of the individuals are from Fairfield, Iowa where the Maharishi University is centered.  The Maharishi (1914-2008) was a proponent of Vedic Science (look it up, weird stuff) who established the Natural Law Party.  The NLP’s platform revolves around the Vedic Science and TM (Jeffrey Smith ran for US senate in 1998 in Iowa for the NLP). The Natural Law Party has branches in both the US and in New Zealand. (check out Smith practicing ‘yogic flying’ on: http://academicsreview.org/reviewed-individuals/jeffrey-smith/)

Now, if that wasn’t peculiar enough, here’s the real kicker. I decided to check into celebrity links with the Maharishi Institute (why not?).  There are numerous celebrities connected to the Maharishi Institute through fundraising events and sponsorship.  These include Ringo Starr, Clint Eastwood, Russell Brand, Katy Perry…the list goes on and on.  David Lynch is also one of them.  He established the David Lynch Foundation to support the teaching of TM (http://www.davidlynchfoundation.org/). For more on celebrities affiliated with TM see: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/20/fashion/20TM.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&pagewanted=all&adxnnlx=1328559372-/uV9YAjo1xkWg8IvtMe83g. Even Obama has “wowed” the TM-ers from Iowa by positioning himself in alignment with the rotation of the earth, in accordance with the teachings of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi when he spoke to a crowd in Fairfield in 2007.

But, interestingly enough, guess who is also part of this celebrity network?  Yep – Dr Oz. Apparently, Lynch, Oz and some other celebrities, including Clint Eastwood and George Lucas, got together for a fundraiser in late November in an effort to bring Transcendental Meditation to veterans with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (see http://maharishi.posterous.com/).  And if you happen to be in NYC on Monday night, you might even want to take in The David Lynch Foundation Benefit Evening at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (http://www.davidlynchfoundation.org/emailing/2010_09_met.html).  Dr. Oz will be there.

This is the crux of the problem.  Bias. This convoluted network that appears to begin with ‘TM’ and end with ‘OZ’ shows how good science and good science communication can be high-jacked and manipulated in entertainment media. 

I think that it is safe to say that our GE advocate, Dr. Pam Ronald, was screwed from the get-go on Dr. Oz’s Show.  In my opinion, the Show had no intention of representing the real, verifiable, documented side of this debate.  How could it?

Dr. Ronald recently blogged her ‘Oz’ experience:

“I  had a chance to plug some great science-based, academic, non-profit sites (bioforitifed,org, ucbiotech.org and academicsreview.org) but all of my case-specific examples (reduced insecticide use in GE cotton fieldsenhanced biodiversitydisease resistant papaya, Golden rice) were cut from the TV version. I guess the producers did not want to mix too much scientific evidence in there with the fantastical stuff.” (http://scienceblogs.com/tomorrowstable/2010/12/dr_oz_prescribes_non-gmo_diets.php)

At least Dr. Ronald still has her sense of humour.

Someone is going to ‘get all up in my grill’ if I say that the Dr. Oz Show is responsible for intentionally spreading false information.  So, I won’t say that.  But based upon the network that I outline here – one which Oz appears to be strongly embedded in and linked to – I think that it is fair to say that the “good” Doctor (I use this term loosely) represents the interests of the anti-GM/GE movement. He has certainly demonstrated an anti-science bias against GM crops and food.

Check out my blog entry on the Genetic ID network that I posted earlier this year.

Here are two other related blog entries that I wrote earlier this week in follow up to the Dr. Oz Show. One is an article by Wager and McHughen addressing some of the misconceptions around GM and the other shines a light on the lack of accountability by some extremists in the anti-GE movement.

*Dr Ronald is Professor of Plant Pathology at the University of California, Davis, where she studies the role that genes play in a plant’s response to its environment. She is the co-author of Tomorrow’s Table. And by the way, Dr. Ronald’s husband (and co-author of the book) – Raoul Adamchuk – is the Market Garden Coordinator at the UC Davis Student Farm and has expertise in organics/production). Check out my blog entry on their book.

EPILOGUE (January 2011):  This blog generated quite a bit of interest and, subsequently, an interesting dialogue on the Biofortified website.  David Tribe initiated the discourse around “Vedic businesses” and “Natural Law” Check out the over 60 comments at: “http://www.biofortified.org/2010/12/vedic-businesses-use-clever-advertising/  Additionally, Why Evolution is True posted another interesting piece on on the campaign “Rock Stars of Science” and Dr. Oz’s involvement in it (posted December 17, 2010): http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2010/12/17/rock-star-of-science-hurts-science/.

Global networks of actors in plant genetic resources and research

 

Hi… we are spreading our knowledge around the world!  Colleague Dr. Peter Phillips is presenting our work with Bill Boland at the 8th Triple Helix Conference in Madrid, Spain this week.  You know, the ‘goods’ on the global pulse system and the interconnectiveness of institutions and actors in plant genetic resources and research.  Talk attached.

Buena suerte, mi amigo! Wish I was there!

http://www.triplehelix8.org/

 

 

Triple_helix_2010

Paper 155 Boland Ryan Phillips Talk.pdf
Download this file

Online Anti-Technology Advocacy Networks

Ryan January 2010 Advocacy & Issue Networks.pdf
Ryan_January_2010_Advocacy_Issues

Please check out this working paper I wrote… “Framing, Exploring and Understanding Online Anti-Technology Advocacy Networks (working title)” (January 2010). I experiment with the webcrawler tool “Issuecrawler” to explore online advocacy networks around this issues of ‘terminator technology’ (or gene use restriction technologies) and ‘synthetic biology’.

Thanks to Dr. Edna Einseidel for her support of this work (through funding from Genome Canada GE3LS).

new paper by Phillips & Ryan on network governance

Governance of International Networks:
A Social Network Analysis of International Institutions related to Plant Genetic Resources
Authors: P.W.B. Phillips and C.D. Ryan (yep, that’s me!)

Presented at the Political Studies Association Conference, Edinburgh, Scotland
March 2010
http://www.psa.ac.uk/2010/UploadedPaperPDFs/695_777.pdf

Abstract
Governing in the modern times has become more complicated and complex, with an array of new governing structures encompassing the globe. Discrete institutions are increasingly intertwined and embedded in governing networks at sub-national, state and international levels. This paper investigates this new reality and uses it to examine the international governing system for plant genetics and genomic resources. Over the last century, issues have surfaced with technological progress and innovations that add complexity in the governing challenge, such as research management, intellectual property ownership, risk regulation and international trade in knowledge-intensive products. This paper explicitly examines one of the foundational issues of global knowledge management in the area of biotechnology—policies, practices and structures to support access and benefit-sharing (ABS) related to traditional knowledge (TK) and capacity-building in indigenous communities and developing countries. This paper uses social network analysis to investigate the complicated and complex interactions among a network of 108 international institutions and programs involved in ABS and TK. Using multiple layers of social network analysis, the structures and underlying meanings of the relationships in the governing network are studied and investigated for their structure, effectiveness and resiliency.

Admit it, you are SO excited to read this!
;oP

Keep it real, folks!

Phillips and Ryan 2010.pdf
Download this file

Governance of International Networks

Paper prepared for the Political Studies Association Conference in Edinburgh, Scotland from March 29 – April 1, 2010.

“Governance of International Networks: A Social Network Analysis of International Institutions related to Plant Genetic Resources.”
Peter W.B. Phillips and Camille D. Ryan
University of Saskatchewan

“On the face of it, the system exhibits small-world effects. [After] knocking out BI and CGIAR from the 2-mode, activity-based analysis, [we] discovered while the overall system looks to implode with the loss of the two core central actors, enough redundancy and interconnections exist to essentially rewire the functional sub-networks, such that while they are diminished, they largely remain functioning with their core members…” (p. 12)

http://www.psa.ac.uk/2010/UploadedPaperPDFs/695_777.pdf

Manuel Castells & Bruno Latour speak…

Bruno Latour:
Presentation and Keynote at the International Network Theory Conference, organized by the ANN and SONIC research centers, that took place on Feb 19-20, 2010 at the University of Southern California.

“A collective phenomenon is not necessarily a social one.”

http://ascnetworksnetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/ANN%20Net%20Theory%2…

Manuel Castells provides an introduction to the conference…
http://www.iq.harvard.edu/blog/netgov/2010/03/video_from_international_semin….

Notes on collaboration in scientific communities…

“Several explanations have been given for the increase in coauthorship over time (Laband and Tollison 2000; McDowell and Michael 1983). Funding requirements, particularly in large lab settings, might induce collaboration (Laband and Tollison 2000; Zuckerman and Merton 1973). While social scientists are rarely as dependent on labs, the rise of large-scale data collection efforts suggests a similar team-production model. Training differences between disciplines might also account for coauthorship differences. Advanced work by PhD students in the natural sciences is usually closely related to an advisor’s work, and commonly results in collaboration. Social science students, in contrast, tend to work on projects that are more independent.” (Moody 2004 (American Sociological Review; volume 69: 217)

In the Canadian context…
“…a number of SSH disciplines have more paradigms competing with one another than do those in the NSE, and as a result SSH literature is more fragmented – a situation that hinders the formation of a solid “core” of scientific journals –, thereby making article-based bibliometric analysis more difficult to conduct successfully.” (Larivière etal 2006; Scientometrics (60;3): 521).

“…According to MOODY (2004), the collaboration rate for books is generally lower than that for articles. Therefore scholarly articles are a more informative medium for analysing collaboration not only in the natural sciences but also in the social sciences and humanities, although we must be careful not to generalize the results to all scholarly research output.” (Larivière etal 2006; Scientometrics (60;3): 521).

“The collaborative activities of Canadian scholars, as measured by the number of joint publications, are increasing in both the NSE and the SSH. There is also an upward trend in international collaboration. However, the rate of growth is not the same across all disciplines. While rates for all types of collaboration in the social sciences rose steadily since 1980, collaboration rates for the humanities remained unchanged in a number of cases. Overall, psychology and economics and administration were the disciplines with the strongest collaboration, followed by social sciences, education, and law. In the humanities, history was the discipline in which collaborative activities were most frequent, but the rate remains very low. In the humanities and literature, formal collaboration based on co-authorship is a marginal phenomenon. Not surprisingly, the disciplines with the highest collaboration rates are, in general, the ones in which journal articles are the main medium of knowledge dissemination.” (Larivière etal 2006; Scientometrics (60;3): 531).

“Usefulness from what is not there…”

In social structures, relationships that ‘could be’ are as important or more important than those that are already there. Ron Burt (2005, etc) refers to such ’empty spaces’ as “structural holes” – holes that provide opportunities for new relationships as well as access to new information and new resources. This notion is not new. Lao Tzu refers to such things in the Tao Te Ching as early as 200 BC:

Thirty spokes share the wheel’s hub;
It is the center hole that makes it useful.
Shape clay into a vessel;
It is the space within that makes it useful.
Cut doors and windows for a room;
It is the holes which make it useful.
Therefore profit comes from what is there;
Usefulness from what is not there.

Tao Te Ching – Lao Tzu – A Comparative Study
(Available online at: http://www.wussu.com/laotzu/laotzu11.html)
 

Hubspoke