The book authored by Erica Borg and Amedeo Policante will be presented in the scope of the Marxist Education Project by Ariel Salleh and Stuart Newman.

Mutant Ecologies

Manufacturing Life in the Age of Genomic Capital

The interconnected fields of genomic science, genome editing, and biotechnology have emerged over the past half-century as a revolution in the production of new life forms that have been eagerly adopted by agriculture, pharmaceuticals, textiles, and other business sectors. While many – including the Nobel Committee – have heralded this as a “new epoch” of limitless possibilities for positive transformation, In Mutant Ecologies: Manufacturing Life in the Age of Genomic Capital, Erica Borg and Amedeo Policante show how genetic science has been deeply intertwined from its beginning with the raw imperatives of capital accumulation. “Genomic capital,” the authors’ term for the use of genetic materials in industrial production, has literally altered many of life’s metabolic processes in service to capital’s demands. Within a socio-historical context defined by the iron rules of competition and exploitation, capital no longer contents itself with simply appropriating the living bodies of plants and animals but purposefully designs their internal metabolism, and in that way it redesigns the countless living vectors that constitute the global biosphere. This biological revolution will ripple through the everyday lives of people everywhere. Erica and Amedeo will present Mutant Ecologies and Ariel Salleh and Stuart Newman will discuss the book and initiate the conversation.

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