The transatlantic conflict over GM food: Cultural background

During the last two decades, an unexpected conflict over GM food arose, with particularly strong transatlantic consequences. Both the defenders and the opponents of GM food are found on both sides of the Atlantic, however, the opponents, affiliated with NGO's and ecological parties, have more success in Europe, while the defenders, bound to GM multinationals, are stronger on the American side. This paper explores the cultural grounds of this conflict. It examines the academic, legal and political argumentation on GM food to uncover the underlying metaphors. It will claim the current debate to be a rationalization of the top of an iceberg, the underwater part of which includes visions on food, nature and human relation to Earth. The talk includes the analysis of the metaphors on GM food, like 'Frankenstein foods' or 'golden rice', and food as a 'program' or 'mechanism'. The conflict is seen as existing between, on the one hand, the Enlightenment ideology, equating living entities to mechanical ones, i.e., objects of engineering, and, on the other hand, the organic approach, rooted in traditional world views, which attributes importance not only to the final result but to the actual processing of organisms into food as well. The debate involves the metaphors of 'pure' versus 'impure' food, 'natural' versus 'artificial', with overtones traceable to alternative visions of morality. A contrast is evident between Europeans, inclined to accept the safety of traditional foodstuffs like raw milk cheese, and Americans, more attracted to experiments with new food processing technologies.