Manjari Mahajan, Assistant Professor of International Affairs
“I am looking forward to reading two books, both of which interrogate how new technology and knowledge are being accompanied by changing modes of democratic governance. The first book, Reordering Life by Stephen Hilgartner, has a narrative mainly situated in the United States. It probes how the Human Genome Project and the modern life sciences have led to new institutional and cultural arrangements of property, exclusion, and control. The second book,Pharmocracy: Value, Politics and Knowledge of Global Biomedicine by Kaushik Sunder Rajan, examines the multinational pharmaceutical industry as it lands in India. The book puts a spotlight on struggles within Indian institutions around issues of access to medicines. The experience of the world’s largest democracy holds important insights for the United States; it underlines that debates around health are seldom about merely technical matters regarding medicines, insurance, and budgets. At stake are fundamental questions of democratic institutions and representation.” |