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In the 1940s, a US-backed campaign spread industrial agriculture across the Americas, dismantling traditional farming systems that had sustained campesino communities for generations. The result was ecological damage, cultural loss, and deepened inequality.
Amid this devastation, a group of Latin American scientists chose another path. Working alongside farmers, Indigenous communities, and social movements, they helped shape a new vision — agroecology: a science grounded in ecology, cultural respect, and political commitment to those most marginalized.
This book tells their story and asks a vital question: Can agroecology thrive as both a science and a movement strong enough to defend millions of campesinos and their communities across the Americas?
Bruce H. Jennings is a political scientist and former senior environmental policy advisor with the California Legislature. He received his undergraduate degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and earned his M.A. and Ph.D. in political science from the University of Hawai’i. His academic work includes appointments as a Fulbright Scholar at the Universidad Autónoma de Chapingo in Mexico and multiple appointments as a visiting scholar at UC Berkeley.
Jennings began his career researching the role of powerful philanthropic institutions — such as the Rockefeller Foundation — in reshaping agricultural systems across the Americas. His doctoral research examined the politics of science and agricultural transformation and was published by Westview Press. As co-chief of the California Senate Committee on Environmental Quality and chief of the Assembly Committee on Environmental Safety and Toxic Materials, he helped shape legislation addressing environmental health, chemical regulation, and farmworker protections. Jennings’s writing and public speaking reflect decades of commitment to ecological sustainability and equity for rural communities across the hemisphere.
Part I:: Conflicts in the Science of Agriculture: Revolution and Counter-Revolution in the Americas
Chapter 1:: Scientific & Social Revolutions
Chapter 2:: Transforming Mexican Agriculture
Chapter 3:: The Counter-Revolution in Mexican Agriculture
Chapter 4:: The Production of Knowledge
Chapter 5:: Expanding a Green Revolution across the Americas
Chapter 6:: The Violence of the Green Revolution
Part II:: Critiquing a Dominant Science and Its Consequences
Chapter 7:: Ecology, Chemistry & Conflicts
Chapter 8:: Fights in the Fields
Chapter 9:: Agrichemicals & the Law
Part III:: Agroecology: The Struggle for a New Science
Chapter 10:: An Alternative in Production
Chapter 11:: Demonstrating Another Knowledge & Practice
Chapter 12:: New Markets/New Conflicts
Chapter 13:: Agroecology at Berkeley: A Path Not Taken
Part IV:: Conclusions: Linking a Science and a Movement
Chapter 14:: Agroecology & Infrastructures of Support
Chapter 15:: Agroecology & Infrastructures of Resistance
: Epilogue
: References