A Reply to Les Levidow

It seems that Les Levidow doesn’t much like the Science Museum’s recent temporary exhibition on genetically modified (GM) food. While acknowledging that we “sought to accommodate both promoters and critics of biotechnology”, he finds that the exhibition “presents a one-sided account of biotechnology as environmentally-friendly, despite a long-standing public debate over what this means” (EASST Review, 17, 1, March, 1998, pp. 3-6). He has reprinted his critique as an Editorial in the Ecologist (Ecologist, 28, June, 1998, pp. 143-5), so clearly he must feel deeply about the issues he raises.

First, I should declare an interest. I am responsible for the Science Museum’s Future Foods? exhibition. I raised the money for it, and I led the team that produced it. As a result, I think I’m in a reasonably good position to say what we were trying to do in this exhibition. From the outset, we had two aims: to explain the use of gene technology in food production; and to explore some of the key issues relating to this technology in order that our visitors could make up their own minds about it. It was no part of our aim merely to promote GM foods. Indeed, we went to enormous pains to try to represent clearly and fairly the views of both supporters and critics of the technology.

In doing this, however, I never expected to satisfy everyone. The handling of controversial issues within an exhibition is a complex issue; indeed, I completely agree with Levidow that there is no entirely neutral way to represent controversy in this (or, I might add, any other!) medium. The reason for this is simple enough: every representation is an interpretation; and every interpretation embodies explicit and implicit value judgments. In a situation where there is significant disagreement, individual judgments differ. As a result, any single representation of a controversy is bound to please some actors witin the controversy more than others.

Just as the act of exhibiting is inevitably interpretive and evaluative, so too is the act of exhibition reviewing. Levidow’s review of Future Foods? is studded with statements that appear at first sight to be straightforwardly descriptive but turn out on closer inspection to be deeply evaluative - and, I would add, deeply tendentious. Here are just a few of the more obvious examples. First, the review misquotes the title of the exhibition. It is not called Future Foods but rather Future Foods? The question mark matters; it is intended to convey the thought that whether we all end up eating GM foods is an open rather a closed question, which depends not least upon the choices that people - including our visitors - make. In short, the question mark is intended to be empowering.

The opening description of the exhibition tells us of “a playful, reassuring atmosphere which associates biotechnology with familiar images and devices”. There is, we are told, a generally “friendly ambience”. Well, yes, to be sure the exhibition does go out of its way to be visitor friendly; but, no, this is not, as the review suggests, part of a strategy to “domesticate” biotechnology. Rather, it is part of a strategy to encourage visitors to engage with the issues by actually stopping at the exhibition! There’s not much point in producing exhibitions that people don’t visit; and believe me, there are plenty of worthy exhibitions about science and technology that people don’t visit. It is tendentious in the extreme (and, ultimately, deeply patronising to visitors) to suggest that a visitor-friendly medium is likely to induce a biotechnology-friendly attitude. In my opinion, visitors just aren’t that dumb.

In several parts of his review, Levidow skillfully marginalises the way in which Future Foods? actually engages with critical perspectives. Thus, an exhibit entitled Technological Fix? (get it?), designed to inform visitors about potential environmental problems associated with the use of gene technology to produce weedkiller resistant crops, is condemned because it supposedly dumps these problems on farmers’ laps by asserting that “vigilance is needed in crop management”. Similarly, an interactive exhibit included to convey the (environmentalist) message that agricultural biotechnologies can have unpredictable ecological effects is dismissed on the absurd grounds that the device used to convey the point is mechanical: “Thus the ecological uncertainties are symbolically converted into a mechanical model; the “unpredictable” is made to appear reassuringly familiar”. Oh please, give us a break!

“Finally, near the end”, writes Levidow, “the exhibition acknowledges safety concerns about biotechnology”. As a matter of fact, the exhibition has no end, any more than it has a beginning. The exhibition isn’t linear at all; it is designed to be approached from several different directions and to be “read” in any order the visitor chooses! (In its travelling form, the exhibition will be arranged on the ground in several different configurations to suit local circumstances.) I suggest that it is only because Levidow is predisposed to find evidence of pro-industry bias that he sees this particular section of the exhibition as something akin to an afterthought.

I could go on, but what would be the point? In the end, the issue is not whether Future Foods? succeeds in getting the balance between competing views precisely right at every point; rather, the issue is whether the exhibition succeeeds in its twin aims of informing visitors about GM foods and helping them to come to their own views about the issues. Here, I am happy to say that the evidence is clear. Our visitor research suggeststhat Future Foods? is one of the most popular of our current series of contemporary science exhibitions; and the visitor comment book, which invites people viewing Future Foods? to say what they think about the issues, reveals that many visitors are stimulated by what they see into expressing some pretty strong views. Les Levidow may perhaps draw some comfort from the fact that - notwithstanding our alleged skill in “domesticating biotechnology” - many of these views are either sceptical or downright hostile towards GM foods.

In the past, science museums have tended to “play safe” by celebrating widely acknowledged achievements and avoiding difficult and controversial subjects. For some time, the Science Museum London has been moving away from this sort of position and towards a closer engagement with the issues of the day. We shall continue to do this - most notably in our new Wellcome Wing, which is due to open in 2000 and which will feature a rolling programme of exhibitions on topical ideas and issues. We know that by engaging with controversial subjects we risk displeasing representatives of particular points of view in the wider society. We are willing to take such risks, not least because we are committed to the facilitation of a broader and better-informed public debate about science and technology. I hope that all who share this commitment will continue to support us in this work, even if they don’t always agree with the treatments we give to topics in which they have special interests.

author’s address: j.durant@nmsi.ac.uk