Flexible Boundaries in Biosecurity: Accommodating Gorse in Aotearoa New Zealand

Abstract

IntroductionA biosecurity threat is defined by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature as``matters or activities that individually or collectively present biological risk to ecological welfare or to the well-being of humans, animals and plants' ' (Fasham and Trumper, 2001, page 7). Donaldson and Wood (2004) remark that the term biosecurity' was largely unheard of in the UK until the 2001 foot and mouth disease (FMD) outbreak, during which it evolved from a reference to practices such as cleansing and disinfecting, to the surveillant control of movement and spaces. Yet it was still firmly associated with attempts to stop the transmission of animal diseases within farming, and this has become the dominant area of social science attention (Donaldson and Wood, 2004; see also Hinchliffe, 2001;Law, 2006). Internationally in the post 9/11 era the term has also come to be associated with the prevention of bioterrorism and the spread of apocalyptic human viruses (Collier et al, 2004). In New Zealand, however, the meaning of biosecurity is broader and its history deeper. The current biosecurity regime is simply one manifestation within the context of 150 years of social and legislative practices related to native and alien species concerns. Biosecurity in New Zealand is currently defined as``the exclusion, eradication or effective management of the risks posed by pests and diseases or unwanted organisms to the economy, environment and human health'' (MAF, 2007). This definition has changed in emphasis over the seventeen years during which a discernible integrated national system has been in place, (1)

Pour une autre représentation métaphorique des invasions biologiques

“…De simples abstractions métaphoriques peuvent alors être perçues comme une réalité par avance négative (Chew et Laubichler, 2003). Un usage trop systématique de la métaphore concourt en outre à une virtualisation de l'objet désigné, devenu une globalité qui ne peut plus être pensée aux échelles locales et immédiates, alors que c'est bien à ces dernières que les invasions biologiques opèrent, même si leur gestion doit s'envisager à des niveaux d'organisation plus élevés (Barker, 2008 ;Tassin, 2012). À tel point que certains auteurs s'interdisent de penser les espèces invasives autrement qu'aux échelles les plus globales, les particularismes des pays en développement étant présentés comme des entraves à la mise en place de stratégies internationales (Nunez et Pauchard, 2009).…”

Mobile Life: Biosecurity Practices and Insect Globalization

“…While these are all valid reasons to question what Barker (2008Barker ( : p. 1611) refers to as the `prevailing anti-governance tone' of critical discourses on biosecurity, there are ways we might extend this sense of an alternative `peripheral' engagement with the generativity of life that offer something more than critique of critique. What we need to take more seriously, I would suggest, are the questions which are being asked, and which have been asked for some time, about what kinds of living things pose the most danger to extant ecosystems, and why they do.…”

Vegetal politics: belonging, practices and places

“…In organizing these sessions, we were aware that although the agency of plants has been increasingly demonstrated in contexts that include trees (Jones and Cloke 2002), gardens (Hitchings 2003(Hitchings , 2007Power 2005), invasion (Barker 2008;Ginn 2008;Atchison and Head 2013), crops (Head et al 2012) and seeds (Phillips 2013), scholars had yet to fully respond, for plants, to Lulka's (2009) call to attend more carefully to the details of nonhuman difference (Head and Atchison 2009). …”