Nanotechnology manipulates matter on the extremely tiny scale of atoms and molecules, but its societal impacts will be titanic. The US government spends more taxpayer money on nanotech than any science endeavor since the Apollo moon shot. Worldwide, industry and governments spent over $10 billion on nanotech R&D last year. The National Science Foundation predicts that nano-scale technologies will revolutionize manufacturing across all industry sectors – capturing a $1 trillion market in less than a decade.
Society isn’t prepared for the technological tsunami approaching. History is littered with past technological wonders that bit back with unintended and unforeseen consequences. Learning from the debacles of past technology waves (chemical, nuclear, biotech) it’s critical to ask: Who will control nanotech? Who will benefit from it? If current trends continue, nanotech will widen the gap between rich and poor and further consolidate economic power in the hands of multinational corporations.
At the nano-scale, where quantum physics rule, ordinary substances exhibit new properties, like extraordinary strength, color changes, increased chemical reactivity or electrical conductivity – characteristics that the same substances do not exhibit at larger scales. The chemical elements of the Periodic Table – the building blocks of nature – are nanotech’s raw materials. Nanobiotechnology, the merging of living and non-living matter at the nano-scale, is harnessing the self-replicating and self-organizing properties of living organisms for industrial uses. But the creation of “biological machines” raises troubling ethical issues and potential hazards related to control or misuse of synthetic life forms.
Companies are now manufacturing nanoparticles (chemical elements or compounds less than 100 nanometers) for use in hundreds of commercial products – from crack-resistant paints and stain-resistant pants, to odor-eating socks. But that’s only the beginning. Nanotech enthusiasts promise more efficient solar cells, clean water, cancer-killing molecules, and more.
Nanotech’s new designer materials also have the potential to topple commodity markets, disrupt trade, and eliminate jobs for the poorest and most vulnerable workers – especially those in the developing world who don’t have the economic flexibility to respond to sudden demands for new skills or different raw materials. Novel nanomaterials could replace conventional commodities. For example, industry is designing nanoparticles to strengthen and extend the life of automobile tires and creating new nanomaterials that could substitute for natural rubber. Demand for natural rubber could plummet with devastating consequences for millions of rubber workers and the national economies of Thailand, India, Malaysia and Indonesia. The point is not that the status quo should be preserved – but that nano-scale technologies will bring huge socio-economic disruptions for which society is not prepared.
In a just and judicious context, nanotech could bring useful benefits to the poor, including environmental gains from replacing conventional materials with new nanomaterials. But in a world where privatization of science and corporate concentration prevail, nanotech’s tools could undermine democracy and human rights. The grab for patents on nano-scale products and processes could mean mega-monopolies on the basic building blocks of the entire natural world. Will the poor benefit from proprietary technologies that are outside their control?
Unknown and Unpredictable: Engineered nanoparticles could pose unique risks to human health and the environment, but few toxicological studies exist. Because of their mobility and increased reactivity, some nanoparticles are more toxic than larger versions of the same compound. Invisible and invasive, nanoparticles can slip past guardians of the body’s immune system, across protective membranes such as the skin and the blood brain barrier.
Nanotech products have come to market in the absence of public debate and regulatory oversight. Over 700 products containing unregulated and unlabeled nano-scale particles are commercially available (e.g., food, cosmetics, pesticides, sunscreens), and thousands more are in the pipeline. Meanwhile, no government has developed a regulatory regime that addresses the nano-scale or the societal impacts of the invisibly small.
It’s time to initiate a wide debate about the implications of nano-scale technologies and democratic control of science and technology for the public good. Debate must not be confined to meetings of experts or focus solely on health and safety aspects. The broader social and ethical issues must also be addressed. New technology is never a “silver bullet” for resolving an old injustice. Hunger, poverty and environmental degradation are the consequences of inequitable systems, not inadequate technologies.
More information on the social and economic impacts of nano-scale technologies is available on the ETC Group website: www.etcgroup.org. To read more about the potential impacts of nano-scale technologies on food and agriculture, check out “Down on the Farm“http://www.etcgroup.org/article.asp?newsid=485. ETC’s group report on nanotechnology and intellectual property is available here.