“Food and People” or How We Learned to Stop Worrying and Love International Development: A Global South Narrative

This chapter analyzes UNESCO’s Food and People project by situating it within the organization’s early commitment to scientific humanism and within broader US agendas for international development. It argues that the project also reflected transnational entanglements from the Global South that shaped how UNESCO articulated science, education and technical assistance. The chapter reconstructs how the initiative emerged from expert discussions on popularizing the social implications of science. Although initially influenced by leading figures such as Julian Huxley and Joseph Needham – associated with scientific humanism and population concerns – it soon incorporated the perspectives of lesser-known contributors. American sociologists, for instance, reframed its aims towards shaping public attitudes about technological change and international aid. With the arrival of Mexican educator Jaime Torres Bodet as UNESCO’s director-general in 1948, the Food and People project became embedded in the agency’s fundamental education programme, designed to promote community development and improve living standards in poor countries. As a result, the project took on a more explicitly educational character and drew on the experience of Latin American experts for its final design and implementation. Ultimately, the chapter broadens dominant themes in the history of science, the Cold War and international development, while complicating North-centric narratives of these relationships.