The Gates Foundation and the technopolitics of development

First guest of the seminar series "Global Health Unpacked", Adam Fejerskov will discuss the Gates Foundation's promotion of technology-based development policies and question the power, legitimacy and accountability of this major player.

Illustration picture, Bill Gates giving a speech

Bill Gates, Illustration picture: Claudio Toledo via Flickr

Adam Fejerskov, Danish Institute for International Studies

In the last decade, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has risen to a position of immense power in global development and health. Through its plutocratic power, and with limited democratic legitimacy and accountability, the foundation promotes development based on logics of technological experimentation, practiced with the developing world as a laboratory.

In this talk, Adam Fejerskov will discuss how the foundation approaches development and exercises international political influence through a range of different modes that sees it sometimes acting as large multinational company, and occasionally almost as a state. 

On the seminar series "Global Health Unpacked"

“Global Health Unpacked” is a new seminar series that aims to foster critical discussions on the politics of global health, with insights from social sciences and humanities. Invited guest speakers from different countries will bring an original perspective to the debates we have in Norway. “Global Health Unpacked” is jointly organized by the research group Power and Politics in Global Health, Centre for Development and the Environment and the UiO Centre for Global Health.

Tags: Global Health, Governance, Development, Technology, Experimentation
Published June 9, 2023 9:52 AM - Last modified June 9, 2023 9:52 AM