Agricultural History Review, Volume 65 Part 2 (2017), pp. 237–253

The first international organizations such as the Commission Internationale d’Agriculture and the International Institute of Agriculture have been studied as historical phenomena since the 1990s. Historians have also analysed the economic projects of the League of Nations, the ambitious programmes of the International Labour Organisation and the economic conferences of the 1920s and 1930s. At the national level, these analyses focus on the transnational connections of the networks of experts, on model transfers, and on scientific controversies and debates on policies. A new field of research is emerging where rural history can find new insights into the challenges posed by global debates on the modernization of agriculture and its place in economic development. This essay reviews the historical literature produced on different international and transnational organizations and networks and, at the same time, introduces the articles on international organizations and agriculture that follow. It is structured along chronological lines, summing up the main traits of the institutions and the publications that have previously discussed them. 

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