Standards and Regulatory Capitalism: The Diffusion of Food Safety Standards in Developing Countries

Abstract

Public health is a major area of social regulation, tied closely to the rise of the regulatory state. Among public health standards, food safety standards were some of the first to be globalized, through the Codex Alimentarius Commission established in 1963. With the establishment of the World Trade Organization (WTO), these international food safety standards have taken on even greater importance, serving as a reference point for the WTO in resolving disputes between countries over trade barriers. Have these international food safety standards influenced domestic policies and, if so, in which directions and why? This article considers how the Codex food additive standard has influenced policy in Argentina and the Dominican Republic. It looks at the role and interaction of international, regional, and domestic actors and top-down, bottom-up, and horizontal directions of policy diffusion. It also examines the role played by powerful states in shaping international standards.

Science and neoliberal globalization: a political sociological approach

“…But in 1994, the World Trade Organization (WTO) built into its regulations incentives for participating nations to base their food regulations on those formulated in the Codex. While the use of Codex standards is still voluntaryparticipating nations can use the Codex standards or use a science-based risk assessment system-countries are advantaged in legal battles if they use the Codex standards (Post 2005). Since 1994, the number of countries that have joined the Codex Consortium has risen from 37 to nearly 200, and its rules cover the foods eaten by 97% of the world's population.…”

“…Since 1994, the number of countries that have joined the Codex Consortium has risen from 37 to nearly 200, and its rules cover the foods eaten by 97% of the world's population. This effectively makes the Codex the de facto basis for international food regulations (Post 2005;Winickoff and Bushey 2010;Lindne 2008). The very character of internationally traded food is based on its alignment with international scientific standards for moisture, purity, and other measures, not cultural meanings or national standards.…”

“…Yet it also offers opportunities for input from NGOs, citizens in participating countries, and scientists who can contribute independent reports, providing for at least some grassroots influence. Still, given that the WTO rules require decisions about the safety of food to be based on scientific and economic criteria, claimants using other forms of argument are at a disadvantage (Winickoff and Bushey 2010;Halfon 2010;Livermore 2006;Post 2005). More generally, given that nation states, not citizens or NGOs, are members of these kinds of regulatory organizations, even those that allow petitions by citizen groups are likely to be attentive to interests of nation-states, not external petitioners.…”

Standard fare or fairer standards: Feminist reflections on agri-food governance

“…''One cannot argue against health'' (Beck-Gernsheim 2000, p. 127). Academic interest in agri-food governance expanded as supranational bodies such as the EU or WTO adopted the position that differences in local, regional or national standards are 'technical barriers to trade' and encouraged their harmonization (Busch 2000;Dunn 2003;Post 2005). The 'standardization of standards' (Dunn 2003(Dunn , p. 1493) is instituted so that all competitors in the marketplace bear an equal regulatory burden.…”

“…States are not disappearing but are being transformed as ''global financial relations and multilateral institutions pressure them to author rules that privatize and/or weaken national capacity and strengthen the reach of global supply-chains'' (McMichael 2007, p. 1). For Post (2005) powerful trade actors shape national foodsafety standards in regulatory capitalism and weaker states adapt their regulations to match those of their major trading partners. The regulatory and economic boundaries between Canada and the US have become increasingly porous through the harmonization of trade and security arrangements, with Canada largely accepting US food-safety procedures (Blay-Palmer 2008).…”