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.
Abbott, Kenneth W., and Duncan Snidal. 2000. Hard and soft law in international governance. International Organization54 (3): 421-456.
2.
Abraham, John, and Erik Millstone. 1989. Food additive controls: Some international comparisons. Food Policy14 (February): 43-57.
3.
Braithwaite, John, and Peter Drahos. 2000. Global business regulation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
4.
Busch, Per-Olof, Helge Jörgens, and Kerstin Tews. 2005. The global diffusion of regulatory instruments: The making of a new international environmental regime. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science598:146-167.
5.
Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC). 1990. Report of the 22nd Session of the Codex Committee on Food Additives and Contaminants; The Hague, 19-24 March 1990. ALINORM 91/12. Rome: Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Program.
6.
Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC). 1991. Report of the 23rd Session of the Codex Committee on Food Additives and Contaminants; The Hague, 4-9 March 1991. ALINORM 91/12A. Rome: Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Program.
7.
Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC). 1992. Proposed Draft Codex General Standard for Food Additives (GSFA). CL 1992/18-FAC. Rome: Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Program.
8.
Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC). 1993a. Consideration of the Proposed Draft Codex General Standard for Food Additives (Government Comments on CL 1992/18-FAC). CX/FAC 93/3. Rome: Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Program.
9.
Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC). 1993b. Report of the Working Group on the General Standard for Food Additives. CRD 2; presented at CCFAC 25th Session. Rome: Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Program.
10.
Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC). 1994a. Report of the 26th Session of the Codex Committee on Food Additives and Contaminants; The Hague, 7-11 March 1994. ALINORM 95/12. Rome: Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Program.
11.
Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC). 1994b. Report of the Working Group on the General Standard for Food Additives. CRD 1, presented at CCFAC 26th session. Rome: Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Program.
12.
Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC). 1995. Consideration of technological justification and need for the use of food additives (Paper submitted by Iceland and New Zealand).CX/FAC 95/5. Rome: Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Program.
13.
Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC). 2001. General Standard for Food Additives. CODEX STAN 192-1995, Rev. 3-2001. Rome: Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Program.
14.
Cortell, Andrew P., and James W. Davis Jr.2000. Understanding the domestic impact of international norms: A research agenda. International Studies Review2 (1): 65-87.
15.
DiMaggio, Paul J., and Walter W. Powell. 1991. The ironcage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organization fields. In The new institutionalism in organizational analysis, ed. W. W. Powell and P. J. DiMaggio.Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
16.
Dirección General de Normas (DIGENOR). n.d. Anteproyecto de Norma: Aditivos Alimentarios y Contaminantes. Aditivos Alimentarios. Especificaciones Generales. NORDOM 67:33-001. Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic: Secretaría de Estado de Industria y Comercio, Dirección General de Normas y Sistemas de Calidad.
17.
Dolowitz, David P., and David Marsh. 2000. Learning from abroad: The role of policy transfer in contemporary policy-making. Governance13 (1): 5-24.
18.
Garrett, Geoffrey, and Peter Lange. 1996. Internationalization, institutions, and political change. In Internationalization and domestic politics, ed. R. O. Keohane and H. V. Milner.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
19.
Gostin, Lawrence. 2000. Public healthlaw: Power, duty, restraint. Berkeley: University of California Press.
20.
Haas, Peter M.1992. Introduction: Epistemic communities and international policy coordination. International Organization46 (1): 1-35.
21.
Halabi, Yakub. 2004. The expansion of global governance into the third world: Altruism, realism, or constructivism?International Studies Review6 (1): 21-48.
22.
Jasanoff, Sheila. 1998. Contingent knowledge: Implications for implementation and compliance. In Engaging countries: Strengthening compliance with international environmental accords, ed. E. Brown Weiss and H. K. Jacobson.Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
23.
Josling, Tim, Donna Roberts, and David Orden. 2004. Food regulation and trade: Toward a safe and open global system. Washington, DC: Institute for International Economics.
24.
Levi-Faur, David. 2005. The global diffusion of regulatory capital. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science598:12-32.
25.
Mercosur. 1993. Criterios de Mantenimiento de la Lista General de Aditivos Alimentarios. GMC/RES No. 17/93. http://www.mercusor.org.uy/espanol/snor/normativa/resoluciones/1993/RES1793.htm.
26.
Meyer, John W., David John Frank, Evan Schofer, and Nancy Brandon Tuma. 1997. The structuring of a world environmental regime, 1870-1990. International Organization51 (4): 623-651.
27.
Millstone, Erik. 1985. Food additive regulation in the UK. Food Policy10 (3): 237-252.
28.
Moravcsik, Andrew. 1997. Taking preferences seriously: A liberal theory of international politics. International Organization51:513-553.
29.
Revesz, Richard L.1992. Rehabilitating interstate competition: Rethinking the “race-to-the-bottom” rationale for federal environmental regulation. New York University Law Review67:1210-1254.
30.
Risse, Thomas, Stephen C. Ropp, and Kathryn Sikkink, eds. 1999. The power of human rights: International norms and domestic change. Cambridge Studies in International Relations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
31.
Social Learning Group. 2001. Learning to manage global environmental risks: A comparative history of social responses to climate change, ozone depletion, and acid rain. 2 vols. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
32.
Victor, David G.2002. WTO efforts to manage differences in national sanitary and phytosanitary policies. In Dynamics of regulatory change: How globalization affects national regulatory policies, ed. D. Vogel and R. Kagan.Berkeley: University of California Press/University of California International and Area Studies Digital Collection.
33.
Vogel, David. 1995. Trading up: Consumer and environmental regulation in a global economy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
34.
Young, James Harvey. 1989. Pure food: Securing the Federal Food and Drugs Act of 1906. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
