How Is Food Political? Market, State, and Knowledge - The Oxford Topic of Food, Politics, and Society - page 16

What then gives the state an interest in how much sugar citizens eat? Legitimation
for intervention depends on both framings of risk and institutional structures of
governance. This is the classic boundary politics of markets and states: where
does society draw the line between individual preferences and public interest?
Characteristically, powerful beverage and food producers—national and global—
argued for consumer choice over government interference in markets; they force-
fully opposed regulations that would reduce demand for their products. Civil
society organizations, nationally and internationally, campaigned for state action in
the public interest (Bittman 2013).
Taxing sugary foods allowed Mexico to achieve what its richer neighbor to the north
had not, despite local attempts: New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg's ban on big
sugary drinks was ruled unconstitutional by an appeals court. The reasons for Mexico's
success were both structural and conjunctural. First, Mexico recently surpassed the
United States as being the most obese country in the world. Special shame was attached
to being more obese than Americans; both America and NAFTA had been blamed for
growing obesity in Mexico. In comparative terms, assuming nutritional knowledge—a
matter disputed by industry—a clear and present danger to public health would seem
to exist. This is the classic rationale for the very existence of state authority. The case for
intervention was reinforced by political economy: Mexico had enacted a single-payer
system of health insurance the previous year. Diabetes is a threat to fiscal sustainabil-
ity of the program. Moreover, a constitutional addendum in 2011 guaranteed citizens
“the right to nutritious, sufficient and quality food.” Globally, a right to food has become
an increasingly important component of political movements for social justice.36
Moreover, new taxes—like all revenues—were attractive to the state itself. There was also
an argument from the developmental state. Mexico's health minister, Mercedes Juan,
stated publically that “obesity and diabetes are affecting school and work performances,
and with it, the country's economic competitiveness.” Mexico's health authorities esti-
mated more than five million obese children and a 9.2 percent incidence of diabetes
among children (BBC, October 31, 2013). The state, in loco parentis , moved where many
moms would not go. President Enrique Peña Nieto also played an individual role, seek-
ing an international model attributable to his leadership. His initiative was backed by a
Nutritional Health Alliance of twenty-two NGOs and networks representing about 650
nonprofits and grass-roots organizations. Even members of opposition parties agreed.37
The argument for state over market in determining what Mexicans should be eating
then has a structural base—a collective interest in a manageable health-care burden in
which every citizen is implicated, fulfillment of a constitutional guarantee, and the state's
appetite for more revenues. The sweetener for consumers was a promise to target new
revenues for public goods—for example, safe drinking water in schools. Though author-
ity to alter food practices is to come from the state, the mechanism is the market: assum-
ing some elasticity of demand for junk food allows the state to alter consumption by
raising taxes. Of course, disagreement exists about what these elasticities are—another
mediation of knowledge, in this case micro-economic theory of consumer choice. The
final lesson is that, predictably, market forces are obdurate and persistent; opponents