The Political Economy of Regulation of Biotechnology in Agriculture - The Oxford Topic of Food, Politics, and Society - page 665

The European situation prompted more sophisticated analyses by economists moti-
vated by questions of whether or not these policies are trade distorting (Lapan and
Moschini, 2004; Sheldon, 2004) and, indeed, certain European policies toward the
import of GM crop products resulted in a formal World Trade Organization (WTO)
dispute, which Europe lost (WTO, 2003). Bernauer (2003) attributes the set of restrictive
European policies to the mobilization of mass opinion among consumer and environ-
mental interests, which prevailed over the more concentrated industry and agricultural
producer interests. This is an exception to the typical political-economic observation of
concentrated interests prevailing over diffused interests. Consumer and environmental
activist groups instead rallied and served those diffused interests by providing extensive
input to the media, educating the public, influencing markets, and effectively driving
a wedge between agricultural industry interests in biotechnology and the interests of
food manufacturers and grocery retailers (Sato, this volume). Thus, it is argued that the
policy situation in Europe influenced domestic policies within Europe's trade partners
as they similarly struggled with broad public and consumer concerns over the safety and
efficacy of the technology. Falkner (2006) describes this process as the transformation
of the European Union from a laggard to a leader in the international politics of biotech-
nology regulation, arguing that its international influence has stemmed from the shift in
Europe's internal politics.
But questions have been raised about these interpretations. Graff and Zilberman
(2007) and Graff, Hochman, and Zilberman (2009) broach the question directly about
whether European policies toward agricultural biotechnology might reflect underlying
strategic interests of the European chemical industry and farm interests, which were
then capitalized on by political environmental groups. These groups significantly influ-
enced the European consumer opinions.
A basic voting model with an evolution
of perceived benefits
This chapter develops a general framework of collective choice based on voting behavior
that is relevant for many contexts and illustrates how voting outcomes are determined
by the influence asserted by those interest groups affected by the proposed policy. Later,
with this framework in mind, we will attempt to identify the key interest groups affect-
ing the biotechnology debate and policy outcomes in Europe, with implications for
analysis of developing countries, where European law, markets, and social-movement
organizations have played an important role in regulation of biotechnology.
The starting point of this exercise is the median voter model popularized by Downs
(1957). The voters may be individual voters as in California Propositions 37, representa-
tives in a parliamentary system as in the U.S. Senate or the European Parliament, or
even backers of competing power centers within an organization such as the Chinese