The changing character of regulation: a comparison of Europe and the United States

Global Regulatory Frameworks for Fermented Foods: A Review

In recent years, there has been a global resurgence of public interest in fermented foods. In parallel, there have been several new studies that associate the consumption of fermented foods with a variety of beneficial impacts. These combined developments have led to a renewed focus in research and innovation vis-à-vis fermented foods, particularly traditional fermented foods, with an aim to harness this information to develop novel fermented foodstuffs and ingredients and make them available in the market. Consequently, an ever greater and more diverse array of fermented foods, including functional fermented foods with health benefits, are becoming available for public consumption in global markets, with the number expected to grow substantially in the coming decade. This rapidly expanding portfolio of commercially available fermented foods has in turn required an evolution in the corresponding global regulatory frameworks. Due to the innovative and emerging nature of these foods, combined with historical differences in regulator approaches, significant disharmony exists across these frameworks, with individual nations and organizations often adopting unique approaches relating to the establishment of standards and specifications. In this review, we provide an overview of the current regulatory frameworks for a diversity of fermented foods across multiple jurisdictions, with special emphasis on differences in legislative structures and approaches, regulatory harmonization, and current legislative limitations. Overall, the review provides important perspective and context in relation to current global fermented food regulatory practices with possible directions and recommendations for future legislative efforts.

Comparing Environmental Risk Regulations in China and the United States

The relative stringency of risk regulation across countries may have significant implications for public health and environmental outcomes, as well as for economic and trade impacts. In this study, we build on prior literature-which has often employed qualitative case studies, and has often focused on comparing the United States and Europe-by using a quantitative evidential reasoning approach to compare the relative stringency of federal/central level written rules for 45 randomly selected environmental risks in the United States and China. We find that, on average, in this sample of 45 environmental risks, the written rules for environmental risk regulation were more stringent in the United States than in China. Within this sample, we find that relative stringency was selective, leaning in both directions, as the United States and China each regulated some risks more stringently than the other; for example, the US written rules were more stringent for risks of toxic chemicals and most air pollutants, whereas China's written rules were more stringent for risks in agriculture. We also observe nuanced differences in relative regulatory stringency within sectors and risks; even where one country regulated one risk more stringently, the other country may regulate certain aspects of that risk more stringently. We comment on possible explanations for the patterns we observe. Our methods and findings may contribute to better understanding of comparative risk regulation across the United States and China, and worldwide. We also recognize that in addition to the written rules studied here, countries may also vary in their implementation.

Reflections on the Use of Conceptual Research in Risk Analysis

A risk analysis science is developing, characterized by knowledge generation on concepts, principles, theories, frameworks, methods, and models, for understanding, assessing, characterizing, communicating, and managing risk (for short referred to as conceptual knowledge generation in risk analysis), as well as supporting risk knowledge generation of specific activities based on these concepts, principles, theories, frameworks, methods, and models. The scientific knowledge generation is based on different types of research methods. This article provides a discussion of some of these, the main purpose being to demonstrate the central role of conceptual knowledge generation and research in risk analysis. The importance of this type of knowledge generation and research is considered undervalued in risk analysis. Several examples are used to illustrate the discussion, including a risk governance framework and the anti-fragility concept.

Nutritional Guidelines and Fermented Food Frameworks

This review examines different nutritional guidelines, some case studies, and provides insights and discrepancies, in the regulatory framework of Food Safety Management of some of the world’s economies. There are thousands of fermented foods and beverages, although the intention was not to review them but check their traditional and cultural value, and if they are still lacking to be classed as a category on different national food guides. For understanding the inconsistencies in claims of concerning fermented foods among various regulatory systems, each legal system should be considered unique. Fermented foods and beverages have long been a part of the human diet, and with further supplementation of probiotic microbes, in some cases, they offer nutritional and health attributes worthy of recommendation of regular consumption. Despite the impact of fermented foods and beverages on gastro-intestinal wellbeing and diseases, their many health benefits or recommended consumption has not been widely translated to global inclusion in world food guidelines. In general, the approach of the legal systems is broadly consistent and their structures may be presented under different formats. African traditional fermented products are briefly mentioned enhancing some recorded adverse effects. Knowing the general benefits of traditional and supplemented fermented foods, they should be a daily item on most national food guides.

Cooperation and the Capacity for Control: Regulatory Styles and the Evolving Influence of Environmental Regulations in the UK

This paper seeks to contribute to the broader debate on how to promote ‘better regulation’ by examining the origins and influence of different regulatory styles. More particularly it examines the extent to which economic theories of cooperation can help to explain the presence of the cooperative regulatory style that has long been associated with the implementation of environmental regulations in the United Kingdom. After reporting the results of empirical research that focused on these issues, it concludes that cooperative regulatory styles are likely to depend upon: (a) the presence of inter-dependencies between regulators and firms; and either (b) the presence of trust amongst stakeholders; or (c) the effective exclusion of those stakeholders from influence in the regulatory decisionmaking process. Highlighting the importance of recent changes in each of these three areas in the United Kingdom, it explains the factors that have led to a shift away from a purely cooperative approach towards what has been termed a more ‘responsive’ or ‘risk-based’ approach. Recognising that such changes have been driven by a desire to enhance the efficacy and the efficiency of environmental regulation, and by concerns about the lack of transparency and accountability in the regulatory process, it concludes that such evolutions represent an important contribution to the debate on regulation and its reform.

A framework for benchmarking product sustainability efforts

Purpose

– Regulatory pressure, consumer awareness, and the quest for competitive advantage place sustainable products in today’s decision-making spotlight. The purpose of this paper is to explore supply chain dynamics as they relate to sustainable product programs and to empirically develop a framework to align efforts across the supply chain to bring sustainable products to market.

Design/methodology/approach

– Grounded in systems design, stakeholder theory, and the theory of planned behavior, the authors conduct an inductive empirical study of 28 European and US companies.

Findings

– The authors make three contributions. First, the authors identify six dimensions of product sustainability, which map to the Greenhouse Gas Protocol’s sustainability scope model. Second, the authors model relational dynamics using systems diagrams to provide a framework that: first, communicates a common understanding of product sustainability; and second, facilitates tradeoff analysis. Third, the authors elaborate behaviors needed to reduce ambiguity and compliance costs.

Practical implications

– Managers can use the framework to assess product sustainability and evaluate tradeoffs across product dimensions and supply chain participants. Using this insight, managers can design sustainable product programs that engage supply chain participants.

Social implications

– By identifying dimensions, defining costs, and uncovering tradeoffs, managers can more effectively implement sustainable product programs.

Originality/value

– The framework provides a much needed source of clarity to mitigate role ambiguity, reduce compliance costs, and promote collaborative behavior in bringing sustainable products to market.

Responsible lobbying: the impact of the institutional context

Purpose

– The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of the institutional context on the awareness and practice of responsible lobbying and to compare relevant factors in the USA and the EU. This paper aims at integrating corporate social responsibility (CSR) and lobbying research.

Design/methodology/approach

– A conceptual framework is presented and exemplified by the USA and the EU context. The research is informed by institutional theory that points to external factors creating profoundly different contexts in which firms operate.

Findings

– The degree of responsible lobbying is likely to vary across nations and regions, particularly due to factors that impact responsible lobbying by shaping the relation between the state and firms, i.e. type of government and lobbying system as well as degree of government intervention, and factors that have indirect effects by shaping the degree to which stakeholders such as employees, consumers and non-governmental organizations push responsible lobbying.

Originality/value

– The link between lobbying and CSR has been long neglected by scholars and practitioners, but is now gaining more attention. Research on this topic is valuable because it helps to ensure the credibility of CSR and alleviate public criticism of lobbying.

Transparency in Europe: A Quantitative Study

In recent years, European pharmaceutical regulators have increasingly committed to heightening access to raw safety-related data as part of a wave of transparency initiatives (e.g., providing public Internet-mediated access to clinical trials data). Yet, the regulators--who are under significant pressure--have not yet benefited from a systematic review of this new policy. In seeking to inject much needed evidence, this article explores the effects of new transparency policies designed to promote meaningful communication of risks and benefits to patients. Results of a cross-national European survey with respondents from Great Britain, the Netherlands, Spain, France, Germany, and Sweden (N = 5,648) shed light on how patients and the public are likely to react to the regulators' new transparency policies. The findings demonstrate clear national variations in how European citizens are likely to react and emphasize the need to develop evidence-based, reasoned transparency policies that integrate benefit-risk communication. The authors conclude by providing six specific recommendations, informed by the study, that seek to improve the European transparency model both within the medical field and across health, safety, and environmental policy domains.

Risk Policies in the United States: Definition and Characteristics Based on a Scoping Review of the Literature

The concept of "risk policy" is used with increasing frequency by decisionmakers, researchers, and the media. However, there is no precise, generally accepted definition of what is covered by policies in this area. Based on a scoping review of the literature published in key journals in the sector, we have identified the main characteristics of public risk policies drawn up and implemented in the United States. The sample comprised 21 articles published in six multidisciplinary journals between 2000 and 2010.

Role of the Indian Supreme Court in Shaping Technology Development

Public interest litigation questioning risk regulation of emerging technologies has been a mechanism through which the Supreme Court has become increasingly involved in the national narrative on technology, development, risk and the role of the state. Such litigations include biotechnology and nuclear technology which have also been identified as important ingredients of the national development agenda. This is similar to other developing countries where identification of emerging technologies that help the economy leapfrog, have become part of the development agenda. Understandably the focus of the state is on development rather than on risk regulation. This has attracted considerable criticism from civil society groups and legal challenges to the regulatory framework. The Supreme Court despite its stated lack of competence to understand and address technological issues and its innate restraint to comment on what it deems to be policy matters, has been forced to address issues of risk regulation and in the process play a critical role in constituting the technology and shaping the imagination of that technology within the national narrative. The aim of this article is to examine and evaluate the role of the Supreme Court in this context through an analysis of two case studies of nuclear technology and biotechnology.

Is risk-based regulation feasible? The case of polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs)

The polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) are a class of brominated flame retardants used extensively in an array of textiles and plastics. Initially viewed as inert and nontoxic, in recent years an emerging body of science has cast doubt on this perception. Consequently, the compounds have drawn sustained government, media, and lobby group focus in the United States and Europe, yet have taken contrasting trajectories in different risk regulation regimes. We present a longitudinal analysis of these pathways, examining the actions of legislatures, executives, courts, scientists, and pressure groups. We show that the emergence and resolution of PBDEs as a risk issue was strongly shaped by path dependency, political entrainment (inter-institutional conflict unrelated to PBDEs), and partisan lawmaking. This raises the question of whether risk-based principles are capable of being the foundation on which managing the potential for harm can be based--even when that harm is associated with specific objects like flame-retardant chemicals. We conclude by reflecting on the difficult normative issues that are raised.

Risks

Risk is our daily work and often our obsession – as risk researchers we are working on research projects which are intended to increase our knowledge about all aspects of risks. Being a “risk researcher” means looking at things through a specific ­perspective – the perspective of what negative consequences a natural or man-made event, a technology, a decision could probably have on the world we live in. Our perspective is a socio-scientific one. This means, we are analyzing what consequences do risks have on the society and what can we do to decrease or prevent them. This includes the possible actions of a single consumer as well as strategies of whole governments to manage risks. How are risks perceived by people? What kinds of knowledge are needed to deal with different kinds of risks? Who should be involved, and when? What to do if conflicts evolve about how to handle risks? How to communicate risks? It is our job to answer questions like these. We are dealing with these questions in many different thematic areas: food safety, climate change, chemicals, nanotechnology, electromagnetic fields, etc. These risks pose very different problems and it seems difficult to find general strategies to deal with them.

A frequency/consequence-based technique for visualizing and communicating uncertainty and perception of risk

This chapter presents an approach under development for communicating uncertainty regarding risk. The approach relies on a risk imaging technology that decomposes risk into two basic elements: (i) the frequency of each kind of harm associated with a hazard and (ii) the adversity of each of those harms. Because different kinds of harm are often measured along incompatible dimensions, adversity is quantified on an ordinal scale. Frequency is quantified on a ratio scale. Sampling error, measurement error, and bias all contribute to uncertainty about frequency. Differences in opinion, measurement error, and choice of dimensions lead to uncertainty about adversity. In this chapter, risk is imaged as an area circumscribed by uncertainty bounds around all of the harms. This area is called the risk profile of a hazard. Different individuals and groups respond to uncertainty and risk differently, and the risk profile can be further focused to visualize particular risk perceptions. These alternate risk visualizations may be contrasted and compared across management choices or across different risk perceivers to facilitate communication and decision making. To illustrate the method, we image published clinical trial data.

White Paper on Risk Governance: Toward an Integrative Framework

This document aims to guide the work of the International Risk Governance Council and its various bodies in devising comprehensive and transparent approaches to ‘govern’ a variety of globally relevant risks. Globally relevant risks include trans-boundary risks, i.e. those that originate in one country and affect other countries (such as air pollution), international risks, i.e. those that originate in many countries simultaneously and lead to global impacts (such as carbon dioxide emissions for climate change) and ubiquitous risks, i.e. those that occur in each country in similar forms and may necessitate a co-ordinated international response (such as car accidents or airline safety). To this end the document and the framework it describes provide a common analytic structure for investigating and supporting the treatment of risk issues by the relevant actors in society. In doing so, the focus is not restricted to how governmental or supranational authorities deal with risk but equal importance is given to the roles of the corporate sector, science, other stakeholders as well as civil society — and their interplay. The analytic structure will, it is hoped, facilitate terminological and conceptual clarity, consistency and transparency in the daily operations of IRGC and assure the feasibility of comparative approaches in the governance of risks across a broad range of hazardous events and activities. In particular, this document is meant to assist members of IRGC in their tasks to provide scientifically sound, economically feasible, legally and ethically justifiable and politically acceptable advice to IRGC's targeted audiences. It is also to support IRGC in its effort to combine the best available expertise in the respective field with practical guidance for both risk managers and stakeholders.

Precautionary regulation in Europe and the United States: a quantitative comparison

Much attention has been addressed to the question of whether Europe or the United States adopts a more precautionary stance to the regulation of potential environmental, health, and safety risks. Some commentators suggest that Europe is more risk-averse and precautionary, whereas the United States is seen as more risk-taking and optimistic about the prospects for new technology. Others suggest that the United States is more precautionary because its regulatory process is more legalistic and adversarial, while Europe is more lax and corporatist in its regulations. The flip-flop hypothesis claims that the United States was more precautionary than Europe in the 1970s and early 1980s, and that Europe has become more precautionary since then. We examine the levels and trends in regulation of environmental, health, and safety risks since 1970. Unlike previous research, which has studied only a small set of prominent cases selected nonrandomly, we develop a comprehensive list of almost 3,000 risks and code the relative stringency of regulation in Europe and the United States for each of 100 risks randomly selected from that list for each year from 1970 through 2004. Our results suggest that: (a) averaging over risks, there is no significant difference in relative precaution over the period, (b) weakly consistent with the flip-flop hypothesis, there is some evidence of a modest shift toward greater relative precaution of European regulation since about 1990, although (c) there is a diversity of trends across risks, of which the most common is no change in relative precaution (including cases where Europe and the United States are equally precautionary and where Europe or the United States has been consistently more precautionary). The overall finding is of a mixed and diverse pattern of relative transatlantic precaution over the period.

The precautionary principle, toxicological science, and European-U.S. scientific cooperation

Although it is an ages old concept, the precautionary principle is only a few decades old as a formal expression of a philosophy guiding protection of the environment and of human health. The emergence of the precautionary principle in the European Community and its relatively slower acceptance in the United States reflects differences in underlying social, cultural, and legal approaches to environmental and public health protection. Unfortunately, this poorly defined principle in some of its manifestations can lead to a loss of the toxicological scientific base that is necessary for short-term and long-term protection of the environment and public health. Examples of problems caused by using the precautionary principle include trade barriers erected by the European Community, and the loss of the impetus to develop understanding of the toxicity of hazardous air pollutants due to precautionary aspects of the 1990 U.S. Clean Air Act amendments. There are other U.S.-European differences in the organization and funding of science that are threatening the legacy of Herbert Remmer which was built on close trans-Atlantic scientific cooperation to the benefit of all.

Food safety: risk assessment methodology and decision-making criteria

As our scientific technology grows, risk assessment methods become more complex and, therefore, open to greater scientific debate. Risk assessment has always been a part of the regulatory notification and approval process for foods. However, the methodologies applied to risk assessment and decision-making have become diverse, dependent on a number of features, including the areas of the world in which one operates, the need to use cumulative risk assessment for pesticides and other ingredients or alternative risk assessment considerations for evaluating nontraditional or bioengineered foods. Diverse institutional structures within a single federal regulatory authority may tend to lead to diversity in risk outcomes that creates policy decisions that complicate and confuse the risk management process. On top of this challenge, decisions become more complicated by the need to examine beneficial factors of foods rather than the adverse effects of foods and food additives. Foods are a complex mixture of ingredients. Regulatory groups recognize the need to use new approaches for evaluating the safety and risks associated with foods and food additives, and to do so in a timely manner. The United States Food and Drug Administration (US FDA) in its need to ensure standards of "reasonable certainty of no harm" continues to explore alternative means to be responsive to petitioners as well as continue to examine scientifically validated means, e.g., quantitative structure-activity relationship (QSAR), and computer-assisted programs, within the approval process to assist in the evaluation of risks. Another means to improve the risk management process would include the cumulative risk assessment of pesticides that will, no doubt, be the beginning of more intensive efforts to understand cumulative exposures and the inherent risks from multiple pathways of exposure. The passage of the Food Quality Protection Act (FQPA) resulted in developing additional risk assessment methodologies and approaches to assess the potential for multiple exposures and risks. Addressing the international criteria used in decision-making related to foods safety assessment has resulted in acceptable intake values for food ingredients for carcinogens and noncarcinogens that, in general, tend to be more stringent in the United States compared to Europe. Clearly, the need for harmonization of risk assessment criteria and the impact of the decision process on regulatory approvals and safety assessment is a future need for the continued assurances of food safety. The topics presented in this paper are based on a symposium held in November 2002 at the annual meeting of the American College of Toxicology.

The precautionary principle and/or risk assessment in World Trade Organization decisions: a possible role for risk perception

Risk analysis has been recognized and validated in World Trade Organization (WTO) decision processes. In recent years the precautionary principle has been proposed as an additional or alternative approach to standard risk assessment. The precautionary principle has also been advocated by some who see it as part of postmodern democracy in which more power is given to the public on health and safety matters relative to the judgments of technocrats. A more cynical view is that the precautionary principle is particularly championed by the European Community as a means to erect trade barriers. The WTO ruling against the European Community's trade barrier against beef from hormone-treated cattle seemed to support the use of risk assessment and appeared to reject the argument that the precautionary principle was a legitimate basis for trade barriers. However, a more recent WTO decision on asbestos contains language suggesting that the precautionary principle, in the form of taking into account public perception, may be acceptable as a basis for a trade barrier. This decision, if followed in future WTO trade disputes, such as for genetically modified foods, raises many issues central to the field of risk analysis. It is too early to tell whether the precautionary principle will become accepted in WTO decisions, either as a supplement or a substitute for standard risk assessment. But it would undermine the value of the precautionary principle if this principle were misused to justify unwarranted trade barriers.

Use of risk assessment and life cycle assessment in decision making: a common policy research agenda

Quantitative risk assessment (RA) and life cycle assessment (LCA) are both analytical tools used to support decision making in environmental management. They have been developed and used by largely separate groups of specialists, and it is worth considering whether there is a common research agenda that may increase the relevance of these tools in decision-making processes. The validity of drawing comparisons between use of the tools is established through examining key aspects of the two approaches for their similarities and differences, including the nature of each approach and contextual and methodological aspects. Six case studies involving use of each approach in public decision making are described and used to draw out concerns about using RA and LCA in this context. The following categories of concern can be distinguished: philosophical approach of the tools; quantitative versus qualitative assessment; stakeholder participation; the nature of the results; and the usefulness of the results in relation to time and financial resource requirements. These can be distilled into a common policy research agenda focusing on: the legitimacy of using tools built on a particular perspective in decision making; recognition and role of value judgments in RA and LCA; treatment of uncertainty and variability; the influence of analytical tools in focusing attention on particular aspects of a decision-making situation; and understandability of the results for nonspecialists. It is concluded that it is time to bring together the experiences of RA and LCA specialists and benefit from cross-fertilization of ideas.