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Technocratic and deliberative governance for sustainability: rethinking the roles of experts, consumers, and producers

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Abstract

While there is general consensus regarding the urgent need for sustainability transitions in food and agriculture, tensions exist regarding how to best stimulate and manage them. Generally, there are two competing agrifood governance models for advancing sustainability: technocratic and deliberative democratic procedures. Taking up Fischer’s (Citizens, experts, and the environment: The politics of local knowledge, Duke University Press, Durham, 2000) call to develop new ways of bringing citizens and experts together in governance, this paper examines an integrative sustainability governance system that uses both technocratic and deliberative procedures. Drawing on a case study of a Japanese consumer cooperative, Seikatsu Club Consumer Cooperative, this paper analyzes the ways that technocratic and deliberative governance procedures use different forms of knowledge, measure and assess sustainability differently, and produce different outcomes. The analysis finds that whereas technocratic forms of governance are most effective at monitoring, verification, and compliance assurance, deliberative processes facilitate relationships, mutual understanding, and commitment among stakeholders. For sustainability governance to address not only the technical but also social dimensions of sustainability, the findings on Seikatsu Club Consumer Cooperative’s integrative governance system support the need for deliberative procedures.

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Notes

  1. Note within transitions research there are also some alternative approaches that focus more on practices. See Shove and Walker (2010) and Spaargaren et al. (2012) for example.

  2. Based on the ABM report, in selling the paprika, SCCC explained the challenging conditions that the paprika farmer group faced and called for understanding and support among the SCCC members through its newsletter and product catalogues.

  3. After the Fukushima nuclear disaster in March 2011, Japanese consumers in general stopped purchasing food products from the region. SCCC continued to purchase mushrooms from the region as long as the mushroom passed the national public radiation standard (even if they did not meet SCCC’s radiation standard, which is considerably more rigorous than the public standard).

Abbreviations

ABM:

Audit by many

SCCC:

Seikatsu Club Consumer Cooperative

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  1. Department of Sociology, Sam Houston State University, Huntsville, TX, 77341, USA

    Maki Hatanaka

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Hatanaka, M. Technocratic and deliberative governance for sustainability: rethinking the roles of experts, consumers, and producers. Agric Hum Values 37, 793–804 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10460-019-10012-9

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