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Policy coherency and regime complexes: the case of genetic resources

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  17 June 2013

JEAN-FRÉDÉRIC MORIN  and
AMANDINE ORSINI
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Abstract

This study argues that ‘regime complexes’ and ‘policy coherence’ are two faces of the same integrative process. The development of regime complexes co-evolves with the pressures on decision makers to coordinate their policies in various issue-areas. Conceptually, we introduce a typology of policy coherency (erratic, strategic, functionalistic, and systemic) according to its procedural and substantive components. Empirically, by triangulating quantitative and qualitative data, we use this typology for the case of the genetic resources' regime complex to illustrate the links between regime complexes and policy coherency. Our results suggest that a coherent policymaking process favours integrated regime complexes, while greater exposure to a regime complex increases the pressure to have a coherent policymaking. This study fills a gap in the literature on regime complexes by providing a micro-macro model linking structure to agency.

Type
Articles
Information
Review of International Studies , Volume 40 , Issue 2 , April 2014 , pp. 303 - 324
Copyright
Copyright © British International Studies Association 2013 

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References

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23 Pistorius, ‘Forum Shopping’.

24 Article 3.

25 Article 27.

26 Bioprospecting refers to the action of collecting genetic resources for commercial or research uses. Biopiracy refers to the misappropriation of genetic resources. On this precise opposition see Bled, Amandine, ‘Technological Choices in International Environmental Negotiations: An Actor-Network Analysis’, Business & Society, 49 (2010), pp. 570–90CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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28 Art. 1(1).

29 Art. 1(2).

30 Art. 19(g).

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36 Article 4.3.

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39 Pistorius, ‘Forum Shopping’; Rosendal, ‘Impacts of Overlapping International Regimes’; Helfer, ‘Regime shifting’.

40 Dirk De Bièvre and Lars Thomann, ‘Forum Shopping in the Global Intellectual Property Rights Regime’, paper presented at the annual meeting of the International Studies Association, New Orleans (2010).

41 For instance the US, EU, and Japan were the top-three governmental actors regarding the share in biotechnology patent applications under the Patent Cooperation Treaty over the period 2007–9 while Switzerland ranked 7th. OECD, Key biotechnology indicators (December 2011), p. 6, available at: {http://www.oecd.org/science/innovationinsciencetechnologyandindustry/49303992.pdf}.

42 We treat the US as any other governmental actor, despite its non-ratification of the CBD treaty. This is justified by the extensive American participation in the CBD negotiations.

43 More precisely, we include the negotiations hosted by the CBD Ad Hoc Open-ended Working Group on Access and Benefit Sharing (ASBWG) that elaborated the Nagoya Protocol on ABS adopted in 2010; the negotiations hosted by the IGC on a ‘legal instrument’ for the effective protection of genetic resources and traditional knowledge; the negotiations of the TRIPs Council that administers the TRIPs Agreement and discusses its revision; the negotiations of the provisions of the FAO Treaty that was adopted in 2004. From the first meeting of IGC in April 2001 to the end of this research project in July 2010, ABSWG met 10 times, IGC 16 times, the TRIPs Council 35 times, and the committee for FAO treaty 6 times.

44 The FAO was not included in the analysis for lack of available data.

45 The corpus includes 192,126 occurrences of 6,730 different words.

46 We therefore contend that coherence implies a certain degree of homogeneity of individual words from one submission to another. While a coherent state could ask for an international certificate of origin at CBD, for disclosure at WTO and WIPO and for open access at FAO, it is most likely to develop all the elements of this political position in each forum.

47 607 keywords were then combined into 27 semantic fields, resulting in the categorisation of 30,970 occurrences (16.1 per cent of the total).

48 The WTO was not included in the analysis for lack of available data.

49 Bureaucratic units have been coded using information given by each participant. By ‘bureaucratic units’, we mean different ministries, agencies, institutes, etc. but have not investigated the origin of the participants inside these units (subdivisions of ministries, etc.).

50 These labels can be attributed only on relative terms. It is important to keep in mind that with a larger sampling, the observed relative positions would have been different.

51 Interviews were conducted with 7 officials, 2 from Switzerland, 3 from the EU, 1 from Japan, and 1 from the US. The small number of interviewees is compensated by their quality – they are all delegates negotiating in at least two fora of the GR complex. See the list of interviewees in Appendix 3.

52 Buck, Matthias and Hamilton, Clare, ‘The Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from their Utilization to the Convention on Biological Diversity’, Review of International Environmental Law, 20:1 (2011), pp. 47–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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55 Interviews 1 and 7.

56 Oberthür, Sebastian and Rabitz, Florian, ‘EU Performance in the Negotiations on the Nagoya Protocol: Revival of EU Global Environmental Leadership?’, in Oberthür, Sebastian and Rosendal, Kristin (eds), Global Governance of Genetic Resources: Access to and Benefit-Sharing after the Nagoya Protocol, (London: Routledge, 2013)Google Scholar.

57 Philippe Cullet, ‘Liability and Redress: International Trends and Domestic Policy Options’, paper presented at the National Consultations on Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, New Delhi (2005).

58 Interview 5.

59 Kraus, Daniel and Rûssli, Markus, ‘Access and Benefit Sharing User Measures in Switzerland’, The Journal of World Intellectual Property, 14 (2011), p. 5CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

60 Marc Hufty, Tobias Schulz, and Maurice Tschopp, ‘The role of Switzerland in the Nagoya Protocol Negotiations’, in Oberthür and Rosendal (eds), Global Governance of Genetic Resources.

61 Interview 5.

62 Interview 4.

63 Interview 3.

64 Interviews 4, 5, 6, and 7.

65 Interviews 4 and 5.

66 Interview 6.

67 The category ‘observers’ is mentioned as such on the lists. It excludes international organisations and includes NGOs, business, scientific organisations, and individual experts. Location was decided upon the address provided by the corresponding observers. The category ‘other’ encompasses observers from countries not included in our study as well as observers labeled ‘international’ when several locations appeared on their record. Figures for Switzerland are partly explained by the fact that WIPO has its head office in Geneva.

68 Interview 6.

69 For the last interval, 2009–10, the figure decreases in two cases (the EU and US) but this is due to the fact that our sample ends in 2010.

70 In their study of the CBD negotiations, Hufty et al. confirm that ‘dense horizontal and vertical collaboration mechanisms between various administrative bodies and interest groups form Swiss environmental foreign policy and characterize the representation of Switzerland in international forums’, Hufty, Schulz, and Tschopp, ‘the role of Switzerland’.

71 The follow-up period of the negotiations is the number of months between the first and last meeting attended by each multi-fora non-state actor.

72 Latif, Developing Country Coordination, p. 27.

73 Vivas-Engui and Olivia, Biodiversity and Intellectual Property.

74 Interview 6.