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Neoliberal discourse, actor power, and the politics of nutrition policy: A qualitative analysis of informal challenges to nutrition labelling regulations at the World Trade Organization, 2007–2019

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  • Barlow, P.
  • Thow, A.M.

Abstract

Unhealthy diets are increasing contributors to poor health and mortality in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Government interventions targeting the structural drivers of unhealthy diets are needed to prevent these illnesses, including nutrition labelling regulations that create healthier food environments. Yet, implementation remains slow and uneven. One explanation for slow implementation highlights the role of politics, including powerful ideological discourse and its strategic deployment by economically powerful actors. In this article, we advance research on the politics of nutrition policies by analysing political discourse on nutrition labelling regulations within an influential and under-studied global institution: the World Trade Organization (WTO). We identified WTO Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) Committee meeting minutes with reference to nutrition labelling policies proposed by Thailand, Chile, Indonesia, Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Uruguay (2007–2019; n = 47). We analysed the frames, narratives, and normative claims that feature in inter-country discourse within TBT meetings and examined how actors mobilize ideological and material sources of power via these statements. We find that informal government challenges to nutrition labelling proposals within the Committee featured a narrative that individualized the causes of and solutions to poor diet, downplayed harms from industrialised food products, and framed state regulation as harmful and unjust. These non-technical claims mobilised neoliberal ideology and rhetoric to contest the normative legitimacy of members’ proposals and to de-socialize and de-politicize poor diets. Furthermore, high-income countries (HICs) re-framed policy goals to focus on individual determinants of poor nutrition whilst calling for their preferred policies to be adopted. Patterns of discourse within TBT meetings also had striking similarities with arguments raised by multi-national food corporations elsewhere. Our findings suggest that non-technical and ideological arguments raised during TBT meetings serve as inconspicuous tools through which nutrition labelling policies in LMICs are undermined by HICs, industry, and the powerful ideology of neoliberalism.

Suggested Citation

  • Barlow, P. & Thow, A.M., 2021. "Neoliberal discourse, actor power, and the politics of nutrition policy: A qualitative analysis of informal challenges to nutrition labelling regulations at the World Trade Organization, 2007–2019," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 273(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:socmed:v:273:y:2021:i:c:s0277953621000939
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2021.113761
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    2. Amber van den Akker & Alice Fabbri & Scott Slater & Anna B. Gilmore & Cecile Knai & Harry Rutter, 2024. "Mapping actor networks in global multi-stakeholder initiatives for food system transformation," Food Security: The Science, Sociology and Economics of Food Production and Access to Food, Springer;The International Society for Plant Pathology, vol. 16(5), pages 1223-1234, October.
    3. Barlow, P. & Stuckler, D., 2021. "Globalization and health policy space: Introducing the WTOhealth dataset of trade challenges to national health regulations at World Trade Organization, 1995–2016," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 275(C).
    4. Dori Patay & Sharon Friel & Ashley Schram & Susan Sell, 2023. "How do interests, ideas, and institutions affect multisectoral governance? The case of tobacco governance in two Pacific small island developing states," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 17(2), pages 313-327, April.
    5. Patay, Dori & Schram, Ashley & Friel, Sharon, 2022. "The role of causal ideas in the governance of commercial determinants of health. A qualitative study of tobacco control in the pacific," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 314(C).

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