Deliberation in Multi-Stakeholder Participation: A Heuristic Framework Applied to the Committee on World Food Security

Abstract

Multi-stakeholder participation (MSP) has become a central feature in several institutions and processes of global governance. Those who promote them trust that these arrangements can advance the deliberative quality of international institutions, and thereby improve the democratic quality, legitimacy and effectiveness of both the institutional landscape, as well as decisions made within it. This paper employs a heuristic framework to analyze the deliberative quality of MSP. Specifically, it applies Dryzek's deliberative systems framework to the case of the Committee on World Food Security (CFS). The assessment shows that the CFS improves the deliberative quality of food security governance by including and facilitating the transmission of discourses from the public to the empowered spaces. However, the deliberative quality of CFS could be higher with stronger accountability mechanisms in place, more meta-deliberation and adoption of CFS outcomes at national and local levels. Reflecting on the limitations of using this heuristic framework to assess MSP, we conclude that the analysis would benefit from more explicit consideration of different forms of power that are part of the social relations between actors involved in such settings. By proposing this analytical approach, we expect to advance a heuristic framework for assessing deliberation in an international context of the growing importance of MSP in sustainability and global governance.

A bibliometric analysis of food safety governance research from 1999 to 2019

“…In order to provide researchers a clear understanding of current emphasis and future trends on food safety governance research, it is necessary to conduct a systematic analysis of relevant literature in the existing research field. In the past two decades, there were many papers published on food safety governance in various academic journals, covering the perspectives of management dilemma (Glamann et al., 2017; Scott et al., 2018), management models (Garcia Martinez et al., 2007; Zanella et al., 2018; Zhu et al., 2019), and consumer behavior (My et al., 2017; Zhu et al., 2017); however, the lack and inadequacy of the existing literature was not only the relevant exploration of relationships among countries, institutions, journals, and authors in the field of food safety governance, but also the systematic analysis of the research hot spots and trends therein. In this regard, the authors of this research expect to use a bibliometric method to collect food safety governance‐related documents, then analyze the research character, context, and hot spots of these documents, and further predict possible future research trends.…”

Public-Private Partnerships for Sustainable Development

“…The concept of deliberative democracy is often put forward as an appropriate approach to assess new forms of governance, such as MSIs [9,34]. Deliberation-careful consideration or discussion and thoughtfully weighing options-is a central feature of MSIs since their outcome is the result of a participatory process [23,35]. Indeed, in his book 'Foundations and Frontiers of Deliberative Governance', Dryzek [36] explains how deliberative principles apply to governance networks, such as MSIs.…”

Trade Unions in Multi-Stakeholder Initiatives: What Shapes Their Participation?

“…The concept of deliberative democracy is often put forward as an appropriate approach to assess new forms of governance, such as MSIs [9,34]. Deliberation-careful consideration or discussion and thoughtfully weighing options-is a central feature of MSIs since their outcome is the result of a participatory process [23,35]. Indeed, in his book 'Foundations and Frontiers of Deliberative Governance', Dryzek [36] explains how deliberative principles apply to governance networks, such as MSIs.…”

“…Evaluations on MSIs reaching this deliberative ideal vary. Positive assessments of MSIs demonstrate how powerless actors can express their voice and successfully manage to influence decision making in their favour, whereas more critical assessments point to the failure of MSIs to redress existing power imbalances, leading to uneven participation and outcomes that do not meet the needs of less powerful actors, such as small farmers and actors from the Global South [1, 12,35]. In general, authors are rather critical of the optimism surrounding MSIs.…”