BSE: risk, science, and governance

Abstract:

This book looks at the BSE crisis and seeks to illustrate the need for change in the relationship between risk, science and governance (i.e. policy making) identified in the analysis of that crisis.

The work is organised over ten chapters. Following an introduction the second chapter examines the role of science in public policy-making, setting out a range of theoretical ideas to test that role. Chapter three explores the history of the UK’s agriculture and food policy regimes, particularly how MAFF developed into a producer orientated institution whilst simultaneously adopting a very relaxed approach to the protection of customer interests and public health. This approach is highlighted in chapter four, which looks at how public policy developed in response to the new cattle disease. Chapter five considers the part played by the first expert policy committee on BSE, the Southwood Working Party. The dynamics at work in the regulatory change in BSE policy during the following seven years are explored in chapter six. Policy responses to BSE in European jurisdictions outside the UK prior to March 1996 are examined in chapter seven. The position after March 1996 and the announcement that BSE was the most probable cause of 10 cases of a new variant of CJD in young British citizens is dealt with in chapter eight. The crisis that erupted from that announcement led to widespread institutional reform in several jurisdictions, not only in the UK, and the role of BSE in that wave of reform is examined in chapter nine. Chapter ten draws conclusions from earlier chapters, not all of which are confident that the risk analysis approach will be fully embraced.

The book will interest all involved in science policy, risk, and public health, as well as public officials, scientists, and policy-makers.

Patrick van Zwanenberg is Research Fellow, Science and Technology Policy Research at the University of Sussex. Erik Millstone is Reader in Science Policy, Science and Technology Policy Research, University of Sussex.

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