eprintid: 27616
rev_number: 13
eprint_status: archive
userid: 4898
dir: disk0/00/02/76/16
datestamp: 2020-01-13 14:09:38
lastmod: 2020-02-03 13:43:54
status_changed: 2020-01-13 14:09:38
type: doctoralThesis
metadata_visibility: show
creators_name: Hartung, Ulrich
title: Multi-level Regulation of Agricultural Biotechnology: Determinants and Actor Strategies in Germany
divisions: i-180500
adv_faculty: af-18
keywords: Grüne Gentechnik; Regulierung; Multi-level Governance; Deutschland; Europäische Union
note: This thesis was supported by German Federal Environmental Foundation
abstract: This thesis investigates the regulation of agricultural biotechnology in the multi-level system of the European Union focussing specifically on the Federal Republic of Germany. In particular, it aims to provide an improved understanding of the determinants underlying regulatory action on subnational levels and certain strategies adopted by political parties and private companies to maximize their respective interests in the unpopular and contested field of agricultural biotechnology. Based on various data sources and the combination of different theoretical and methodical approaches, the thesis provides several important insights. It shows that German municipalities regulate the cultivation of genetically modified crops for various reasons, but most importantly because of functional motivations to prevent negative socio-economic effects or impacts on the environment and human health. For the regional level, the thesis reveals among other things that strong environmental interest groups have positively conditioned German states’ symbolic policy-making, but with seemingly no effect on the adoption of hard regulations. With regards to the actor strategies, it proves that parties, here the German CDU, strategically de-emphasize their unpopular positions on green genetic engineering for various reasons including coalition formation prospects with B’90/Grüne and increasingly diverging policy preferences of their regional branches. Finally, the thesis demonstrates that biotechnology firms make strategic use of specific opportunity structures by lobbying institutionally closed and favorably embedded policy venues at member state level aiming thereby to promote the de-regulation of new plant breeding technologies in the European Union.
date: 2020
id_scheme: DOI
id_number: 10.11588/heidok.00027616
ppn_swb: 168730498X
own_urn: urn:nbn:de:bsz:16-heidok-276169
date_accepted: 2019-12-16
advisor: HASH(0x55fc36c17ff8)
language: eng
bibsort: HARTUNGULRMULTILEVEL2020
full_text_status: public
place_of_pub: Heidelberg
citation:   Hartung, Ulrich  (2020) Multi-level Regulation of Agricultural Biotechnology: Determinants and Actor Strategies in Germany.  [Dissertation]     
document_url: https://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/volltextserver/27616/1/DISSERTATION.pdf