The Conundrum of Civil Society Participation: Analysis of Risk Regulation in Taiwan''s “Plasticizer" and "Tainted Starch" Cases

• Main Authors: Pei-Ying Wu, 吳佩盈
• Other Authors: Kuei-Tien Chou
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2015
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/y3vzsr

碩士 === 國立臺灣大學 === 國家發展研究所 === 103 === The main objective of this study is to reflect the loopholes of food safety regulations in Taiwan. In recent years, Taiwan hit by a series of food-related scandals which trigger the public panic and crush the public confidence in government regulation. Taiwan government relies on “expert decision”, being difficult to refine regulations with high uncertainty and high complexity in the “post-normal science” area. Due to the multiple criteria of food safety, this research only focus on the controversy of using illegal industrial chemicals as food additives in Taiwan. It examines the ” Plasticizer” event and the“Tainted Starch” event, observe the reply of the government, the industry, and the public through the context of the examples, and to analysis the risk of the regulation in Taiwan deeply. This research recognizes that Taiwan’s regulation mode is prone to the trade-led and base on science evidence; even the Legislative Yuan amended the law to a stricter regulation in response of social concern. But the regulations of food safety are still mostly limited from the weak precaution to moderate precaution. It is insufficient to handle the difficult situation of post-normal science by depending on few experts in specific fields and some scientific evidence. Even the government amended the regulation including the public during the policy-making process. After the interviews with various NGOs on their involvement in the government policy-construction, this research concludes that the policy-making process could not achieve the lay participation and the multiple value within the institution of the policy-making design. Neither will the government makes the “Extended Peer Communication” function real. It leads to the perception gap between government and civil society. To sum up, this study suggests that the policy-making process should include multiple experts and the lay to share their experience and express their views. The food safety regulation requires the public surveillance and constructs through food information which is from farm to table be transparent and to achieve equality in interaction.