Mellem stat og marked: Danske økologiske landbrugsorganisationers rolle i implementering af økologipolitik

Summary

Organic farming growth is to a considerable extent fostered by state intervention, in particular in Europe. As an example of successful state involvement in ‘green’ infant industries, it forms a new research field for policy analysts interested in studying the relationship between public policy and industrial development.
Denmark was the first country to form a distinct law on organic farming in 1987. The Danish organic sector has been regulated ever since. The major role of the Danish organic farming policy, in particular conversion subsidies, is to enable market creation which require that there are both suppliers of organic products and consumers of organic products. In that connection the Danish state granted financial support for initiatives related to the development of the organic market, in addition to conversion and production subsidies scheme. In spite of the high growth in the Danish organic market the literature is silent about the connection between the Danish organic policy and organic market growth. This dissertation takes the view that the connection between policy and growth can be made by investigating the process of implementation.
While the Danish state has developed capacities to govern supply through administration of subsidies scheme, it is unlikely that it has maintained capacities for implementation of market development activities. On the other hand the organic groups had been involved in activities related to developing the organic market, and as such might posses such capacities. In light of that, this dissertation forms an explorative study on the role of the Danish organic interest groups in implementation of the organic farming policy in Denmark . The aim of the dissertation is to contribute new knowledge about the role of the organic interest groups in developing the organic sector in Denmark. The second objective of this dissertation is to establish the basis for a future analysis that will examine whether the activities of interest groups can be linked to growth in organic market.
Theoretically the dissertation seeks to contribute to the literature by creating a new analytical model for linking state-interest group relations to industrial and economic development. The Dissertation criticizes the existing literature, which seeks to explain industrial development through state-interest group relations, for focusing mainly on policy formulation processes and processes inside state sphere. On the contrary the dissertation seeks to construct a theoretical model for analyzing industrial development through examining state and interest group activities during the implementation of industrial/economic policy.
This dissertation uses the Dutch Schools policy network approach to connect state and interest group activities to the development of the organic market. The dissertation shows that the implementation of the organic farming policy happens inside policy networks between the state and the organic interest groups. The state is responsible for financing market development activities. On the other hand the organic interest groups have built capacities for carrying out such activities, and are responsible for converting public resource to market development activities.
The dissertations shows that an interest group can play a role in governing a specific market and by that can be a central factor in the development of a specific industrial sector. By using the Dutch Schools notion of network management, the dissertation shows that the organic interest groups used public financed activities to govern the organic market agent and their mutual relations. Furthermore the dissertation shows that the public financed market-managing activities performed by the organic interest groups, have occurred in synergy with other independent market-management activities that the organic interest groups have been performing. By that the dissertation shows that the activities performed by interest organizations outside the state arena pose an important variable, in analyzing the role played by interest organizations in the process of policy implementation.