Import Safety: Regulatory Governance in the Global Economy, U. Penn. Press
One of the editors of this collection of essays about how to protect consumers when food and products freely cross international borders is Adam Finkel, a former senior enforcement official at the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. The book is “a direct outgrowth” of a 2009 Penn Law School conference that brought together leading scholars and analysts to discuss import safety. Among the authors are professors in law, economics, political science, criminology, engineering, psychology, risk assessment, and business. The overall tone of the work is to find innovative ways to ensure product safety with a combination of effective “public action and private inspections, public and private standard-setting, and a degree of dependence on consumers to take some responsibility for their own safety.”
The essays are grouped under four headings: “Perspectives on the Problem,” “International Trade Institutions,” “Toward Smarter Regulation,” and “Leveraging the Private Sectors.” The authors discuss the massive scale of the import safety issue; the institutions, such as the Codex Alimentarius Commission, that can help improve import safety; ideas for smarter government initiatives; and “proposals for harnessing market power and incentives to drive improved product safety.” Among the latter are (i) “augmenting liability rules to force domestic firms that benefit from foreign production and low-cost imports to internalize the domestic costs of their activity,” (ii) compensating injured consumers by means of bonded safety warranties with incentives to avoid warranty breaches, and (iii) placing “some regulatory responsibility for product safety onto manufacturers and third-party certification, scientific, and auditing bodies.”
The book concludes by calling for the creation of “a regime of delegated governance.” According to Cary Coglianese, director of the Penn Program on Regulation, Adam Finkel, and David Zaring, Wharton School of Business law professor, “Given the complexity of global systems of production, shipment, and sale of consumer goods, domestic governments and private firms will continue to be called on to prevent, interdict, and respond to hazardous imports, whether they are contaminated foodstuffs, unsafe pharmaceuticals, or consumer products with hidden dangers. Ensuring safe imports in an era of globalization will undoubtedly strain traditional domestic regulatory entities.”
