The Emergence of a Standards Market: Multiplicity of Sustainability Standards in the Global Coffee Industry

By Juliane Reinecke, S. Manning, Oliver von Hagen. 2012

503 citations recorded by the source corpus.

The growing number of voluntary standards for governing transnational arenas is presenting standards organizations with a problem. While claiming that they are pursuing shared, overarching objectives, at the same time they are promoting their own respective standards that are increasingly similar. By developing the notion of ‘standards markets’, this paper examines this tension and studies how different social movement and industry-driven standards organizations compete as well as collaborate over governance in transnational arenas. Based on an in-depth case study of sustainability standards in the global coffee industry, we find that the ongoing co-existence of multiple standards is being promoted by the interplay between two countervailing mechanisms: convergence and differentiation. In conjunction, these mechanisms are enabling the emergence and persistence of a market for standards through what we describe as meta-standardization of sustainable practices. Meta-standardization leads to convergence at the ‘rules of the game’ level, but allows also differentiation at the attributes level, which is enabling parties to create and maintain their own standards. Our study helps to advance the understanding of transnational governance by explaining the dynamics of competing and collaborating non-state actors in constituting a standards market.

Subfields: Strategy and Management

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/235d55abb693fd0aaab371cd4323e82ec2dbcc37

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Citations in the corpus

Marking the success or end of global multi-stakeholder governance? The rise of national sustainability standards in Indonesia and Brazil for palm oil and soy (2014, background): “According to Smith and Fischlein (2010), rivalry between different inter-organizational forms of collaboration has little to do with the specific rules or standards proposed by a private governance network, as emphasized by other scholars showing that the market for standards in the coffee or cut fl”
The emergence of Southern standards in agricultural value chains: A new trend in sustainability governance? (2015, background): “The resulting multiplicity of standards has been observed in different global value chains (Reinecke et al., 2012; Fransen, 2011), which sheds light on the political struggles for credibility and influence underlying the creation of voluntary standards based on competing problem definitions and obje”
Sustainability labels on coffee: Consumer preferences, willingness-to-pay and visual attention to attributes (2015, background): “It is focused on transparency in the supply chain and responsible production (Reinecke et al., 2012).”
The Political Dynamics of Sustainable Coffee: Contested Value Regimes and the Transformation of Sustainability (2016, unknown): “transnational arena for private regulation (Bartley, 2007; Muradian and Pelupessy, 2005; Reinecke et al., 2012).”
Reviewing the impacts of coffee certification programmes on smallholder livelihoods (2017, background): “This review is timely: the market has become crowded with competing labels (Barham & Weber 2012), and has even created a market for standards themselves (Reinecke et al. 2012).”
Means versus Ends in Opaque Institutional Fields: Trading off Compliance and Achievement in Sustainability Standard Adoption (2014, background): “…supply chains (Henson et al., 2011; King et al., 2012), legitimacy in the eyes of their stakeholders (Yaziji & Doh, 2009; Sine et al., 2007), and the possibility to live up to their norms of ‘responsible corporate citizens’ (Aguilera et al., 2007; Bansal & Roth, 2000; Reinecke et al., 2012).”
Revisiting Supplier Compliance with MNC Codes of Conduct: Recoupling Policy and Practice at Chinese Toy Suppliers (2014, unknown): “…framed by numerous concepts, such as “self-regulating governance mechanisms” (Beschorner and Müller 2007), “soft law” (Wells 2007; Adeyeye 2011), “governing without government” (Blowfield and Dolan 2008), “voluntary standards” (Reinecke et al. 2012), and “privatized regulation” (O’Laughlin 2008).”
How Do Firms Comply with International Sustainability Standards? Processes and Consequences of Adopting the Global Reporting Initiative (2015, background): “…sustainability standards The field of CSR is a relevant context for studying standardization processes as the number of sustainability standards has multiplied in recent years forming ‘standards markets’, where standard organizations compete (and collaborate) for adoption (Reinecke et al., 2012).”
From Employment Relations to Consumption Relations: Balancing Labor Governance in Global Supply Chains (2014, background): “This multiplicity of private governance schemes can be called “standards markets” (Reinecke et al., 2012).”
Sustaining Inter-organizational Relationships Across Institutional Logics and Power Asymmetries: The Case of Fair Trade (2016, methodology): “This new vision of certification is also relevant to complete the multiple functions of standards developed in the FT and more broadly the certification literature (e.g. Abbott and Snidal 2001; Reinecke et al. 2012).”