It is a commonly held view to see the CAP as a highly sectorised policy field, largely impervious to outside influence (Swinbank 1989; Grant 1993;
Nedergaard et al. 1993; Lenschow and Zito 1998; Skogstad 1998; Daugbjerg 1999; Pappi and Henning 1999; Ackrill 2000; Sheingate 2000). It has, however, also been proposed that the perceived 'negative externalities' of the CAP, including the ever-increasing expenditures, surplus production and adverse effects of agricultural production on the environment have, to some degree, redefined the expectations of what the CAP should deliver (Nedergaard et al.
1993; Patterson 1997; Daugbjerg 1999; Ackrill 2000; Sheingate 2000; Hennis 200 1; Greer 2005).
In support of the latter view it is proposed that the ideas translated and institutionalised alongside other concerns within the CAP during the period in question have been made available partly by the EC's environmental policy (see Chapter 4) and partly by proponents of alternative agricultural production methods (see below). Whereas both the EC environmental policy and proponents of alternative agriculture make a link between intensive agricultural production and environmental problems available for translation, it is proponents of alternative agricultural production methods, which supply organic farming as a potential and partial solution to certain problems within the CAP.
It is also a common view that the Commission is the most likely agent to act as a policy entrepreneur and, hence, to facilitate change within the CAP (Patterson 1997; Coleman and Tangermann 1999; Daugbjerg 1999; Sheingate 2000; Fouilleux 2004). Although the EP at large, the Commission and the Council have contributed to the carrying of concepts and conceptions linking organic farming to the CAP during this particular period, it has already been proposed above that the EP Committee on Regional Policy exercised the more vigorous type of policy entrepreneurship by contributing to the translation of organic farming within the CAP. In the following, it will additionally be proposed that agents within alternative agriculture exercised policy entrepreneurship by making ideas available and contributing to the translation of organic farming within the CAP.
110 The Translation and Institutionalisation ofEnvironmenta1 Ideas Within the CAP (1978-1985)
Organic Farming Within the CAP (late 1970s)
The first articulations of organic farming as a potential and partial solution to certain problems within the CAP can be traced back to the late 1970s. In the late 1960s, the then Commissioner for Agriculture, Sicco Mansholt, gave his name to the first attempt to carry through a major CAP reform and. in general, the name of Mansholt has been connected with solutions related to the modernisation of agriculture by means of industrialisation and rationalisation of agricultural production methods (Agra Europe 19.10.1979; Mansholt interview
1978, p.7)".
However, the retired Mansholt had, in the late 1970s, become a member of the Council of The Ecological Agricultural Foundation" and began speaking out in favour of keeping the remaining labour force in the countryside and adopting policies aiming to maintain small farms. With reference to the then ongoing energy crisis and economic stagflation, the problems to be addressed were those of high unemployment and the concentration of capital. The free movement of capital, a steep rise in energy prices, and the increasing use of technology rather than labour contributed to these problems. More specifically, in relation to agriculture, the continuous industrialisation of agricultural production involving developments towards larger farm units became a central concern since it forced labour out of agricultural production, which in turn is exerted ever more pressure on public expenditures in the form of unemployment benefits. Two additional problems relating to intensive agricultural production and the use of agri-chemicals were identified. Intensive agricultural production was considered to disturb the ecological balance as well as being unprofitable in the long term.
The latter was based on the assumption that a future shortage of raw material - as predicted by The Limits to Growth - would drive up the price of artificial fertiliser, making its use uneconomic (Mansholt interview 1978, p. I, 6, 13-14).
The problems identified regarding the agricultural sector were explicitly linked to a depressed economic environment as well as to the 'world problematique' as it was first expressed in the context of the The Limits to Growth. For instance, in accordance with the ideal conception of the 'world problematique', little trust was placed in technological progress as a solution to the impending problems in agriculture. It was argued at the time that 'the I' The interview with the former Commissioner for Agriculture Sicco Mansholt first appeared in a German edition of the IFOAM Bulletin in 1978. In 1979 a full English translation of the interview appeared in a publication by the Soil Association (the national UK association for organic farming) along side a reprint of the 'Conclusions drawn by the European Environmental Bureau from a seminar on the Common Agriculture Policy'. Both the interview and the 'Conclusions' will be referred to individually and by the year when they were first published.
"
The Ecological Agricultural Foundation is established in 1975 by suggestion of E.F. Schumacher, the author of SmaN is Beazrtiful(1973) (Mansholt interview 1978, p.1).The Common Agricultural Policy und Organic Farming: An Institutional 11 1 Perspective on Continuity and Change
methodology of today is based on the view of agriculturalist and biologists who assume a limitless growth of technology. In actual fact we are already doing violence to the nature in many respects and therefore have arrived at the limits of possibilities for increasing production' (Mansholt interview 1978, p. 1). That is, the conception of technological progress articulated by the former Commissioner for Agriculture fitted in with the equation of the 'world problematique' as given voice by the 'Club of Rome' in the mid-1970s. Yet, this conception is also in conflicts with the mutation that the 'world problematique' had been subject to in the context of the emerging Community environmental policy, which entailed that the resolving of environmental problems should be pursued through technological innovations. To be sure, the analytical lines drawn between the articulations of certain ideal conceptions are not conditioned by explicated references, yet Mansholt, in fact, refers to The Limits to Growth and, indeed, had personal discussions with some of those involved in the 'Club of Rome' (Mansholt interview 1978, p.5, 7).
The solutions to some of the problems within European agriculture as articulated by Mansholt envisaged a CAP that encouraged small farm units, less intensive productions methods and in this regard also organic farming through subsidies. In particular, organic farming was seen as a potential solution to the rising expenditures of intensive agricultural production on energy use and agri- chemicals. Moreover, whereas it was doubtful if organic farming would address the problem of agricultural surplus production in Europe, organic farming was conceived to counteract the adverse environmental effects of intensive agriculture and, essentially, contributed to the ecological balance that is needed for sufficient food supplies in the long term (Agm Europe 19.10.1979; Mansholt interview 1978, p.4, 13).
The diagnosis of the central problems of the CAP as well as the potential solutions outlined above was echoed in the conclusions from a European Environmental Bureau seminar on the CAP in late 1978 (EEB 1978). In addition, the conclusions explicated that it is the CAP, which contributes to 'trends towards specialisation, concentration and industrialisation in agriculture' (EEB 1978, p.3) and, in general, that the CAP ought to support less intensive farming, smaller farms and rural society. One of the means envisaged to counter the shortcomings or undesirable effects of the CAP was 'more active support for
6 6 organic" husbandry comparable to that already available for those practising
' 6
conventional" farming; and the initiation of a major research effort to evaluate organic methods and the energy use in different systems of husbandry' (EEB 1978, p.3). Hence, whereas the CAP had been identified as the prime source of the current problems of industrialised agriculture, a changed CAP may also address these problems - among other ways - by supporting organic farming and initiating complementary research. That is, the practice of resolving current problems in agriculture, through the CAP, was not called into question.
The conceptions linking organic fanning to European agriculture as articulated by Mansholt and the EEB conclusions appear to have been endorsed
112 The Translation and Institutionalisation of Environmental Ideas Within the CAP (1978-1985)
and, to some degree, wield authority among people involved in organic farming.
In the introduction to the publication, bringing the Mansholt interview and the EEB conclusions together, members of the Soil Association were thus asked 'never lose a suitable opportunity of drawing the attention of as wide a circle of people as possible to its existence' and it was recommended that British MEPs should all receive a copy (Soil Association 1979; Introduction). In particular, the Mansholt interview is considered to be of 'outstanding importance'. It is also worth noting that the introduction is written by Lady Eve Balfour who has been included as one of three people who 'initiated the development of organic farming in the UK and provided a powerful stimulus to the founding of the Soil Association in 1946' (Michelsen et al. 200 1, p. 128). "The publication also attracted interest outside of the more narrow circles of those involved in organic farming and was reported at some length in Agra Europe (1 9.10.1979).
This broader attention given to organic farming seems, at least partly, to be generated by the fact that it is a concern raised by a former Commissioner for Agriculture and the person who gave name to the first attempt to radically reform the CAP. This point is illustrated by Agra Europe (19.10.1979) running the story under the headline: 'The New Mansholt Plan: Small is beautiful'.
Likewise, even though the EEB is not part of the formal decision-making structures of the EU and it is considered to have had only a marginal influence on EU policies, the EEB was set up in 1974 with the support of the Commission with the aim of mediating contacts to organised environmental interests and has thus been consulted regularly on general matters relating to the environment (Grant 2000 et al., pp.52-53; Weale et al. 2000, p.106; McCormick 2001, pp.1 17-1 18). Against this background, while organic farming was far from being widely accepted and conceived of as constituting a readily available solution to problems within the CAP, it did appear to be accepted among agents involved in alternative agriculture at the margin of the CAP in the late 1970s and was, within this sphere, articulated as an alternative, potential solution to some of the problems within the CAP.
In all, the problems of European agriculture and the CAP, as made available for translation by those involved in alternative agriculture, had to do with processes of industrialisation and concentration in agriculture, the disturbance of an ecological balance, and agricultural surplus production. The causes of the problems made available for translation were multiple, clearly structural and thematic in nature (economic recession, energy crisis, unemployment, technological progress, free movement of capital, intensive farming) and found both inside (intensive farming) and outside (economic recession, energy crisis, unemployment, technological progress, free movement of capital) the CAP.
Importantly, the ideal conception holding that technological progress does not supply viable solutions to problems in agriculture in the long term was made
" See also a special memorial issue of The Journal of the Soil Association, Living Earth (1990) Lady Eve Balfour - A tribute to an organic pioneer and the founder of the Soil Association
The Common Agricultural Policy and Organic Farming: An Institutionai 113 Perspective on Continuity and Change
available for translation by those involved in alternative agriculture, and not through the emerging EC environmental policy (see Chapter 4). The solutions envisaged and made available by those in alternative agriculture had to do with a CAP, which encourages smaller farm units, engages in less intensive farming and, in this context, organic farming.
Organic farming was accepted as a solution since it reduces the use of energy and agri-chemicals, and contributes to an ecological and economic balance needed for a sufficient supply of food in the long term. While organic farming is an acceptable solution to certain problems within the CAP, it is not a readily available solution and research is needed into the scope and potential of the organic farming sector. Finally, those individuals involved in alternative agriculture may be said to have exercised policy entrepreneurship in the sense that they contributed to the translation of organic farming as a potential and partial solution to some of the problems within the CAP. The EEB may also be identified as exercising policy entrepreneurship by establishing a forum for communication in the form of a seminar on the CAP.
The problems articulated within alternative agriculture may be characterised, as normatively instituted in the sense that they are based on a coupling between actual but also predicted further industrialisation and concentration in agriculture and, on the other hand, an ideal conception holding that there exists such a thing as an ecological balance, which public policies should strive towards. Finally and importantly for subsequent discursive and institutional changes within the CAP, the problems related to the modernisation or industrialisation of agriculture, to which organic farming is offered up as a potential and partial solution, is increasingly conceived of as being a central concern within the CAP. That is, even though organic farming was given voice only at the margin of the CAP in the late 1970s, the problems, and some of the sources of the problems to which organic farming is conceived to constitute a potential and partial solution, fit in with some of those articulated closer to the heart of the CAP towards the mid- 1980s.