206
9 The Politics for a Fairer Bioeconomy
(1966) seminally termed “conservative modernization,” i.e., updating some technical and economic arrangements without challenging existing social or political
inequalities. Instead, the process of (technical) change, guided by the winning side
of those relations, precisely maintains those advantages—and, thus, the inequalities they produce—in place. We can therefore identify a dominant paradigm of
conservative ecological modernization in current bioeconomy promotion.
However, unsustainability has not arisen only from the social pillar. The overall
environmental performance of large-scale biofuel production, too, has overall been
rather negative. Although fossil fuel substitution helps with climate change mitigation
and can improve air quality, the expansion of industrial agriculture for feedstock
cultivation has fueled numerous environmental issues such as soil, freshwater, and
(agro)biodiversity depletion. While biofuels’ use seems beneficial, their production
patterns have been grossly unsustainable from social and ecological standpoints.
9.2.2 Institutional Causes Behind Unsustainable
Bioeconomy Development
The prevalence of unsustainable bioeconomy development, such as socially and environmentally unsound biofuel production, is inextricably linked to its governance.
Institutions have been crucial for the thrust and prevalence of specific biofuel expansion patterns in at least three ways. First, national public policies have driven and
largely shaped how biofuels are produced and consumed. They have been determinant both to the failures and to more successful cases. Second, biofuel expansion has
counted on a surprisingly supportive institutional environment at the international
level, despite public controversies. Third, some underlying norms at both national
and international levels have been particularly critical for the bioeconomy’s current
limitations on promoting equity and sustainability. It is worth fleshing out each of
these causation links.
Despite its global dimension, one cannot sufficiently understand the current
biofuel expansion without reference to national policy frameworks. Public policies
have enabled, financed, and largely steered biofuels and other bioeconomy sectors so
far. Even if additional drivers such as foreign market demands have sometimes been at
play, domestic regulatory and economic incentives have usually been the main—and
the only sine qua non—cause of biofuel expansion. Such incentives have included
national consumption goals, blending mandates, facilitated regulations on investment, tax breaks, targeted public credit, and a range of other instruments. Without
these, the current development of biofuels and other bioeconomy value chains would
not have been nearly as attractive—or at all possible.
Critically, those public institutions have not only promoted but also shaped such
value chains. Biofuel policies have systematically allocated nearly all incentives to
private agribusiness while placing most burdens on public banks and state-controlled
oil companies. However, that support has not always been indiscriminate. Incentives
9 The Politics for a Fairer Bioeconomy
(1966) seminally termed “conservative modernization,” i.e., updating some technical and economic arrangements without challenging existing social or political
inequalities. Instead, the process of (technical) change, guided by the winning side
of those relations, precisely maintains those advantages—and, thus, the inequalities they produce—in place. We can therefore identify a dominant paradigm of
conservative ecological modernization in current bioeconomy promotion.
However, unsustainability has not arisen only from the social pillar. The overall
environmental performance of large-scale biofuel production, too, has overall been
rather negative. Although fossil fuel substitution helps with climate change mitigation
and can improve air quality, the expansion of industrial agriculture for feedstock
cultivation has fueled numerous environmental issues such as soil, freshwater, and
(agro)biodiversity depletion. While biofuels’ use seems beneficial, their production
patterns have been grossly unsustainable from social and ecological standpoints.
9.2.2 Institutional Causes Behind Unsustainable
Bioeconomy Development
The prevalence of unsustainable bioeconomy development, such as socially and environmentally unsound biofuel production, is inextricably linked to its governance.
Institutions have been crucial for the thrust and prevalence of specific biofuel expansion patterns in at least three ways. First, national public policies have driven and
largely shaped how biofuels are produced and consumed. They have been determinant both to the failures and to more successful cases. Second, biofuel expansion has
counted on a surprisingly supportive institutional environment at the international
level, despite public controversies. Third, some underlying norms at both national
and international levels have been particularly critical for the bioeconomy’s current
limitations on promoting equity and sustainability. It is worth fleshing out each of
these causation links.
Despite its global dimension, one cannot sufficiently understand the current
biofuel expansion without reference to national policy frameworks. Public policies
have enabled, financed, and largely steered biofuels and other bioeconomy sectors so
far. Even if additional drivers such as foreign market demands have sometimes been at
play, domestic regulatory and economic incentives have usually been the main—and
the only sine qua non—cause of biofuel expansion. Such incentives have included
national consumption goals, blending mandates, facilitated regulations on investment, tax breaks, targeted public credit, and a range of other instruments. Without
these, the current development of biofuels and other bioeconomy value chains would
not have been nearly as attractive—or at all possible.
Critically, those public institutions have not only promoted but also shaped such
value chains. Biofuel policies have systematically allocated nearly all incentives to
private agribusiness while placing most burdens on public banks and state-controlled
oil companies. However, that support has not always been indiscriminate. Incentives