Eleventh International Conference on Food Studies

Abstract

First enshrined in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Right to Adequate Food (RtAF) gained clarity and prominence with the General Comment 12 on the RtAF (UNCESCR, 1999) and the Voluntary Guidelines to Support the Progressive Realization of the RtAF (FAO, 2004). Since then, UN bodies have actively promoted the transposition of RtAF into national legislations. Yet, only 29 State-Parties amended their legislation in a way that explicitly protects the RtAF. On the topic, most of the scientific literature consists of single-country studies of the transposition and/or realization of the RtAF. In the grey literature, cross-country perspectives focus on barriers and enablers that fall within the mandate of bodies of the UN system. Without a cross-country comparison, we lack a comprehensive answer to the question: What are the barriers and enablers to transposing the Right to Adequate Food into national legislations? Mapping these factors of change is a prerequisite to measure their relative importance. Beyond, the abundant data on the transposition of the RtAF into national legislations makes it an interesting case for the study of policy change in countries of the Global North/South. To do so, we conducted a systematic literature review. We retrieved 101 journal articles pertaining to the RtAF. Our content analysis grid included codes deriving from the scientific and grey literature on the RtAF, and political science theoretical frameworks of policy change (Baumgartner Jones, 2002). Results take the form of a comprehensive map of barriers and enablers, organized at national, and sub-national level.