Research On The Reputation Mechanism In The Food Safety Regulation

The frequent occurrence of food safety incidents in recent years reflects the existence of flaws in current food safety regulations in China. Practically, traditional regulation practices (e.g. certification, fines, etc.) are not sufficient to suppress the food safety problem. On the analysis of the problems existing in traditional regulation practices carried out by the governments, a new approach is investigated for food safety regulation from the perspective of jurisprudence by using the reputation mechanism. The proposed approach aims to solve the problem in food safety regulation.First of all, on the base of the nature of the reputation mechanism, the regulation capability of the reputation mechanism as an evaluation tool is introduced first. In various scenarios, the reputation mechanism for food safety regulation possesses the function of punishment in administrative law. Hence, it is better to consider the reputation mechanism as a reputation penalty. In regard to the operation, reputation mechanism follows that procedure:data collection management, release, and distribution, which is different from the traditional punishment methods and displays the implementation of information tool in new regulation practices.Secondly, this report investigates the unique advantages of the reputation mechanism in comparison to the traditional regulation practices, which involve its high deterrence, low management cost, and high diversity in participants.1) Negative evaluation of the reputation mechanism for a particular enterprise brings the enterprise significant cost for regulation violation. Thus, the deterrence of the reputation mechanism overwhelms the traditional regulation practices.2) Considering the limitation of law enforcement resources in food safety regulation in China, reputation mechanism is capable of reducing the cost of law enforcement.3) Reputation mechanism stresses on the participation of the consumers in the process of food safety regulation, which abandons the dual structure of the traditional regulation practices and adopts the public’s role in the supervision process.Thirdly, the current applicability and problems of the reputation mechanism for food safety regulation are also studied in this report. In regard to the provisions in current jurisprudence to guarantee the operation of reputation mechanism, the legislators of the recently revised Food Safety Law improved several institutional clauses, which clarify the main body of practice and establish the strict regulatory framework of responsibility imputation and the uniform platform of information release. In practical, the reputation mechanism have achieved favorable regulation results in food safety incidents and played the role of "pressure relief valve" in administrative law enforcement. Nevertheless, various problems have also been exposed with the increase in its implementation. The difficulties confronted in the practice of the reputation mechanism in food safety regulation can be summarized as: 1) The ambiguity in applicable area of the reputation mechanism; 2) The lack of uniform procedure for releasing information of regulation violation; 3) The lack of pre-incident and post-incident administrative relief for the enterprise; 4) The insufficiency in the details of the regulation violation incident; 5) The public credibility problem caused by the government’s authority abuse of reputation mechanism.Based on the analysis, this report proposed strategies to improve the reputation mechanism which satisfies the specific restraining factors. In regard to the layout of the regulatory framework, the applicable areas, operation principles, and relevant supervision and relief mechanisms should be further improved. That is to strictly classify several applicable scenarios, standardize the procedure for releasing details of the regulation violation, enrich the released contents for effective distribution, and adopt preventative administrative litigation relief mechanism and "reasonable" investigation of administrative action in the post-incident administrative litigation thus protecting the production and operation rights of the enterprise.To conclude, reputation mechanism provides a new way for food safety regulation. In the process of establishing the regulatory framework of the reputation mechanism, the operation principle should be focused on to constrain the reputation mechanism in specific rules or framework. Consequently, the reputation mechanism can develop properly in practical, and positive interaction among the government, food producer and consumer can be achieved in food safety regulation.