Definition of Product Quality in a Market Economy
The business of "mad cow", contaminated blood and transgenic products, but also the debates on the real value of bags and branded clothing compared to their counterfeits (the first are they better than the second?) Testify to an essential question: how can we define the quality of a product? To answer this question is to choose a representation of the functioning of the market economy. Thus, for some, free competition leads to a relationship between price and quality which ensures a minimization of production, transaction costs (the price reflects the quality) and thus an efficient distribution of resources. For others, on the contrary, public health and the difficulties of the circulation of information, and, from there, the effects of control of the markets by the lobbies are not taken into account.
The qualification of products thus refers to one of the main issues of political debates, for at least three centuries, namely the ability of markets to coordinate or not by the only means of competition. Proponents of the competitive model take the example of product quality to show that the market manages to match prices to qualities. A less extreme variant of this approach is to say that the market ensures an imperfect circulation of information and that, therefore, it is necessary to impose signs of quality, labels and labels to overcome this situation. European consumer and competition policies are inspired by these ideas.
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Critics of this approach point out that the consumer does not have the necessary tools to evaluate the information displayed and that, as a result, expert policies, possibly leading to bans, must be conducted by public institutions. In this context, public action can develop on at least two registers: the discipline of competition and the guardianship of public health. In the case of wine, for example, schemes can be devised to avoid over-production and to protect producers from counterfeits (AOCs, appellations d'origine contrôlée, meet these requirements). But we can also prohibit substances deemed dangerous for health (artificial colors, plaster, etc.). But these two aspects of quality policies are not always easy to distinguish: the ban on importing English beef in the name of the precautionary principle has not it been profitable to the French breeders?
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However, each of the mentioned forms of market coordination (free competition, labels, prohibitions and controls) has different impacts on economic growth, income distribution and public welfare. Thus, the approach that finds in labeling the solution to these problems of coordination of the markets underlines that the free choice of the consumer "well informed" makes it possible to reconcile market and protection of the weakest. However, health effects and the cost of labeling are hardly taken into account. The example of organic products, whose higher price reflects less their "quality" than the higher costs of certifications, is a good example of this problem.
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On the other hand, prohibition policies and the precautionary principle emphasize public health rather than market efficiency and producer profits, and neglect the impact of these measures on the distribution of income. Thus, the so-called mad cow crisis caused the disappearance of the market for standardized and cheap meats and the proliferation of quality labels, with an increase in prices (after the panic and price drop phase). The most disadvantaged consumers were penalized.
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How to decide between these different orientations? In the pages that follow, we will begin by discussing the strength and weakness of the main economic and sociological approaches to product quality. We will then place these approaches on the bench of empirical analysis of historical forms of qualities and markets. In particular, we will distinguish the history of brands from the one of qualitative product definitions, and the latter, of food safety cases. We will see that the current problems and instruments that we have today are the result of these historic choices and bifurcations.
Insufficient traditional approaches
Consumer choices
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The most obvious way, at first glance, to define the quality of a product is to retain the approach of the consumers themselves and thus to adopt the representation of the principles of consumer choice that the theory proposes. usual economic. However, it only has a very partial apprehension of the quality of the products. The latter are evaluated according to their utility (demand) and their production costs (supply), the prices of the free market making it possible to reconcile these two aspects. An approach that leaves many unanswered questions.
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Thus, referring to "tastes" the preference of Southern Europe for wine and that of Northern Europe for beer does not explain these preferences, except to mention, precisely, in the context of circular reasoning, the same "tastes". The latter do not explain the reasons why, for example, towards the end of the nineteenth century, margarine can not be called butter and raisin wine is prohibited while spirits and alcohols are allowed for sale, or why, nowadays, French producers protest against the manufacture of camembert in Switzerland but would like to produce feta or mozzarella AOC.
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Overemphasizing consumer preferences could even lead to paradoxical explanations. Thus, in 2001, some managers of major retail chains explained that it was the consumer demand for meat less expensive months that had caused the crisis of the "mad cow" ...
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If, therefore, consumer preferences alone are insufficient to account for the qualities of products, other variables need to be introduced and the different definitions of quality placed in an appropriate historical and institutional context.
Good labeling is enough
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A first solution is to take into consideration the fact that the market, on its own, does not disclose all product information. In the early 1970s, the American economist George Akerlof advanced the notion of "anti-selection": in the presence of an imperfect circulation of information, it is the substandard products that prevail [1] [ 1] George A. Akerlof, "The Market for" lemons ": quality .... In the used car market, there are both stalls and flawless cars but buyers are unable to make a difference As they mistrust, they will drive down the prices, to compensate for the risk of falling on a defective car.Thus, the owners of impeccable cars are discouraged and withdraw from the market.So that the proportion of bad cars s' increases: when prices fall, sellers of good equipment withdraw, others remain, in which case quality depends on price, rather than the other way around [2] [2] Joseph E. Stiglitz, "The causes and consequences of ....
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This approach makes it possible to take into account the quality of the products. It provides a convincing explanation of the presence of institutions aimed at counteracting the insufficient flow of information (in this case, the requirement for car dealers to deliver all the information they have). The main limitation of this approach is that information asymmetry implies that contractors share the same notion of quality about the good or service being traded. To take the example of used cars, a "quality" car is not the same for everyone, and the diversity of points of view is accentuated when different temporal and spatial contexts are considered. "Quality" meat is not the same in the 18th and 20th centuries! So, it becomes imperative to understand in which situations the actors share the same "quality conventions".
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This question has been one of the main objects of analysis developed by French economists and sociologists [3] [3] For an overview, see "The economics of conventions ... according to which the definition of quality as well as that the perceptions and practices of economic agents in this respect flow from "quality agreements" [4] [4] François Eymard-Duvernay, "Convention of quality and .... So, for example, if raw milk camembert is not necessarily synonymous with "quality" from the point of view of food safety, the "quality agreements" shared between producers and consumers allow to assign a high value in the qualitative scale of dairy products. These conventions materialize when the production of industrial camembert leads to the establishment of an official definition of the "traditional" camembert, sanctioned by rules of law (the AOand highlighted on the cheese packaging [5] [5] Marie-Thérèse Letablier and Claire Delfosse, "Genesis ....
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This approach has the merit of exceeding the uncertainties of standard thinking and of highlighting in quality conventions a powerful factor of market coordination, beyond prices and norms. Camembert raw milk is successful, despite the health uncertainties, because producers and consumers agree on what is the quality of a cheese.
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At the same time, this solution leaves open the question of why the producer associations are struggling to obtain and defend AOCs if they only express underlying quality conventions. Nor do we know how these quality conventions change over time; to take the example of meat, we can always say that the success of the nineteenth century boiled and steak nowadays express conventions of different quality. But how did the transition from one to the other convention take place?
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Here we reach the limits of the purely economic explanation of the link between price and quality in a market economy. Each of the approaches presented reflects a particular aspect (the relationship between price and production costs in neoclassical theory, the requirement of labels in the information asymmetry approach, the existence of shared notions of quality following the theory of conventions). However, these approaches have difficulty in accounting for the evolution of "tastes" and qualities over time [6] [6]. Alessandro Stanziani, History ....
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We can then try to take into account how historically the definition of quality has been made. We will see that, in this process, quality standards are neither in opposition to the market (neoclassical liberal thesis), nor a complement to the imperfect market (theory of information asymmetries), nor, finally, a simple superstructure of quality (argument of the conventionalists). On the contrary, standards (GMO labeling, ban on English beef) are a tool for economic actors, producers, traders and consumers. We must avoid seeing in any quality standard the mere result of the intervention of a pressure group. If, contrary to official statements, quality standards only indirectly reflect the demands of consumers, conversely, they are not just a ruse for producers. Standards arise from the convergence of interests in principle different. The way in which they are reconciled determines the structure of the market and the economic hierarchies.
The historical construction of quality
Brands and quality
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We can start with one of the first instruments supposed to ensure the respect of the quality in the operations of market, namely the labels and labels. Take the history of collective marks (the antecedents of AOCs) in France. Too often, the work on AOCs is limited to studying the relationship between this sign of quality and the "tastes" of consumers. The AOCs would express the quality of certain products rooted in the traditions of a terroir. These signs of quality would also meet the expectations of consumers. Like any brand, AOCs would improve market transparency.
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However, some also believe that brands serve less to ensure quality than to protect interests and provide a form of monopoly. Such and such a product would not necessarily be better than its counterfeit; it is just more expensive because of a monopoly related to the registered trademark [7] [7] It is indicative that, as much the works of history ....
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To this debate, we must add a problem specific to the French case: brands, and collective marks in particular, refer to the issue of breaks and continuity between the Old Regime and the market economy, so well analyzed by Philippe Minard and Jean-Pierre Hirsch [8] Philippe Minard, The Fortune of Colbertism. State and .... Historians have for a long time associated brands, and collective marks in particular, with the Ancien Régime and the corporations: the latter would have been depositories of brands certifying a certain quality of the product via taxation. , to the whole group, some production rules. From this point of view, the end of the Old Regime would have been accompanied by the end of these marks as a tool of monopoly, and the rise of individual brands, supposed to protect rather the consumer. In this way, producers relying on quality would have been rewarded for their effort by the possibility of setting a higher price.
This opposition between Old Regime brands and brands in a "liberal" economy deserves to be nuanced. First of all because under the Ancien Régime, corporations do not concern all trades and products and, above all, regulations and corporations do not necessarily coincide. Trademarks do not always constitute an expression of corporate monopoly, but they also refer to contractual law; and, even in the presence of corporate brands, these serve less to freeze production techniques than to produce a framework for negotiations around these techniques and, therefore, product characteristics.
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This fluidity of the marks under the Ancien Régime then makes it possible to account for the complexity of this question in the revolutionary era. The abolition of corporations in 1791 was immediately accompanied by pressure from several professional associations to protect their products from fraud and counterfeiting. Special standards are thus adopted to protect manufacturers of hardware and cutlery or those of a particular sheet. In general, counterfeiting is considered an infringement of private property and, as such, it is punishable by both the Civil Code and the Penal Code. However, no specific law is adopted in this area. Thus, throughout the nineteenth century, producers and manufacturers of wine complain that, if the individual mark (for example: Veuve Clicquot-Ponsardin) is protected by law, no provision of this kind exists for the collective mark, for example "champagne" or "bordeaux". It is therefore possible to produce Champagne wine in the Midi or in Italy without standards expressly sanctioning this practice. However, there are multiple reasons for officially recognizing these marks; several elected officials and representatives of the world of business outside the wine-growing world consider that the recognition of these signs of quality would mark the return to the Ancien Régime. Pragmatic reasons are added: it is impossible to say where the Bordeaux or Champagne stops because economic regions, unlike the administrative departments, are constantly changing, according to the needs of the companies in supply, transport etc. Producers in the regions concerned are themselves divided on the delimitation to be proposed, as each adopts different strategies for supplying, then bottling and selling the product. In other words, producers complain, but they are the first to adopt unscrupulous practices in this area.
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These tensions sharpen towards the end of the 19th century, when the industrialization of the food chain and the entry of organic chemistry into the agricultural sector pose the problem of defining a "natural" product or even a agricultural product. The possibility of patenting and filing a trademark in these areas continues to raise questions. In particular, in the wine markets, phylloxera (the disease that ravages the vine throughout the last quarter of the nineteenth century) and the rise of agronomy and synthetic chemistry encourage the search for new technical solutions that question the characteristics of regional products and the forms of competition.
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To these elements must be added the boom in international markets, which fuels counterfeiting on a scale that is difficult for individual producers to manage. A convention of defense of the industrial property is signed on March 20, 1883; it seeks to repress false or misleading indications of source. A growing number of trademarks are registered with the International Bureau of Berne, with a significant participation of the French. In 1896, out of 304 trademarks registered in Berne, 145 are French, or 48% of the total.
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These provisions remain partly valid today, despite attempts by the World Trade Organization (WTO), that international trademark disputes are most often settled by bilateral political and economic agreements. For example, in 1992, there was a dispute between Australia and the European Union, with producers in the first country adopting French wine names. The outcome of this standoff was that Australia gave up 23 denominations and obtained in exchange better access to the European market ...
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As for collective marks, the French law of 1905 on food fraud and falsification invites the government, with the help of local representatives, to identify the limits of products and areas entitled to an appellation of origin. On this basis, in 1907, several commissions were set up in Gironde, Champagne, Burgundy, etc., in order to define the regional appellations. However, a problem arises immediately: is it enough that a vineyard is placed in the administrative region of the Gironde to be entitled to the name "bordeaux", or it is necessary to draw up beforehand a list of accepted grape varieties, as well as that winemaking processes tolerated? Conversely, if, in another region, we use the grape varieties and techniques of Bordeaux, can we be entitled to the name "bordeaux"?
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These questions continue to provoke major conflicts within the regions to be delimited, where riots are multiplying. These difficulties then encouraged certain representatives of the Bordelais to pass a law according to which "the delimitation of the regions being able to claim exclusively to the labels of origin of the products (...) will be made taking as base the constant local usages".
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This proposal aims to reduce the conflicts evoked on the assumption that constant local practices are not challenged by the actors involved. This is what producers in these regions keep repeating until today: Champagne or Bordeaux wine with an AOC is produced following ancestral traditions ... However, this statement does not correspond to reality, as witnessed at the time when the AOCs were put in place, disputes relating precisely to the definition of local and constant usage. The latter are practically impossible to define inasmuch as phylloxera and the technical progress of the last quarter of the nineteenth century had radically changed old techniques. It is rather the opposite that occurs: the new provisions of law imply the invention of a non-existent tradition and which serves precisely to legitimize certain economic hierarchies.
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However, as no agreement is found among the producers of a given region on what is a "local" and "constant" use, this debate will restart after the war. These tensions sharpen with the crisis of 1929, which makes fall the courses of the wines and poses a big problem of overproduction. At the same time, the rise of the Californian vineyard launches a major challenge on the international markets. The winegrowers associations of Bordeaux then come to vote the famous decree of July 30, 1935 which gives life to AOC as we know them today. This decree not only limits the areas and areas of origin, but also provides a list of accepted techniques and varieties, region by region. The regulation is about the process and not so much about the product itself. This is the difference, still today, between AOC and other labels. The former discipline the production techniques without mentioning the quality of the final product; the other quality labels focus on this element.
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We are very far from the AOC as an expression of the terroir and its traditions. A variety of standards, justified in the name of the consumer and his or her interests, are in fact intended to give a group of producers rents of position and an institutional framework in which to negotiate any innovation. For decades, winemakers and traders from Bordeaux and Champagne will be protected not only from foreign counterfeiters, but also from the temptations of some of them to unilaterally change the production techniques, or even to "cheat" any short . Hence the desire of producers from different regions and products also different to benefit from these same benefits and, from there, the multiplication of AOC during the second half of the twentieth century.
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Hence also, the crisis that the AOC are going through nowadays. In the face of globalization, on the one hand, and the proliferation of AOCs in France, on the other hand, consumers in emerging countries find it difficult to find their way among the appellations and feel they are better off playing the game. with single-varietal wines - chardonnay, pinot, etc. -, regardless of their region of production, Africa, Australia, Hungary, France. In this context, we are witnessing in France the rise of single-varietal wines which, as a result, are putting into question the valorization linked to both the terroir and the blend of different grape varieties. Thus the reaction of some great wines, in France as in Italy, asking to leave the strict frameworks of the AOC is it also symptomatic. These producers feel they can better benefit from their individual reputation without having to respect
The evolution of the qualities of the products
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The quality of a product and its signs are not limited to trademark infringement issues. Broader trade issues and health issues are also important. Most economic theories have difficulty explaining the reasons why eighteenth-century consumers preferred boiled and those in the twenty-first refuse this kind of meat preparation. In order to answer this question, it is not enough to mention tastes or conventions, because their subsequent presence and modification are not a solution to our problem: they are the problem. To overcome this obstacle, it is necessary to take into account the way in which, at different times, institutions and economic actors intervene in the definition of the quality of a product. Most often, it is not just about admitting or banning a substance, but identifying a bar of acceptability: from what percentage of added water is a wine considered "wet"? "? This question is constantly renewed. The latest definition of chocolate: what percentage of cocoa paste should be included to qualify for the right to call "chocolate" a product derived from the mixture of cocoa derivatives?
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But these issues of qualification of food products arise very early, as early as the fifteenth century at least. They most often concern bread, flour and wine. The baking police in the seventeenth century, as described to us by Steven L. Kaplan, would thus have a triple objective: "to get good bread, to have enough and at a fair price" [9] [9] Steven L. Kaplan, the best bread in the world, Paris, .... In France as in England, the suspicions of adulterated products multiply throughout the eighteenth century. Doctors and chemists indicate the dangers of adulterated products for health and the newspapers take up these arguments. On several occasions, bakers are accused of mixing potato starch, beans and peas with their pulp, and so on. But it is significant that, in the spirit of the times, these measures are always related to the problem of fixing the prices of cereals and bread. Under the Ancien Régime, the control of quantities (the famine plot) is hardly separable from that of the "qualities" of products. The authorities' efforts consist in imposing an institutional definition of quality that allows prices to be set.
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This situation is partly modified in the nineteenth century, when the freedom of contract, support of free competition, is essential as the principle of market regulation. The free market is in fact an institutional construction which provides for certain contractual forms rather than others and, with them, ultimately rather limited responsibilities of the producers vis-Ã -vis the consumers. The principle of free competition and freedom of contract implies that everyone is free to engage in a purchase and, except in the case of proven fraud, the judge has little to intervene in the transaction. A buyer can therefore legitimately buy wet wine provided that he is informed by the seller. The evolution of consumption during a large half of the nineteenth century is based on this model. The trivialization of the main products and the access of most of the population to consumer products can be done on the condition that the decline in their quality can hardly be penalized in law.
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It was not until the last quarter of the nineteenth century that this model was put back into discussion. The second industrial revolution, the rise of new techniques, the progress of synthetic chemistry in particular, pose quite important problems of nomenclature of products in the exchange: how to qualify an artificial fiber? Like fabric or something else? And a wine containing chemicals, from vines themselves treated, is it still an agricultural product?
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For their part, urbanization and the growth of national and international networks increase intermediation operations and, with them, asymmetries of information. Faced with these phenomena, several judges and politicians believe that the final consumer would not be able to identify, for example, mixtures of butter and margarine or the addition of chemical dyes in wine. As a result, special protection is then recognized as necessary. Unlike the dominant orientation of the late eighteenth century, the qualities of the thing are less related to the interpretation that gives the will of the parties than their intrinsic nature. Thus, a product called "wine" must have certain recognized characteristics; these are not subject to negotiation during contracts. The underlying assumption is that the market is not capable of solving..
competition problems and improving the flow of information is also not a sufficient solution.
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This conclusion is opposed to that of the liberal currents of the time, which start from the idea that demand determines the supply and that any external intervention distorts the market, which is supposed to lead to an optimal solution. The first orientation is required from the end of the 19th century (special laws on butter, wine and nitrates), and even more with the law on fraud and falsification of 1905. This law, which will remain in force until in 1993 and, again, to be integrated into the new Codex Alimentarius, is supported by Meline and by a convergence of interests between, on the one hand, the hygienists, and on the other, the Bordeaux wine growing environments and noon. The 1905 law aims above all to discipline competition. The health of the consumer, it, intervenes only incidentally [10] [10] Chamber of Deputies, meeting of November 24, 1904, Journal ....
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This principle still dominates the European devices of today: the law must correct the market by imposing to inform the consumer; the latter is then free to choose which product to buy. These standards, officially promoted for the defense of the consumer, are in fact aimed at ensuring fair competition among producers. This model has been the basis of public policies on food and nutrition for most of the twentieth century. Corrected competition solves quality problems; once producers are protected from unfair competition, consumers will also be protected. This is why health issues are not part of this framework and, as a result, "corrected" competition has been able to support the growth of agriculture and food but not to avoid health crises. How are they then settled?
Product quality and consumer health
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The discourse becomes even more complicated if, to these strictly commercial questions, are added the sanitary stakes. In this case, it is necessary to understand the hierarchy that norms and procedures establish between the protection of the consumer and that of the producer, or, in other words, between competition discipline and the supervision of public health. Thus, nowadays, products or substances harmful to health are so if the scientific experts agree on this harmfulness and if, subsequently, this possible agreement is taken into account by the public authorities. However, as the cases of GMOs and others have shown, it is difficult for scientists to agree on the harmfulness of this or that substance. The authorities then have the choice between waiting for scientific uncertainty to be lifted or, in the meantime, withdrawing the product or substance (precautionary principle) from the market. It is no coincidence that the US authorities do not recognize the precautionary principle and feel that it is simply disguised protectionism. Thus, in the case of "mad cow", the ban on English meat has taken place without any scientific link being proved between the animal disease and that of the human being. The crisis was highly publicized, despite the fact that the number of human cases remained derisory, especially compared to that of deaths for gastroenteritis. In fact, the crisis in question erupted at a time when meat consumption was stagnating and even shrinking due to attention to cholesterol and obesity issues. In particular, the standardized and secure meat, which had been a hit with supermarkets at the expense of butchers during the 1970s and 1980s, was staggering. The "crisis" has unlocked this situation: standardized and anonymous but cheap meats have been removed from the market, supermarkets have opened a butcher's corner, and even discount stores now display quality labels. And prices have further increased. The consumer may have gained in safety, but the income effect has been important, especially for social groups with limited financial means.
In reality, these phenomena and their consequences are not new. For example, in the nineteenth century, the case of porcine trichinosis closely resembles that of the "mad cow". Even if, in the medical world, there was talk of trichinosis since the 1840s and if, in Germany, an epidemic and many studies had emerged during the 1860s, it is necessary to wait until the end of the following decade for the This phenomenon has a major impact in several European countries. The chronology is significant: the medical aspects take on a media dimension only after the protectionist positions of the French breeders. It's not just a Franco-French affair; in 1877-1879, while cured meats were the subject of tariff debates in France, they aroused various reactions in several countries. But the context changes when cases of human trichinosis are reported in the United States, Germany, Spain and Italy. These four countries then question the production of cured meat products. However, in December 1880-January 1881, contaminated salted pork meat imported from the United States was seized by the special inspectors of the cities of Lyons and Paris. As a result, and despite the unfavorable opinion of the Advisory Committee on Hygiene, the embargo on American cured meat was enacted in February 1881.
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It was not until 1891 that the situation was unblocked. Several factors contribute to this: firstly, no doubt, the continuing absence of cases of trichinosis in France, added to the considerable decline in cases in the United States. At the same time, the equilibrium in the meat market is changing. In the early 1890s, the price of pork remained at a relatively stable level, even gaining in relative terms compared to other meats. The consumption of fresh meat tends to decrease, while canned foods, rather than cured meats, are in full swing. Without the scientific debate having known any real novelties compared to the 1880s about trichinosis, the embargo is lifted. In the meantime, prices will have risen to the expense of US cured consumers, namely the lower classes of income. This is the same issue after the "mad cow" crisis.
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In addition to animal diseases, food security is about the absorption of limited or even minute quantities of substances that are supposed to be harmful to health. Nowadays, the case of asbestos, for example, is significant (but one could also mention the health effects of the absorption of heavy metals contained in fish such as salmon or tuna). The question is to prove that the absorption of these elements in small quantities but over several years is actually dangerous for health. Health and economic policies such as lawsuits are part of this issue. The solutions adopted depend on the way in which the law deals with these aspects, on the balance between lobbies and pressure groups and, finally, on the relationship between scientific arguments and economic interests.
In order to understand these aspects, we can recall one of the earliest historical cases of this problem. In the mid-19th century, the question arose as to whether the addition of plaster in wine is harmful to health. The addition of sulphate of potash is a traditional technique used in the south of France, the Italian Mezzogiorno and Spain, to prevent the wines from turning quickly to vinegar due to heat and sudden changes in temperature. (This problem is aggravated by the lack of real cellars). Plastering is also used to prevent the wines from turning in case of rain at the time of the grape harvests. [11] Gérard Fox, "Report on the Plastering of Wine", Bulletin .... It is clear from this practice that any ban or limitation on plastering would affect the south of France and imports from Italy and Spain. That is why, from the end of the 1850s, producers from Bordeaux and wine traders questioned the judges and the ministries concerned about whether plaster should be banned. At that time, the Advisory Committee on Hygiene, attached to the Government, gave a negative answer to this question. This decision supports the tremendous growth of the wines of the South between 1850 and 1880. At the end of this period, the question is presented differently. Plastering is impeached not only by vintners in other regions than the South, but also by the hygienist and anti-alcoholic movement that is developing at this time. As a result, the Advisory Committee gives a new appreciation and prohibits plastering. The lobbies of the Midi are mobilized and rely on the School of Agronomy of Montpellier, supposed to give another appreciation of this practice. The researchers then decide to lock up twenty people in two rooms for two weeks. Half drinks unplastered wine, the other half plastered wine. At the end of the two weeks, the scientists do not notice any significant difference in behavior and health status of the two groups. This experience, which can make us smile today, has not lost its relevance. Do not American and European laboratories give different assessments on GMOs or on doping products?
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One can not imagine a functioning market economy without the plaintiffs being able to compare the different qualities of the goods and services offered to them. Contrary to the theoretical model of the market proposed by the dominant economic approach, this quality is not read simply in the price level. It is the result, in each period, in each place, of long historical processes of resolution of power relations and evolutionary compromises between producers, between producers and consumers, between producers and public power. A less simple model that better reveals the political nature of the market and its operation.
