Private Actors and Public Practices in Global Administrative Law

• Autor(a) principal: Schmidt,Rebecca
• Data de Publicação: 2015
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://scielo.pt/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S2183-184X2015000300010
• topic: Public-Private Distinction; Global Governance; Private Actors; Public Practices; GlobalGAP

Based on the examination of the powerful, industry-based food safety regulator GlobalGAP this paper revisits the public-private distinction in Global Administrative Law (GAL). It argues that defining public as practice is the most coherent approach both from a practical as well as from a theoretical point of view. Using the GAL framework it is possible to identify acts and processes which are of common concern and ultimately public. In fact, looking at the normative goals of GAL it is striking what significant impacts an actor such as GlobalGAP has on common public concerns. Under these circumstances ‘complying' with GAL principles can be a venue even for formally private actors to create public processes which ultimately better correspond the public character it has in some of its regulatory activities.