Skip to main content
Kent Academic Repository

'Embedded Regulation': The Migration of Objects, Scripts and Governance

Cloatre, Emilie, Dingwall, Robert (2013) 'Embedded Regulation': The Migration of Objects, Scripts and Governance. Regulation and Governance, . ISSN 1748-5991. (doi:10.1111/j.1748-5991.2012.01152.x) (The full text of this publication is not currently available from this repository. You may be able to access a copy if URLs are provided) (KAR id:32814)

The full text of this publication is not currently available from this repository. You may be able to access a copy if URLs are provided. (Contact us about this Publication)
Official URL:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1748-5991.2012.01152.x

Abstract

This paper asks why an officially unregulated market in pharmaceuticals in a least developed country, Djibouti, behaves as if it were strictly regulated, with limited access to a small number of high-cost drugs. We use Actor-Network Theory (ANT) to show that the explanation is more complex than critics of the international pharmaceutical industry have supposed. Regulation and property rights generated in developed countries have become embedded in the drugs and “black boxed” to the point of invisibility. This has allowed them to travel to Djibouti with the drugs, while maintaining their effects in action. This case study develops our understanding of the way in which materials that are not designated as regulatory agents may still have regulatory impacts through their ability to enrol complex networks of actors, rules, values, and practices. Finally, it argues against the notion of law as a fixed and distinctive space for action, as opposed to the ANT vision of a fluid and contingent order, where law is part of a socio-technico-legal alliance that happens to achieve certain effects.

Item Type: Article
DOI/Identification number: 10.1111/j.1748-5991.2012.01152.x
Additional information: Published online before inclusion in an issue
Uncontrolled keywords: actor-network theory; development; intellectual property; pharmaceuticals; regulation
Subjects: K Law
Divisions: Divisions > Division for the Study of Law, Society and Social Justice > Kent Law School
Depositing User: Sarah Slowe
Date Deposited: 08 Jan 2013 10:15 UTC
Last Modified: 16 Feb 2021 12:43 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/32814 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

University of Kent Author Information

  • Depositors only (login required):

Total unique views for this document in KAR since July 2020. For more details click on the image.