Is bioeconomy policy a policy field? A conceptual framework and findings on the European Union and Germany

Bioeconomy policy is often labelled a policy field or at least an emerging policy field. But is it really one? And how can one tell and what does it mean? Drawing on the scarce research on what exactly are policy fields and what are the factors driving their emergence, we aim to answer these questions based on the definition of a policy field as a specific and long-term constellation of related problems, actors, institutions and instruments. Empirically drawing on the European Union and Germany, in a first step we find that bioeconomy policy can be characterised as an emerging policy field at most, as it is limitedly institutionalised and lacks a genuinely bioeconomy-related actor constellation and problem structure. Moreover, there are hardly any bioeconomy-specific instruments in place. In a second step, we find that the fragmented institutional and regulatory landscape particularly hinders the establishment of bioeconomy policy as a policy field, as do the ambiguity and inconsistency of its overarching goals as well as its fragile supportive actor constellations. As a result, bioeconomy policy to date rather serves as a conceptual umbrella for a number of already existing policies, so far with little tangible effect.