Fixing the meaning of floating signifier: Discourses and network analysis in the bioeconomy policy processes in Argentina and Uruguay

Abstract

The concept of bioeconomy has spread globally as a floating signifier leading to multiple policies and strategies. As an ambiguous concept, bioeconomy policy agendas at national levels draw on a variety of discourses and visions later reshaped by the particular political and social contexts of each country or region. From the broad boundaries of the overarching bioeconomy meta-discourse, local dominant discourses emerge, created and transformed by international and national social actors in the frame of power relations displaying discursive struggles. Analyzing this body of social dimensions, particularly from less studied Global South countries, can contribute to a critical comprehension of ongoing bioeconomy policy processes and the relationship between international regimes and domestic policies. In recent years, efforts to develop bioeconomy and forest-based bioeconomy strategies and related policy-making were observed in Argentina and Uruguay, two neighbouring countries with analogous forest sector development. Against this background, our study aims to explore these ongoing forest-based bioeconomy policy processes. In order to do so, discourse analysis tools were used to identify current dominant visions regarding bioeconomy. Additionally, the main social agents dealing with and promoting forest-based bioeconomy as well as discourse coalitions were identified with social network analysis techniques. Our findings revealed generally scarce activity of bioeconomy policy debate in media, conducted by a narrow number of legitimatized actors, namely the private sector and interest groups in Argentina and government agencies and TNCs in Uruguay. Local promoters and dominant visions mirror pre-existing narratives and experiences excluding alternative visions. Uruguay's forest-based bioeconomy aims to mirror European experiences, while the Argentinian is embedded in the national agricultural bioeconomy discourse. As bioeconomy operates as a floating signifier, political demands are articulated to a particular meaningful configuration partially fixing bioeconomy's meaning. In this process, central actors exert structural power, indicated by their discourse network centrality as a parameter of their social capital, but also hegemonize bioeconomy excluding alternative actors and their visions.