Trust, legitimacy and power in forest certification: A case study of the FSC in British Columbia

• Published in: Geoforum 2012-05, Vol.43 (3), p.634-644
• Main Author: McDermott, Constance L.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Accreditation; British Columbia; Canada; Control; Distrust; Environment; Environmental policy; Ethical certification; Forest; Forest conservation; Forest policy; Forest resources; Forestry; Forests; Governance; Government and politics; Labelling; Legitimacy; Power; Social scientists; Trust
• ISSN: 0016-7185; 1872-9398
• DOI: 10.1016/j.geoforum.2011.11.002

► Trust and distrust in certifiers shapes certification standards and outcomes. ► Perception of value salience is key to trust in certifiers. ► Rationalistic accreditation systems fuel value-based distrust. ► Distrust of certifiers drives prescriptive standards and a spiral of surveillance and control. ► Trust is better viewed as a prerequisite to certification than an outcome of global, rationalistic control. The root of the word certification is “to make certain”. Yet the complex technical and normative challenges certification aims to address, and its engagement of diverse and distant actors, are more about trust than certainty. The reliance on trust is perhaps most evident in “ethical” certification schemes due to the contested normative and affective nature of their environmental and social claims. Yet there is little research on the dynamics of local to global trust in these schemes. Social scientists have instead focused on the “legitimacy” of certification as an authoritative governance mechanism. This discourse has reinforced general trends towards structural formalization and rationalistic control that fail to address underlying sources of distrust. This paper draws on a case study of Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification in British Columbia to examine how trust and distrust in certifiers influences the legitimacy and power dynamics of ethical certification, and its ability to promote desired outcomes. It observes how a global, rationalistic system for accrediting certifiers failed to build trust among core local supporters. Instead, normative and affective distrust in certifiers drove the development of prescriptive standards designed to control even the most distrusted certifiers and producers. The result has been slow growth in certified area relative to industry-backed competitor schemes and the demotivation of producers who might otherwise be willing to commit to desired outcomes. The current strategy to build global legitimacy through increasingly formalized and rationalistic certifier accreditation systems runs counter to the development of local trust in certifiers and the creation of shared values and commitment to good forestry.