Different worlds: law and the changing geographies of wine in France and New Zealand

Abstract

This thesis examines the ways that laws are implicated in the apparent political, commercial and ideological divide between the 'Old World' wine industries of Europe and the 'New World' of non-European wine-producing countries. This divide has arisen out of dramatic changes in the geography of the wine industry over the past fifty years. These changes include an increase in international trade and competition, the emergence of non-European wine-producing countries, the development and dispersal of knowledge and learning, changes in patterns of consumption, and the rise of international regulation. National and international laws provide the venue and the vehicle for political contests between so-called Old World and New World wine countries. In this context, differences between national laws are used to explain the differences between Old World - New World wine countries in the face of globalising change. The thesis questions that understanding, and examines the ways that law is implicated in the differences (and similarities) between national wine industries on either side of the Old World — New World divide. In order to do this, a number of theoretical approaches are drawn upon to develop the concept of the 'legal geography of industry'. The legal geography of industry has two overlapping and simultaneous aspects — the representations of spaces that are formalised in the laws that govern an industry, and the multiple ways that such laws are lived by people in place. This concept suggests a methodological approach that analyses not only the 'black-letter' texts of laws, but also the ways that they are formed and interpreted in place. The examples of France and New Zealand are used to illustrate the different ways that law is implicated in the geography of national wine industries and in the construction of the Old World — New World divide. Through these examinations, the stereotypical representations of Old World and New World are replaced with a deeper understanding of the complex relationships between law, space and society that underpin the differences and similarities between wine-producing countries.