Electronic Cigarettes Regulation in the UK: A Case Study in Evidence Informed Policy Making

This chapter argues that policy debates on electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) are structured around competing evidence claims between proponents and sceptics, who remain bitterly divided on the issue. The confusion and intransigence which has emerged between these camps is, in part, the result of an insufficiently nuanced understanding of the value-centred and highly political nature of the policy process, and the highly circumscribed (yet nonetheless important) role which evidence can play within this. Key policy actors, often from biomedical backgrounds, or trained in the natural sciences, have been unable to recognise the limits of evidence to resolve protracted policy controversies such as that surrounding e-cigarettes. The chapter highlights the value of insights, derived from interpretative social science, about the multiple potential framings of an issue and the need for reflexivity on the part of policy actors to move beyond the current impasse.