Technical standards: legal scope and product development

Technical standards are an instrument of economic power, the results of which are the fruit of consensus under pressure from multiple interests, including lobbies (see some of the articles cited in Pour en savoir plus). They are a source of optional and sometimes imperative requirements.

So we have to reconcile what is technical, and therefore sometimes uncertain, with obligations that entail responsibilities.

In this section, we attempt to define the legal scope of reference to standards and their integration into the management of industrial programs in general, and product development in particular.

Technical standards are often mistakenly confused with legal standards, whose application is imperative. The latter, moreover, often call on the former, which contributes to the confusion of genres. Calls for administrative simplification and a reduction in normative pressure relate more to regulatory standards.

Technical standards are documents whose identification is sometimes uncertain. They are documents, most often in the form of technical specifications, established as standards by one or more standardization bodies. These bodies are recognized by the World Trade Organization (WTO).

In its agreement on technical barriers to trade (TBT), the WTO defines the standard as follows:

"Document approved by a recognized body, which provides, for common and repeated use, rules, guidelines or characteristics for products or related processes and production methods, compliance with which is not compulsory. It may also deal in whole or in part with terminology, symbols, packaging requirements, marking or labeling, for a given product, process or production method."

The TBT agreement (see Note) only covers technical regulations, standards and conformity assessment procedures relating to products or production processes and methods. However, standards are not limited to the field of application of the TBT agreement on goods. In addition to services and associated benefits, whether lucrative or not (e.g. rescue services for victims), standards can also affect the functioning of organizations in terms of their operational and functional processes, including managerial processes: quality, social ethics, corporate social responsibility, sustainable development, resilience, business continuity, safety - all subjects generating uncertainties and therefore risks.

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