Promoting Chinese Herbal Drugs through Regulatory Globalisation

This study explores the social dynamics in promoting traditional Chinese medicine (tcm) drugs by making them acceptable to biomedical markets. It investigates the Consortium for Globalization of Chinese Medicine (cgcm), an organisation based in Hong Kong in pursuit of advancing tcm, and traces the development of the herbal formula phy906, a Chinese herbal product intensively discussed at the cgcm that has been tested according to the us Food and Drug Administration's regulation for approval. Departing from accounts on the organisation's success that focus either on its scientific approach or its leader Yung-chi Cheng, this paper argues that it was the synergy between the cgcm and the pursuit of approval for phy906 that contributed to the regulatory globalisation of tcm. In this process, not only organisations like the cgcm are required to streamline efforts for producing globalised tcm; also researchers are needed who, with cultural commitment, seek for transforming tcm to meet biomedical indications.