'… All Stakeholders Are Equally Unhappy’: The politics of frame consensus

Consensus is often seen as a necessary condition for collaboration in multi-stakeholder initiatives and in multilateral settings. Yet, how the requirement of consensus shapes deliberations and negotiations of global governance issues – and at what costs – remains underexamined. This article raises the questions: How are contested frames revised for consensus in multilateral contexts, and what are the implications for the issues framed? We trace contestations over the framing of sustainable diets across diverse actors in the United Nations (UN). Based on a frame analysis of official policy documents, substantiated by insights from interviews with UN staff and experts on UN policy, we develop a processual model of frame revision in multilateral governance that explains how different forms of frame consensus – integrative, antagonistic, and evasive – are reached. We advance framing research by theorizing how frames are revised for consensus through compartmentalization and subversion of contentious issues, thereby masking incommensurable differences. We also contribute to research on deliberative tensions through a processual take on consensus in multilateral settings. These contributions have wider implications for understanding global governance, highlighting why UN consensus politics are often associated with incremental rather than radical changes.