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This article analyses, through Spanish food safety policy, to what extent policy change can be generated by crisis situations and the accumulation of policy failures. The analysis shows that crisis opens a window for a policy change, but a significant transformation in policy goals and structure only occurs when, at the same time, there is a paradigm change. The entry of new ideas into the political system about how to understand and define policy problems gives rise to the opportunity to transform the institutional context within which policies are developed, ending long periods of stability and incremental change that usually characterize these policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]