  We study the one-loop renormalization and evolution of the couplings in
scalar field theories of the Lifshitz type, i.e. with different scaling in
space and time. These theories are unitary and renormalizable, thanks to higher
spatial derivative terms that modify the particle propagator at high energies,
but at the expense of explicitly breaking Lorentz symmetry. We study if and
under what conditions the Lorentz symmetry can be considered as emergent at low
energies by studying the RG evolution of the ``speed of light'' coupling
$c^2_\phi$ and, for more than one field, of $\delta c^2\equiv
c^2_{\phi_1}-c^2_{\phi_2}$ in simple models. We find that in the UV both
$c^2_\phi$ and $\delta c^2$ generally flow logarithmically with the energy
scale. A logarithmic running of $c^2$ persists also at low-energies, if $\delta
c^2 \neq 0$ in the UV. As a result, Lorentz symmetry is not recovered at low
energies with the accuracy needed to withstand basic experimental constraints,
unless all the Lorentz breaking terms, including $\delta c^2$, are unnaturally
fine-tuned to extremely small values in the UV. We expect that the
considerations of this paper will apply to any generic theory of Lifshitz type,
including a recently proposed quantum theory of gravity by Horava.
