The Regulatory Enterprise

The use of regulation to control behavior is a defining feature of modern government, penetrating a wide range of social and economic life. This book offers a detailed study of how regulation works in practice, its legal framework, and the arguments surrounding its economic and social impact.

Simplifying entry regulation has been a popular reform since the publication of Djankov and others (2002). The inclusion of business entry indicators in the World Bank's Doing Business project has led to an acceleration in reform: in 2003-08, 193 reforms took place in 116 countries. A large academic literature has followed: 201 academic articles have used the data compiled by Djankov and others (2002) and subsequently by the World Bank. The author identifies three theories as to why some countries impose burdensome entry requirements. He also surveys the literature on the effects of making business entry easier.

This book is a revision of the author's text Public enterprise economics. Since the mid 1980sin the UK major structural changes have taken place in every sector of the economy to which that previous book addressed. Public ownership has been replaced by regulated private ownership and the attempt has been made to develop new modes of regulation. There is however a basic core of normative economics that is relevent regardless of how these markets are regulated and the purpose of this book is to give an up-to-date exposition of this core. This consists of the application of concepts of economic efficiency to pricing and investment decisions. The book goes on to consider the relationship between the behaviour and the performance of a firm or industry and the regulatory framework within which it operates, contrasting public ownership, the US form of rate-of-return regulation and price cap regulation as it is evolving in the UK and USA. Particular use is made of principal-agent theory to carry out both positive and normative analyses of alternative regulatory systems.

Research universities are critical contributors to our national research enterprise. They are the principal source of a world-class labor force and fundamental discoveries that enhance our lives and the lives of others around the world. These institutions help to create an educated citizenry capable of making informed and crucial choices as participants in a democratic society. However many are concerned that the unintended cumulative effect of federal regulations undercuts the productivity of the research enterprise and diminishes the return on the federal investment in research. Optimizing the Nation's Investment in Academic Research reviews the regulatory framework as it currently exists, considers specific regulations that have placed undue and often unanticipated burdens on the research enterprise, and reassesses the process by which these regulations are created, reviewed, and retired. This review is critical to strengthen the partnership between the federal government and research institutions, to maximize the creation of new knowledge and products, to provide for the effective training and education of the next generation of scholars and workers, and to optimize the return on the federal investment in research for the benefit of the American people.

This volume introduces readers to regulatory theory. Aimed at practitioners, postgraduate students and those interested in regulation as a cross-cutting theme in the social sciences, Regulatory Theory includes chapters on the social-psychological foundations of regulation as well as theories of regulation such as responsive regulation, smart regulation and nodal governance. It explores the key themes of compliance, legal pluralism, meta-regulation, the rule of law, risk, accountability, globalisation and regulatory capitalism. The environment, crime, health, human rights, investment, migration and tax are among the fields of regulation considered in this ground-breaking book. Each chapter introduces the reader to key concepts and ideas and contains suggestions for further reading. The contributors, who either are or have been connected to the Regulatory Institutions Network (RegNet) at The Australian National University, include John Braithwaite, Valerie Braithwaite, Peter Grabosky, Neil Gunningham, Fiona Haines, Terry Halliday, David Levi-Faur, Christine Parker, Colin Scott and Clifford Shearing.

Regulatory frameworks are a common tool in the EU food policy to achieve objectives on the society level, e.g. an increase in the society’s health status. Analyses of potential consequences of regulatory frameworks are a basis for policy makers deciding on their implementation. To support policy decision making the thesis builds on an ex-ante approach considering the development path from a regulation via enterprises’ behaviour to society consequences. Limiting the thesis’ focus on modelling the enterprise behaviour towards regulations its objective is to generate a step-by-step approach for regulatory decision support in food policy and to transform this approach into a computer-based interactive system. After a theoretical background the thesis presents a basis of an argumentation line that should lead to the requested results, i.e. the enterprise compliance behaviour. This hypothesis is specified and validated according to a decision scenario defined by two regulatory frameworks. A step-by-step approach for regulatory decision support is generated composed of two knowledge areas. (1) A sequence of arguments relying on expertise, and (2) a knowledge base backing up the arguments with modular data, relying on various sources. Of importance for decision aiding is transparency improvement and complexity reduction which is considered by the step-by-step procedure and the filter concept of each argument reducing the model scope. The utilization of the step-by-step approach through field tests in the cereals industry of several EU countries approved the desired outcome and identified improvement potential. The improved model is translated into a decision support system. The user interface supports the utilization of the model by guiding the interaction between the sequence of arguments, the knowledge base, and the analyst, who has to make the specifications necessary to go from one step to the next. The decision support system presents to the policy maker the status quo of the compliance level, the potential increase through the regulatory framework and the lack in compliance based on the estimated behaviour of affected enterprise classes. The transparency of the system enables recommendations of specific changes in the regulatory framework or corrective policy actions.