Abstract
Scholars sometimes criticize durable regulatory systems for being costly, inefficient, ineffective, and inequitable. This article reassesses regulation, arguing that a mis-categorization of types of regulatory activity has led critics astray. More specifically, the article observes that regulation “hardened” by being built into infrastructure often ceases to be seen as regulation and its benefits are therefore inappropriately omitted from assessments of regulatory accomplishments. Hardening into one or another durable form can create two important benefits: durable regulation moves some items off the agenda of regulators, conserving resources for other regulatory work; durable regulation also creates regulatory endowments, preserving key bargains struck at the time infrastructure was created and reducing future opportunities for capture. Such endowments can then become the foundation for other regulatory work. Examples from the regulation of drinking water in the United States and brief discussions of road safety and disability regulation illustrate the argument.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | S63-S82 |
| Journal | Regulation and Governance |
| Volume | 15 |
| Issue number | S1 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Nov 2021 |
Funding
This article began life as a presentation at the 2012 meetings of the Society for the Study of Socioeconomics (Heimer 2012). Later versions were presented at a 2017 workshop on Progressive Politics of Financial Regulation at Allard School of Law, University of British Columbia, and at the 2021 Law and Society Association conference. The authors are grateful to participants in these events and to the Regulation and Governance editors and anonymous reviewers for helpful comments.
Keywords
- architecture
- durable
- infrastructure
- regulation
- water
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Sociology and Political Science
- Public Administration
- Law
