New modes of governance based on voluntary performance standards, rather than compulsory regulation, have gained salience in the European Union (EU). Can these new modes of governance offer a credible solution to the current challenges faced by EU policy-making? In this article, we assess the potential of new governance in the light of the theory of democratic experimentalism. This theoretical perspective suggests, first, that co-ordination by voluntary performance standards can lead to more effective rules and more opportunities for political participation; second, that the scope of this mode of governance in the EU is not confined to cases which are explicitly flagged as new governance; and third, that one of the main problems is how a voluntary mode of governance can coexist with compulsory regulation. Copyright Blackwell Publishing Ltd 2004.
Global regulation increasingly relies on alternatives to legal rules, variously termed "soft law," "best-practice rules," or "standards." Such voluntary best-practice rules can be highly effective. Standards influence users by virtue of the expertise on which they are based and because of their enforcement by public and private actors. Standards globally proliferate because they are more compatible with regulatory autonomy of states than binding directives. When global standards are effective, the question of how to subject them to democratic control often arises. The prospects for holding global standard setters accountable largely depend on how decisions on standards are made. These insights are illustrated by examples of the global regulation of financial markets. The preliminary evidence suggests that standards need to be taken more seriously by students of global regulation.
Credit Rating Agencies (CRAs) are private nonmajoritarian regulators (NMRs) of international capital markets. Ratings of creditworthiness are ubiquitous in financial markets, and in this way they exercise considerable control over the flow of credit. CRAs entail a puzzle for the question of the legitimacy of global regulation. As profit seeking firms, they lack a formal element of coercion. Yet, CRAs are often criticized for wielding illegitimate power. Furthermore, the broad demand for accountability has not had a great effect on how CRAs operate. Thus, there is a persistent mismatch between demand and supply of accountability, an "accountability gap." By analyzing the accountability gap, this article seeks to enhance the understanding of the nature and the scope of the legitimacy problems of global NMRs. CRAs suggest that the legitimacy problems of global governance extend beyond formal NMRs to informal NMRs and that solutions sometimes are elusive.
As organizations have come under the increasing influence of global rules of all sorts, organization scholars have started studying the dynamics of global regulation. The purpose of this article is to identify and evaluate the contribution to this interdisciplinary field by the `Stockholm Centre for Organisational Research'. The latter's key proposition is that while global regulation often consists of voluntary best practice rules it can nevertheless become highly influential under certain conditions. We assess how innovative this approach is using as a benchmark the state of the art in another field of relevance to the study of global regulation, i.e. `International Relations'. Our discussion is primarily theoretical but we draw on the case of global anti-money laundering regulation to illustrate our arguments and for inspirations of how to further elaborate the approach.
Recently, 'new modes of governance' based on voluntary performance standards, rather than compulsory regulation, have gained salience in European Union governance. Can these 'new modes of governance' offer a credible solution to the challenges faced by EU policy making? We argue that a critical appraisal is difficult when it is based a) on the scarce empirical evidence, or b) the programmatic pronouncements of policy makers. We suggest instead c) assessing the potential of new governance in the light of theoretical approaches to the EU polity. While current theories of European governance shed some light on the challenges to be addressed by new governance, we argue that the theory of democratic experimentalism makes it possible to better identify the potential and the problems of new EU governance. This theoretical perspective suggests, first, that coordination by voluntary performance standards can lead to more effective rules and more opportunties for political participation, second, that the scope of this mode of governance in the EU is not confined to cases which are explicitly flagged as 'new governance', and third, that one of the main problems is how a voluntary mode of governance can coexist with compulsory regulation. Kurzfassung Seit einiger Zeit gewinnen in der Europäischen Union neue Formen politischer Regelung ("Governance") an Bedeutung, die nicht mehr auf verbindlicher Regulierung sondern auf freiwilligen Leistungsstandards beruhen. Dieser Aufsatz geht der Frage nach, ob diese neuen Formen politischen Entscheidens sich im Rahmen der EU bewähren können. Gegenwärtig ist eine kritische Bewertung schwierig, wenn diese sich hauptsächlich entweder auf a) die bisher bescheidene empirische Datenbasis, oder b) die programmatischen Verkündungen der politischen Akteure stützt. Als Alternative schlagen wir vor, c) die neuen Formen des Regierens im Lichte der Theorien über europäisches Regieren zu betrachten. Die bisher gängigen Ansätze tragen zwar schon etwas zu einem verbesserten Verständnis bei, aber erst die Theorie des demokratischen Experimentalismus erlaubt es, die Probleme und Lösungspotentiale der neuen Regelungsformen umfassend zu analysieren. Dieser theoretische Ansatz zeigt, dass eine Koordination durch freiwillige Leistungsstandards, erstens, effektivere Regeln und mehr politische Partizipation ermöglicht, zweitens, die Domäne dieser Form der Regulierung nicht auf solche Policies beschränkt sein muss, die als "neue Regelungsform" etikettiert werden, und drittens, dass eines der Hauptprobleme die Koexistenz zwischen den neuen freiwilligen und die den alten formal rechtlichen Regelungsmodi ist.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.