Caught in quicksand? Compliance and legitimacy challenges in using regulatory sandboxes to manage emerging technologies

Regulatory sandboxes have become the latest development in regulatory reform, starting first in financial regulation and now expanding to other sectors. While sandboxes offer notable potential benefits for managing emerging technologies, achieving desirable policy outcomes with this novel regulatory instrument also comes with technical and political challenges. This article offers a framework to characterize regulatory sandboxes in any sector, involving a blend of (1) approval regulation with broad-based standards, (2) restricted discretion by the regulator for specific norms, (3) process-oriented regulation, (4) an outcomes-orientation, and (5) structured regulator–regulatee information sharing or dialogue. Using this model, the article outlines issues in compliance and legitimacy, including in trust and accountability, responsive enforcement, the politics of participation, and post-sandbox oversight. The article concludes by calling for greater scrutiny when considering implementing a sandbox instrument, with attention to sector-specific concerns, and offering directions for empirical evaluation of regulatory sandboxes.     

Politics and policy of Artificial Intelligence

While recent discussions about Artificial Intelligence (AI) as one of the most powerful technologies of our times tend to portray it as a predominantly technical issue, it also has major social, political and cultural implications. So far these have been mostly studied from ethical, legal and economic perspectives, while politics and policy have received less attention. To address this gap, this special issue brings together nine research articles to advance the studies of politics and policy of AI by identifying emerging themes and setting out future research agenda. Diverse but complementary contributions in this special issue speak to five overarching themes: understanding the AI as co-shaped by technology and politics; highlighting the role of ideas in AI politics and policy; examining the distribution of power; interrogating the relationship between novel technology and continuity in politics and policy; and exploring interactions among developments at local, national, regional and global levels. This special issue demonstrates that AI policy is not an apolitical field that can be dealt with just by relying on knowledge and expertise but requires an open debate among alternative views, ideas, values and interests.     

当前及今后时期服务业重点行业人才缺口研究

当前“十四五”及今后一段时期，积极引导高校毕业生从事服务业重点行业，是应对新形势下 劳动力市场用工需求、充分挖掘高技能人力资源、稳定青年人就业的重要渠道。本研究基于 2010—2022 年《中 国统计年鉴》、2018年中国经济普查宏观数据和2010—2021年国泰安经济金融研究数据库中的A股上市公司数据， 采用多维固定效应模型等方法，测算服务业重点行业的人才缺口数量，总结出三大重点服务行业亟须的人才类 型和特点。研究发现：当前人才教育培养存在“用工荒”与“招工难”并存的现象；重知识、轻实践，受教育 水平与能力不匹配问题凸显；针对青年人就业观念的教育和引导较为有限。研究建议：教育部门应完善专业设 置和培养方案；企业和高校应积极推进大学生见习计划，加强校企合作，提高大学生的职业技能；高校和社会 要积极引导大学生群体树立正确的就业观念。