Enticing Business to Create a Healthier American Diet: Performance‐Based Regulation of Food and Beverage Retailers

The American public could enjoy a much healthier diet if we enticed food and beverage retailers (stores and restaurants) to substantially reduce the calories, added sugar, sodium, and saturated fat that pass through their cash registers—say, a 25 percent reduction in sugar, salt, and fat and a 10 percent reduction in calories. Rather than ordering firms to make specific changes in what they sell, this strategy—called performance‐based regulation—leaves industry to figure out what is the best way to transform the American diet in a positive way. Because it calls for real changes in outcomes, this regulatory strategy could be far more effective than information disclosure policies that rely on consumer choices, and because it does not require adding extra cost to the price of food and beverages, it could be politically far more attractive than taxing unhealthy foods. Appealing to both conservative and liberal values, instead of relying on the professional expertise of public health regulators, performance‐based regulation enlists America's large food retailers to serve the public good—or suffer substantial financial penalties for failing to do so.     

Disclosing Conflicts of Interest in Clinical Research: Views of Institutional Review Boards, Conflict of Interest Committees, and Investigators

Strategies for disclosing investigators' financial interests to potential research participants have been adopted by many research institutions. However, little is known about how decisions are made regarding disclosures of financial interests to potential research participants, including what is disclosed and the rationale for making these determinations. We sought to understand the attitudes, beliefs, and practices of institutional review board chairs, conflict of interest committee chairs, and investigators regarding disclosure of financial interests to potential research participants. Several themes emerged, including general attitudes toward conflicts of interest, circumstances in which financial interests should be disclosed, rationales and benefits of disclosure, what should be disclosed, negative effects of and barriers to disclosure, and timing and presentation of disclosure. Respondents cited several rationales for disclosure, including enabling informed decision making, promoting trust in researchers and research institutions, and reducing legal liability. There was general agreement that disclosure should happen early in the consent process. Respondents disagreed about whether to disclose the amounts of particular financial interests. Clarifying the goals of disclosure and understanding how potential research participants use the information will be critical in efforts to ensure the integrity of clinical research and to protect the rights and interests of participants.     

Hart Interviewed: H.L.A. Hart in Conversation with David Sugarman

Within the English-speaking world, H.L.A. Hart (1907–1992) is regarded as the twentieth century's foremost legal philosopher. He revived the moribund discipline of jurisprudence, reorientating it so that the qualities associated with analytical philosophy in the second half of the twentieth century² were applied to the investigation of the most fundamental concepts of law and to major public issues, notably, the complex relation between law and morality. As a colleague, teacher, mentor, and author, he exercised a profound influence, an influence that extended to the 'real world' and 'real issues'. From the late 1950s onwards, he championed a new humaneness in punishment, speaking and writing for a right to abortion and against the death penalty and the prosecution of people because of their sexual preferences. His exploration of the balance between the modern welfare state and individual liberty - in particular, the legitimate use of state power to impose standards of private morality -produced an eloquent and highly influential manifesto for modern political liberalism. As Tony Honore, his close colleague at Oxford, put it,'He was the most widely read British legal philosopher of the twentieth century and his work will continue to be a focus of discussion.³