Uber Über regulation? Regulatory change following the emergence of new technologies in the taxi market

Can emerging technologies transform not only markets, but also foster new regulatory change mechanisms? In the context of prevailing theories of regulatory change, this article explores the extent to which an interest‐based explanation can account for the regulatory responses toward emerging Transportation Network Companies (TNCs). Based on a primary cross‐city analysis of the 40 largest cities in the United States, the study found that although the existence of ex ante interest groups indeed somewhat limited the extent of ex post regulatory acceptance of TNCs, regulators seemed to prefer the newcomers over existing incumbents and approved TNCs in 77.5 percent of the examined cities, rarely pursuing harsh enforcement even when TNCs operated illegally. The research attempts to explain this intriguing phenomenon by extending the interest‐based approach to account for the key role played by “technological regulatory entrepreneurs.” The entrepreneurs bridged collective action barriers by becoming the central agent that managed, and reaped the benefits of, the collective action, by lowering the organizational costs and by disseminating information effectively and turning consumers into political campaigners, thus successfully promoting regulatory change.     

What causes employees to whistle while they work? Factors affecting internal whistle‐blowing in the Australian Public Service

What causes employees in the Australian Public Service (APS) to internally blow the whistle on corruption in the workplace? This research examines the impact of the nature of corruption, organisational culture, and employees’ work attitudes and actions on internal whistle‐blowing in the APS. The respondents were found to internally blow the whistle for most types of corruption: fraud, conflict of interest, unlawful disclosure of government information, and perverting the course of justice. Their whistle‐blowing behaviour was, however, unaffected by observations of theft of official assets. They were also unlikely to report observations of cronyism and nepotism. Active observers of workplace bullying (those who have blown the whistle after witnessing someone else being bullied) were three times more likely to also internally report corruption than inactive observers of bullying.