States' interests as limits to the power of finance: Regulatory reforms in early local government financialization in the US and UK

Through a comparison of typical and deviant cases, this study probes and refines the augmented power model which argues that the structural power of the financial industry fosters its instrumental power in influencing regulatory reforms under certain scope conditions. It shows the industry's success in influencing policymakers to authorize municipalities to use derivatives and thereby to financialize their debt management in the US (typical case). The failure of banks to acquire such a law in the UK (deviant case) reveals a hitherto little-noticed condition under which this power explanation collapses: states' fiscal and monetary constitution. We demonstrate that analyzing the operation of finance power requires a precise consideration of how states' fiscal and monetary constitution structures governments' responses to financial industry's regulatory preferences. Moreover, we conclude that synthesizing business power research with literature on the mutual dependence between states and finance helps to explain patterns of state financialization.     

Empires built on sand: On the fundamental implausibility of reactor safety assessments and the implications for nuclear regulation

This paper explores the nature of expert knowledge-claims made about catastrophic reactor accidents and the processes through which they are produced. Using the contested approval of the AP1000 reactor by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) as a case study and drawing on insights from the Science and Technology Studies (STS) literature, it finds that the epistemological foundations of safety assessments are counterintuitively distinct from most engineering endeavors. As a result, it argues, those assessments (and thus their authority) are widely misconstrued by publics and policymakers. This misconstrual, it concludes, has far-reaching implications for nuclear policy, and it outlines how scholars, policymakers, and others might build on a revised understanding of expert reactor assessments to differently frame, and address, a range of questions pertaining to the risks and governance of atomic energy.     

The re-occurrence of violations in occupational safety and health administration inspections

How well do firms in the United States maintain compliance with occupational safety and health administration (OSHA) standards after being cited for a violation? How and why does this vary among standards? This paper identifies serious violations of 91 frequently cited standards at manufacturing plants during 1992–2002 and tracks compliance with that standard in later inspections over 10 years. While formal measures of Repeat violations are quite low, we find considerably higher re-violation rates for some standards once we look separately at how often health standards are cited in later health inspections and safety standards cited in later safety inspections. Characteristics of the standards affect re-violation rates, but not always in the expected direction. Standards whose violations are rated as more hazardous or which received higher initial penalties tend to have more re-violations. These findings could reflect inspector behavior, with those standards getting more attention and thus being cited more frequently. When, as in the case of OSHA and other enforcement agencies, we know about violations only when inspectors cite them, we need to consider bureaucratic behavior as well as employers' incentives.     

Power transitions and the rise of the regulatory state: Global market governance in flux

This special issue examines the consequences of the ongoing power transition in the world economy for global regulatory regimes, especially the variation in rising powers' transition from rule-takers to rule-makers in global markets. This introductory article presents the analytical framework for better understanding those consequences, the Power Transition Theory of Global Economic Governance (PTT-GEG), which extends the scope of traditional power transition theory to conflict and cooperation in the international political economy and global regulatory governance. PTT-GEG emphasizes variation in the institutional strength of the regulatory state as the key conduit through which the growing market size of the emergent economies gives their governments leverage in global regulatory regimes. Whether or not a particular rising power, for a particular regulatory issue, invests its resources in building a strong regulatory state, however, is a political choice, requiring an analysis of the interplay of domestic and international politics that fuels or inhibits the creation of regulatory capacity and capability. PTT-GEG further emphasizes variation in the extent to which rising powers' substantive, policy-specific preferences diverge from the established powers' preferences as enshrined in the regulatory status quo. Divergence should not be assumed as given. Distinct combinations of these two variables yield, for each regulatory regime, distinct theoretical expectations about how the power transition in the world economy will affect global economic governance, helping us identify the conditions under which rule-takers will become regime-transforming rule-makers, regime-undermining rule-breakers, resentful rule-fakers, or regime-strengthening rule-promoters, as well as the conditions under which they remain weakly regime-supporting rule-takers.     

Why and how does the regulation of emerging technologies occur? Explaining the adoption of the EU General Data Protection Regulation using the multiple streams framework

Why and how the regulation of emerging technologies occurs is not clear in the literature. In this study, we adapt the multiple streams framework – often used for explaining agenda-setting and policy adoption – to examine the phenomenon. We hypothesize how technological change affects policy-making and identify conditions under which the streams can be (de-)coupled. We trace the formulation of the General Data Protection Regulation to show that the regulation occupied the legislative agenda when a policy window was exploited through policy entrepreneurship to frame technological change as a problem for data privacy and legislative harmonization within the European Union. Although constituencies interested in promoting internet technologies made every effort to stall the regulation, various actors, activities, and events helped the streams remain coupled, eventually leading to its adoption. We conclude that the alignment of problem, policy, politics, and technology – through policy entrepreneurship – influences the timing and design of technology regulation.     

Opening-up labor mobility? Rising powers' rulemaking in trade agreements

This article analyzes China's and India's role as emerging rulemakers in one of the most contested fields of international cooperation: labor mobility. It shows how both countries have seized the trade venue to negotiate labor mobility clauses that go well beyond the original preferences of established powers. Whereas India's more vocal claims have faced resistance, China's success in concluding far-reaching bilateral deals with Western countries is explained with stronger domestic regulatory capability and capacity. Maintaining a technocratic approach in trade negotiations, supported by the centralization of relevant competences in the trade ministry and consistently synchronizing external commitments with domestic reforms, China has been able to convey its market power into regulatory influence. As a result, the global standard for negotiating mobility in trade agreements has risen – notwithstanding the enduring stalemate at the multilateral level.     

论我国秘密侦查手段的规制

秘密侦查在历史上早已有之,只是在现代成为一个比较常规的侦查方式之一。但是由于多方面的原因,我国法律对于秘密侦查几乎没有任何明确的规定,这就容易造成秘密侦查手段在使用过程中的不规范,严重的甚至可能违反法律,侵害公民权利。基于秘密侦查在侦破一些特殊类型案件中具有难以替代的作用,法律宜对其进行合理的规制,使其使用有章可循,严格恪守相关原则,做到在有效打击犯罪的同时又不无理地侵犯公民的合法权利。     

《中华人民共和国反垄断法》析评

The Anti-Monopoly Law of the People’s Republic of China has provided to prohibit monopoly agreements and abuse of dominant market position, control concentration of business operators and fight against administrative monopoly. The transformation of China’s economic system is incomplete, and the Anti-Monopoly Law has many flaws. At the initial stage of enforcing the Anti-Monopoly Law, severe challenges will occur in legislative purposes, enforcement authorities, fighting against administrative monopoly and handling of the relationship between anti-monopoly enforcement and industry supervision. Thus, the promulgation of the Anti-Monopoly Law is only the first step in the legislation on anti-monopoly. Wang Xiaoye held a bachelor’s degree of philosophy from Inner Mongolian Normal University (1981), LL.M. from Renmin University of China (1984) and Doctor Juris magna cum laude from the University Hamburg (1993). Since 1984, she works at the Institute of Law, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS). From 1988 to 1993, she studied in Germany based on Max-Planck Institute for Comparative Private Law. As visiting scholar she spent a year at Max-Planck Institute for Comparative Intellectual Property and Competition Law, and a year at Max-Planck Institute for Comparative Social Law in Munich. In 2004, she was invited to the US by the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice. In 2005, she was invited to the European Union Visitors Program, and awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to spend a year at the Chicago-Kent College of Law. Prof. Wang works in the areas of economic law, international economic law, and focuses on competition law. Her publications include: Monopoly and Competition in the Chinese Economy — A conception for merger control in China in view of the American and German practices (J C B Mohr, 1993); Monopoly Problem in the Merger of Enterprises (Law Press, 1996); On Competition Law (China’s Legal Publishing House, 1999); Competition Law of European Community (China’s Legal Publishing House, 2001); Economic Law (Social Sciences Academic Press, 2005); Competition Law (Social Sciences Academic Press, 2007). She also has over 200 papers published in Chinese, German and English languages. Prof. Wang has served as vice president of National Association for Economic Law of China, the head of the Consultant Committee for WTO Trade and Competition Policy of the Ministry of Commerce, and member of the Expert Advisory Board for Anti-Monopoly Legislation of the State Council and the National People’s Congress. In her honor, she once lectured on competition law for the Standing Committee of the Ninth and Tenth People’s Congress. In international academic activities, she is a founding member of Academic Society for Competition Law (ASCOLA) and of the Asian Competition Forum, and member of International Advisory Board of the CUTS C-CIER. She lectured on Chinese law at ABA, IBA, IPBA, ACF, Harvard University, Columbia University, Washington University (St. Louis), New York University, KFTC, Chatham House, LIDC, IDRC and other institutions.     

试论"超越法律"的企业社会责任

The corporate social responsibility “beyond law” is the responsibility of enterprises beyond the mandatory obligations by force of law but in line with social values and expectations. Indeed, the legal norms on such kind of responsibility are “soft law”, which mainly incorporate social values and expectations in corporate business behaviors and governance structure, so as to realize corporate “self-regulation”. By protecting the substantive and procedural rights of stakeholders and improving their negotiation power, the “soft law” aims at realizing the spontaneous confrontation and balance of the market, and the corporate reputation mechanism and the functions of NGOs adds much to the performance of corporate social responsibility. He Zhaodan, Economics Doctor of Sun Yat-Sen University, mostly focuses on Law and Economics. She has published six research articles in the academic journals of China.