[Apologies for cross-posting]
Call for Papers: ECPR General Conference, Wroclaw, Poland, 4 to 7 September 2019 Panel: Transnational private governance under concerted attack? Examining contestations and challenges from businesses, states, and global consumers Dear all, As part of the Section “Regulatory Governance under Pressure” (coordinated by Eva Ruffing and Christel Koop; see Section description below), this panel examines the multiple challenges private regulatory governance is currently faced with. After a period of enthusiastic support by academics and practitioners, and a mushrooming of transnational private governance schemes in a broad range of sectors (e.g. agri-food; forestry; electronics; textiles) and issue areas (focusing on labor rights, environmental degradation, and resource sustainability), these initiatives are now increasingly put into question. Inter alia, pressure on the original model of rulemaking, certification and auditing is caused through the rise of more flexible business-led models of supply chain governance, the emergence of alternative loci of consumption in the Global South, and increasing contestation by national regulators in producing countries over the appropriate forum for making and enforcing production rules. This panel will examine these and other pressures and their implications for the future and evolution of private regulatory governance, as well as the fate of the problems they were created to address. The panel will include 3 – 5 papers. At this point, I anticipate chairing the panel and presenting one co-authored paper. If you are interested in contributing a paper, please send me an email until February 12st 2019 with the following information: Title Abstract (max. 500 words) 3 – 8 keywords Presenter and co-author information (name, email, institutional affiliation) I am also looking for interested discussants, so please let me know if you plan on attending the General Conference and would be willing to act as discussant. Many thanks, Janina Section description: Regulatory Governance under Pressure The Section ‘Regulatory Governance Under Pressure’ brings together panels and papers that focus on regulatory governance in a changing world. By regulatory governance, we mean the use of rules – including standard-setting, monitoring and sanctioning – to intervene in the activities of specific categories of economic, political or social actors. Such interventions may be the initiative of governments and national-level regulatory agencies, but they may also take the form of self-regulation by industry and regulation by international organisations, and transnational regulators. The scope of regulatory governance has expanded considerably over the past decades – at all levels of governance and both within and outside the state. Yet, partially as a consequence of this expansion, regulatory governance is increasingly challenged. Pressures on regulatory governance come in a number of forms. First, crises in various areas of regulation have raised questions about the effectiveness of current models of regulation. This is particularly – but by no means exclusively – the case in the field of financial market supervision, where the global financial and European debt crises have exposed regulatory failures and deficiencies at the national, supranational and international level. Second, as many regulatory competences are exercised by independent regulatory bodies, questions and critique have been expressed of alleged democratic deficits in the regulatory state. With the expansion of regulatory governance, and the increased visibility of failures and crises, critics of this aspect of the regulatory state have also become more vocal. Third, the ability of regulatory governance to tackle emerging challenges has been questioned. Societal issues associated with technological change and the mobility of companies in a globalised world have led to calls for more regulation. At the same time, regulatory ‘solutions’ that have emerged so far are themselves subject to considerable criticism. Fourth, the expansion of business regulation has also resulted in increased interest in the influence of the regulatory sector on the shape and contents of regulation, including questions of co-regulation, business lobbying, revolving doors and capture (e.g., Carpenter and Moss 2014). These questions have become more salient in a period in which populist parties and leaders are increasingly successful, challenging the role and motives of politicians as well as regulators. This Section seeks to address the causes and consequences of the different pressures on regulatory governance, and invites panels and papers that centre on any of the contemporary pressures on this mode of governance. Janina Grabs (BA Hons Political Science, MSc Agricultural and Food Economics) Postdoctoral Research Associate Institute of Political Science, University of Münster Mail: <mailto:[email protected]> [email protected] Skype: janina_grabs Websites: janinagrabs.com www.uni-muenster.de/Transsustain/ Blog: foodpolicyforthought.com -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "gep-ed" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
