Master
2021/2022
Regulation and Reform: Analysis and Policy
Category 'Best Course for Broadening Horizons and Diversity of Knowledge and Skills'
Category 'Best Course for New Knowledge and Skills'
Type:
Elective course (Political Analysis and Public Policy)
Area of studies:
Political Science
Delivered by:
Public Policy Department
Where:
Faculty of Social Sciences
When:
2 year, 1, 2 module
Mode of studies:
offline
Open to:
students of all HSE University campuses
Instructors:
Victor Attila Albert
Master’s programme:
Political Analysis and Public Policy
Language:
English
ECTS credits:
5
Contact hours:
40
Course Syllabus
Abstract
This is a master’s level course on regulatory governance. The structure of the course is broadly historical. It traces the changes to the state which have been described as the move from an administrative to a regulatory state, particularly focusing on the kinds of control it enables governments to have and also criticisms of these reforms. It then introduces better and smart regulation, drawing on the introduction of better regulation and its adoption by the EU, and then considers the utility of regulatory impact assessments as a tool of better regulation, with the examination of environmental regulation a case in point. Next, the course moves beyond government-centric conceptualisations of regulation and examines decentralised forms of regulation and what might be termed ‘regulation from below’. Finally, the course examines the effects of the Global Financial Crisis and the Covid-19 pandemic on regulatory systems and explores the strengths and limitations of efforts to deal with such crises.
Learning Objectives
- To provide students an understanding of regulatory governance, and some of the recent developments in it, and their strengths and weaknesses. Critically engage with the regulation literature and the arguments for and against particular kinds of regulatory reform; also be able to critically assess the language and ideology of regulation and its relationship to politics
- Make your own arguments about regulation that draw on particular cases of regulatory reform, or changes in regulatory settings, and present these arguments in the proper academic form
- Understand the case and comparative and historical literature on regulatory reform, with a particular focus on EU and (to a lesser extent the United States) and participate in class discussions relating to it.
Expected Learning Outcomes
- Here students will understand Better and Smart Regulation, their main principals and characteristics, and the historical context in which they emerged
- Students here will gain a deeper understanding of regulatory governance through case studies of environmental regulation in the EU
- Students will gain a broad understanding of regulatory governance and the historical context in which it emerged.
- Students will gain a deeper understanding of poly-centric and de-centred conceptualisations of regulation
- Students will gain an understanding of Regulatory Impact Assessments, their role in Better Regulation, and their strengths and weaknesses
- Students will gain an understanding of the history of deregulation, the consequent need for re-regulation and some of the paradoxes of deregulation
- Students will learn about bottom-up forms of regulatory input and intervention
- Through examining the (weak) responses to the GFC, students will gain insights into vulnerabilities and path dependencies of the political economy of regulation in the core states in which regulation emerged.
Course Contents
- Introduction to Regulation and the Regulatory State
- Deregulation and its Paradoxes
- Smarter or Better regulation: justifications and theories.
- Assessing the Impact of Better regulation
- Better Regulation in the EU: environmental cases
- Regulation Beyond the State
- Regulation from below – cases of participatory policy-making
- Regulation in an Age of Crisis
Bibliography
Recommended Core Bibliography
- Majone, G. (2002). Delegation of Regulatory Powers in a Mixed Polity. European Law Journal, 8(3), 319–339. https://doi.org/10.1111/1468-0386.00156
Recommended Additional Bibliography
- Kai Wegrich. (2011). Regulatory Impact Assessment: Ambition, Design and Politics. Chapters. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsrep&AN=edsrep.h.elg.eechap.13210.29