TOPICS:
Politics; overall approaches to the environmental policy-making process; of general applicability to environmental problems; written for the first party participant.
ABSTRACT:
Regulatory Policy and the Social Sciences is an examination of the effect which the social sciences (excluding the effects of economics) has had, historically on regulatory policy.
Regulatory Policy and the Social Sciences is a collection of the work of multiple authors divided into five parts each of which addresses a particular area of the overall topic of the book. This book will be of interest to those who seek an understanding of the contributions made by non-economist social scientists to the formation of regulatory policy. Part one presents an overview by the editor of social science research on regulation, and presents a multidisciplinary survey and synthesis of government regulatory behaviour. Part two addresses regulation in the larger social setting and begins with consideration of the relation between policy and administration in State politics. Lawrence M. Friedman offers his consideration of regulation and the legal process. The chapter closes with an anthropological perspective on regulation, followed by a comment by Carol MacLennan.
Part three addresses the politics of regulation and deregulation. Morris P. Fiorina considers group concentration and the deregulation of legislative authority. The final chapter of this part offers an explanation of the motivation for regulators to deregulate. Part four focuses on applications of social scientific methods by way of case studies, beginning with a psychological perspective of the regulation of risk. Theodore Caplow presents six small studies which examine conflicting regulations and offers an interpretation. The final chapter of this part offers an organizational perspective on self-regulation as market maintenance.
The final part considers the research and policy agenda. Bruce A. Ackerman considers the integration of themes and ideas and the compatibility of cost benefit analysis with the U.S. Constitution. James Q. Wilson offers his appraisal of the neglected areas of research on regulation. The closing chapter of the book offers the recommendation of focusing organizational research on regulation.
Regulatory Policy and the Social Sciences is appended by a list of participants of the Caltech/NSF Conference on Social Science and Regulatory Policy, the findings of which the book is a synthesis. The text is also followed by an extensive bibliography.
T. A. O'Lonergan