Some Cracks in the Regulatory Capitalism Formulation

• In Event: 048 - Section on Organizations, Occupation and Work Paper Session. Organizations and Social Inequality

Abstract

Recent scholarship asserts the rise of the “regulatory state” and “regulatory capitalism” (e.g. Braithswaite, Levi-Faur, Potaski, Prakash, Sabel, Zeitlin, Bartley, Vogel) This essay critiques these concepts by focusing upon the difference between declining public regulation (because of business and congressional efforts) and increasing private regulation (because of globalization, technology and increased interdependency), with the latter focused upon the private rather than the public good. Eg, the literature in particular celebrates the rise of NGOs but fails to see that as attempts to make up for declining public regulation. I explore deregulation in the financial sector, transportation, industrial accidents, and the public sector (e.g. Postal Services, education) and make the case that we have the deregulated state and deregulated capitalism.

Author

• Charles B. Perrow, Yale University