Synopses & Reviews
The past two decades have seen remarkable change in American regulatory politics. The reemergence of public interest movements in the sixties and seventies served to expand dramatically the government's role in the protection of public health, the consumer, and the environment. The far-reaching effects of this new regulatory regime in turn precipitated a countermovement--spearheaded by the Reagan Administration--to restrict social and economic regulation. Examining two of the most influential regulatory agencies--the Federal Trade Commission and the Environmental Protection Agency--this study assesses the long-term consequences of the Reagan Administration's curtailment of social regulation. The F.T.C. and the E.P.A. together represent the spectrum of regulatory bodies--one an independent commission and product of the Progressive era and the other an executive agency created in the last wave of public activism. Richard Harris and Stanley Milkis find that the Administration's program of regulatory relief faced a remarkably resilient policy process. Reform, the authors contend, is most effective when an agency head proposes an alternative philosophical framework based on stricter research standards and policies incorporating economic considerations--as was the case at the F.T.C.--and least effective when a director strives to undermine agency functions for no purpose other than regulatory relief--as Ann Burford did at the E.P.A. They also show how Congress has firmly resisted all efforts to enact the fundamental institutional reforms required for prolonged regulatory change. This important study will be of great interest to a broad range of scholars and professionals concerned with the political, economic, legal, or business aspects of regulatory policy.
Synopsis
The past three decades have brought remarkable change in American regulatory politics. The re-emergence of public interest movements in the sixties and seventies raised fundamental questions about our market economy and dramatically expanded the government's regulatory role in the protection of public health, the consumer, and the environment. The far-reaching effects of this new regulatory regime in turn precipitated a counter-movement to restrict social and economic regulation spearheaded by the Reagan administration. In their first edition of The Politics of Regulatory Change, Richard Harris and Sidney Milkis assessed the long-term consequences of the Reagan administration's attempt to drastically curtail social regulation through an in-depth study of how two of the most influential regulatory agencies, the Federal Trade Commission and the Environmental Protection Agency, were affected by administration reforms. Now with their second edition, Harris and Milkis continue their assessment, creating a completely revised edition that includes coverage of the changes in regulatory politics during the Bush and Clinton administrations. They conclude that the essential elements of the 'public lobby regime' remain intact, even as the successive deregulatory assaults on that regime in the 1980's and 1990's have polarized Washington not simply over public policy but more fundamentally over the just ends of the American political system.
Description
Includes bibliographical references (p. 391-406) and index.
Table of Contents
1. Regulation, Deregulation, and the Administrative State
2. The Politics of Regulatory Change
3. The New Social Regulation
4. The Regulatory Program of the Reagan Administration
5. The Federal Trade Commission, Consumer Protection, and Regulatory Change
6. Regulation and Deregulation at the Environmental Protection Agency
7. Regulatory Relief: To Be Or Not To Be
8. Janet Steiger's Federal Trade Commission: The Limited Possibilities of Consensus Politics
9. The EPA under George Bush
10. Conclusion: Social Reforms and Divided Democracy--The Future of Regulatory Politics