Balancing experimentalist and hierarchical governance in European Union electricity and telecommunications regulation: A matter of degrees

Emmanuelle Mathieu and Bernardo Rangoni

Regulation & Governance, 2019, vol. 13, issue 4, 577-592

Abstract: While the widespread diffusion of experimentalism across sectors and polities is well documented, less is known about the extent of the shift to this non‐hierarchical form of governance, which continues to coexist with traditional hierarchical governance and involves more inclusive rulemaking and revision based on review of alternative implementation experiences. By comparing and process‐tracing electricity and telecommunications regulation in the European Union, we find diversity in experimentalism over time and across two sectors often considered similar. We explain varying degrees of experimentalism with strategic uncertainty and the constellation of preferences, which we label “de facto polyarchy.” Thus, we confirm the emphasis on uncertainty documented in the experimentalist literature, while addressing a conventional critique by also highlighting the relevance of “politics.” Moreover, while corroborating the common spread of experimentalism, we suggest that an analytical framework based on ideal types offers the best route forward to develop comparative analysis of experimentalism and non‐hierarchical forms of governance more broadly.

Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/rego.12254

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wly:reggov:v:13:y:2019:i:4:p:577-592

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Regulation & Governance from John Wiley & Sons
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().