Public Participation and Regulation
"Public Participation and Regulation" in Susy Frankel (ed) Learning From the Past, Adapting for the Future: Regulatory Reform in New Zealand (LexisNexis, Wellington, 2011).
52 Pages Posted: 23 Sep 2015
Date Written: October 1, 2011
Abstract
This chapter analyses the place of participation in the making and application of regulation. The broad concerns that are implicated in this question are democratic legitimacy and good regulatory outcomes, and it is often argued that more participation than presently exists in many areas is necessary to secure these aims.The objective of this chapter is to examine the general benefits and disadvantages of an increase of public participation in the making of regulations, the way in which different forms of participation might be put into practice by specific mechanisms, and how the desirability of an increase of public involvement might be affected by the need to privilege certain forms of “expertise” in some regulatory contexts. The first section explores the relationship between input and output legitimacy to participation and democracy. The second and third sections consider some of the possible reasons for and against increased public participation in the making of regulation. In the following section we discuss the main kinds of mechanisms through which participation can be achieved.
Keywords: Regulation, Law, Participation, Public Participation, Democracy
JEL Classification: P1, L5
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation