A Crisis of Regulation

State regulation — the use of standard setting, behaviour modification and information-gathering tools by state institutions to influence the everyday actions of public and private actors — has been a long-established feature of UK governance (Moran 2003). While its form and content have evolved over time, in line with the prevailing political-economic logic of the era, regulatory change is often particularly acute during periods of crisis. In many ways, regulation and crises are natural bedfellows. In moments of crisis, when the fabric of society is threatened, states (especially liberal democratic states with high public expectations placed upon them) need to act. Regulation has become a matter of recourse in these circumstances. Braithwaite (2008) accordingly observes that regulatory innovation and expansion often follows crises, and the recent global financial crisis — marked in the UK by the first run on a bank since the late 19th century — is no exception.