			Home About us Contact

Private Actors (private + actor)

Distribution by Scientific Domains

Humanities and Social Sciences	66%
Law and Criminology	25%

Selected Abstracts

Private Actors and the State: Internationalization and Changing Patterns of Governance

GOVERNANCE, Issue 1 2002
Christoph Knill
This article investigates the implications of political and economic internationalization on patterns of governance from a statecentric perspective. The actual patterns of governance in internationalized environments can be related to the respective governance capacity of public and private actors, which hinges in turn on the strategic constellation underlying the provision of a public good. The specific strategic constellation varies in three dimensions: the congruence between the scope of the underlying problem and the organizational structures of the related actors, the type of problem, and the institutional context, all of which involve a number of factors. With this concept in mind, we identify four ideal-typed patterns of governance, enabled by different configurations of public and private capacities to formally or factually influence in various ways the social, economic, and political processes by which certain goods are provided. [source]

Innovations to Make Markets More Inclusive for the Poor

DEVELOPMENT POLICY REVIEW, Issue 4 2008
Ronald U. Mendoza
Market failures, government failures and some of the characteristics of both the poor and business actors as well as their environment can act as barriers preventing the poor from participating more actively in markets, both as consumers and as producers. Private actors - including for-profit and not-for-profit entities, often in partnership with the public sector - have been able to mitigate some of these constraints through innovations that have helped to make markets more inclusive for the poor, enabling them not just to gain access, but also to participate in ways that enhance their economic empowerment and human development. This article identifies the strategies and innovations used and devises a possible typology for them. [source]

The Anonymous Matrix: Human Rights Violations by ,Private' Transnational Actors

THE MODERN LAW REVIEW, Issue 3 2006
Article first published online: 27 APR 200, Gunther Teubner
Do fundamental rights obligate not only States, but also private transnational actors? Since violations of fundamental rights stem from the totalising tendencies of partial rationalities, there is no longer any point in seeing the horizontal effect as if rights of private actors have to be weighed up against each other. On one side of the human rights relation is no longer a private actor as the fundamental-rights violator, but the anonymous matrix of an autonomised communicative medium. On the other side, the fundamental rights are divided into three dimensions: first, institutional rights protecting the autonomy of social discourses , art, science, religion - against their subjugation by the totalising tendencies of the communicative matrix; secondly, personal rights protecting the autonomy of communication, attributed not to institutions, but to the social artefacts called ,persons'; and thirdly, human rights as negative bounds on societal communication, where the integrity of individuals' body and mind is endangered. [source]

Private Actors and the State: Internationalization and Changing Patterns of Governance

Financial Integration in the EU: the First Phase of EU Endorsement of International Accounting Standards,

JCMS: JOURNAL OF COMMON MARKET STUDIES, Issue 2 2008
IAN DEWING
In 2002 the EU adopted the Regulation which required European listed companies to prepare their consolidated accounts in accordance with international accounting standards from 2005 onwards. A novel set of structures for the endorsement of international accounting standards for use in the EU was put in place. This article examines the first phase of endorsement of international accounting standards in the context of the novel endorsement structures. The article concludes that problems over the endorsement of IAS 39 Financial Instruments: Recognition and Measurement reveals a number of significant policy implications for the EU including the difficulty of forming a European view, the role of private actors in EU regulation, and the issue that international standards largely reflect Anglo-Saxon accounting practices rather than continental European practices. [source]

Government,Business Strategies in EU,US Economic Relations:

JCMS: JOURNAL OF COMMON MARKET STUDIES, Issue 3 2002
The Lessons of the Foreign Sales Corporations Issue
The increasingly complex character of the US,EU economic relationship is well understood. Within this relationship, trade politics is an important setting for the interaction of firms, states and civil society. Focusing on a highly significant transatlantic trade dispute relating to a US tax policy (called foreign sales corporations), the article explores the business,government interactions generated. We conclude that such cases illustrate how the integrated character of the transatlantic economy limits the tactical options for all policy players and produces patterns of interaction between public and private actors in which both can come to assume significant roles. [source]

Control Modes in the Age of Transnational Governance

LAW & POLICY, Issue 3 2008
DIRK LEHMKUHL
The article starts with the observation that there are overlaps in, so far, largely unrelated research programs concerned with the legalization in international relations, on the one hand, and transnational regulation and governance, on the other. The analysis of the literature at the interface between the "fourth strata of the geology of international law" and the "governance in the age of regulation" literatures reveals a substantial common interest in structures of transnational regulatory governance. At the same time, the theoretical toolkit of both strands of literature does not match the task of coping analytically with structures and processes in the overlapping realm. To sharpen the analytical edge, the article elaborates hierarchy, market, community, and design as four ideal types of control modes in transnational regulatory spaces. The application of this model to the empirical analysis of a number of regimes underpins the observation that control frequently occurs in hybrid regulatory constellations involving public and private actors across national and international levels. A key example concerns the prominence of domestic regulatory regimes in underpinning transnational governance processes, where national rules achieve extraterritorial effect as much through competitive as through hierarchical mechanisms. [source]

The Politics of Connectivity: The Role of Big Business in UK Education Technology Policy

POLICY STUDIES JOURNAL, Issue 4 2001
Neil Selwyn
Since 1997, the United Kingdom (UK) government has embarked upon a series of education policy initiatives based around the increased role of private interests in both policy formulation and implementation. This article takes a detailed look at private sector involvement in education policymaking and implementation using the current "National Grid for Learning" (NGfL) technology policy drive as a contemporary form. Based on a series of in-depth interviews with key public and private actors in the NGfL the article covers the role of business in the origins, policy formation, and eventual implementation of the initiative. It concludes by discussing the function big business can be said to be playing in UK education policy and the bearing this may have on the long-term sustainability and effectiveness of such policies. [source]

When soft regulation is not enough: The integrated pollution prevention and control directive of the European Union

REGULATION & GOVERNANCE, Issue 3 2010
Charalampos Koutalakis
Abstract Recent debates regarding the effectiveness of regulatory policymaking in the European Union (EU) focus on the merits of soft, non-binding forms of regulation between public and private actors. The emergence of less coercive forms of regulation is analyzed as a response to powerful functional pressures emanating from the complexity of regulatory issues, as well as the need to secure flexibility and adaptability of regulation to distinctive territorial economic, environmental, administrative, and social conditions. In this article we empirically assess the above normative claims regarding the effectiveness of soft regulation vis-à-vis uniformly binding legislation. We draw on an exploratory investigation of the application of the Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control Directive of the EU in four countries. Our study reveals that effectiveness in the application of soft policy instruments is largely contingent upon strong cognitive, material, and political capacities of both state regulators and industrial actors involved in regulatory policymaking. In the absence of those conditions, the application of soft, legally non-binding regulation may lead to adverse effects, such as non-compliance and the "hollowing out" of the systems of environmental permits to industry. In the medium term, such developments can undermine the normative authority of the EU. [source]

When trade liberalization turns into regulatory reform: The impact on business,government relations in international trade politics

REGULATION & GOVERNANCE, Issue 2 2007
Cornelia Woll
Abstract Business,government relations on trade issues are generally characterized as protectionist lobbying or , less often , lobbying for the liberalization of markets. However, with the evolution of the trading system, negotiations today concern not just market opening, but also the regulatory frameworks that structure international trade. This transformation has important consequences for the ways in which private interests can contribute to trade negotiations. Instead of simply trying to exert pressure, businesses and other private actors now form working relationships with governments based on expertise, learning, and information exchange. This article illustrates these new forms of public,private interactions with examples from the USA, the European Union, and Brazil. [source]

The Anonymous Matrix: Human Rights Violations by ,Private' Transnational Actors

The Andersen-Comsoc affair: Partnerships and the public interest

CANADIAN PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION/ADMINISTRATION PUBLIQUE DU CANADA, Issue 3 2001
David Whorley
Thc business transformation project was intended to support the Ontario Works program and Ontario Disability Support program. The provincial auditor subsequently reviewed the project and identified a number of problems. This particular case illustrates some of the key issues associated with public-private partnerships in Ontario, and perhaps more generally. The article examines the government's managerialist agenda and the twin goals of downsizing the Ontario Public Service while increasing the involvement of business in program delivery. Analysis focuses on how the Ontario government conceives of partnership arrangements; the issue of differences in organizational power between public and private actors; the question of whether shared interests need necessarily exist between the parties; and the problem of securing accountability in partnership arrangements. It finds that collaborative partncrships and democratic accountability are in tension; public-sector organizations risk entering public-private partnerships in subordinate roles; and that divergent public and private purposes hampered the project. Moreover, the article suggests that the ministry's eventual corrective actions embraced traditional public administrative concerns. This development indicates that while recent managerialist reforms havc posed some challenge to public administration, it shows continued relevance in protecting the public interest. Sommaire: En janvier 1997, le ministère des Services sociaux et communautaires de l'Ontario a conch avec Andersen Consulting un partenariat entre secteurs public et privé. Le projet visait à appuyer le programme Ontario au travail et le Programme ontarien de soutien aux personnes handicapées. Le vérificateur provincial a, par la suite, passé en revue le projet et a identifié un certain nombre de problèmes. Ce cas particulier illustre certaines des questions clés associées aux partenariats entre le secteur public et le secteur privé en Ontario, et peut-être dans un champ plus vaste. L'artio cle examine le programme de nouveau management public du gouvernement let les deux objectifs jumeaux consistant à réduire la taille de la Fonction publique de l'Ontario tout en augmentant le rôe du secteur privé dans la prestation des programmes. L'analyse se centre sur la manière dont le gouvernement de l'Ontario conçoit les contrats de partenariat; la question des différences en matière de pouvoir organisationnel entre les intervenants des secteurs public et privé; la question de savoir si les parties doivent nécessairement partager des intérêts communs; et le problème de la garantie de l'imputabilité dans les contrats de partenariat. L'article montre qu'il existe des tensions dans les partenariats de collaboration par rapport à la responsabilité démocratique, que les organismes du secteur public risquent de conclure avec le secteur privé des partenariats où ils joueront des rôles subordonnés et que les objectifs divergents des secteurs public et privé ont été une entrave au projet. Par ailleurs, l'article laisse entendre que les mesures correctives prises finalement par le ministère ont tenu compte des préoccupations traditionnelles de l'administration publique. Cela indique que même si les récentes réformes de gestion ont posé certains défis à l'administration publique, elles visent toujours la protection de l'intérêt public. [source]