Law Commons^™

The Use Of Audited Self-Regulation As A Regulatory Technique, Douglas C. Michael

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

At first blush, "self-regulation" seems to be self-contradicting. If government regulation of an industry or problem is considered necessary, how can that responsibility then be returned to those from whom it was taken? Notwithstanding this apparent contradiction, audited self-regulation is used successfully by federal regulatory agencies. It is apparently adopted, however, on an ad hoc basis: in one industry or application but not in another that possesses similar characteristics. This article reviews these previously uncollected efforts at audited self-regulation to evaluate the general usefulness of this regulatory technique across industries and applications. These insights would be relevant not only to …