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THE SHIFT IN REGULATORY STRATEGY THAT ACCOMPANIED THE SINGLE MARKET PROGRAM HAS ENABLED THE EUROPEAN UNION (EU) TO DELEGATE RESPONSIBILITY FOR MAKING THE RULES GOVERNING MARKET ACCESS TO STANDARD-SETTING BODIES. THIS DELEGATION HAS ENABLED FIRMS TO BECOME DOMINANT PLAYERS IN THE POLICY-MAKING PROCESS. HOWEVER, THE RESULTING REGULATORY REGIME HAS NOT PRODUCED THE EXPECTED OUTCOMES, BECAUSE FIRMS HAVE BEEN UNABLE TO OVERCOME COLLECTIVE-ACTION PROBLEMS. USING PRINCIPAL-AGENT ANALYSIS, THE AUTHOR EXPLORES THE EFFORTS TO DEAL WITH THE ABSENCE OF COMMON STANDARDS BY DISCUSSING EU EFFORTS TO MONITOR, OVERSEE, AND CONTROL THE PACE OF EUROPEAN STANDARDIZATION. THEN SHE DISCUSSES THE IMPACT OF DELEGATION UPON EUROPEAN GOVERNANCE, DEMONSTRATING SOME OF THE PROBLEMS PRODUCED BY THE INCREASING USE OF PRIVATE ACTORS IN THE POLICY-MAKING PROCESS.

Todd LaPorte's contribution to knowledge about Hazardous Large Technical Systems (HLTS) and Critical Infrastructure (CI) systems has provided a way to place these systems in sociological context. The article describes LaPorte's development of the concept of Institutional Stewardship, as an amalgamation of High Reliability Organizations, Institutional Constancy, and Public Trust and Confidence has provided a way of understanding the enormous public challenges of managing and maintaining systems that create public vulnerabilities. The article suggests the development of the Vulnerability Principle as a way of bringing the requirement of Institutional Stewardship to the management of HLTs and CIs.

: One approach to addressing the negative health and social harms of excessive drinking has been to attempt to limit alcohol availability in areas of high outlet density. The Licensing Act (2003) enables English local authorities the power to implement a Cumulative Impact Policy (CIP) in order to tackle alcohol challenges. More than 100 English local authorities have implemented a CIP in one or more designated areas. We examined local licence decision-making in the context of implementing CIPs. Specifically, we explored the activities involved in alcohol licensing in one London local authority in order to explicate how local decision-making processes regarding alcohol outlet density occur. Institutional ethnographic research revealed that CIPs were contested on multiple grounds within the statutory licensing process of a local authority with this policy in place. CIPs are an example of multi-level governance in which national and local interests, legal powers and alcohol licensing priorities interface. Public health priorities can be advanced in the delivery of CIPs, but those priorities can at times be diluted by those of other stakeholders, both public sector and commercial.