IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wly/reggov/v17y2023i3p709-725.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Caught in quicksand? Compliance and legitimacy challenges in using regulatory sandboxes to manage emerging technologies

Author

Listed:
  • Walter G. Johnson

Abstract

Regulatory sandboxes have become the latest development in regulatory reform, starting first in financial regulation and now expanding to other sectors. While sandboxes offer notable potential benefits for managing emerging technologies, achieving desirable policy outcomes with this novel regulatory instrument also comes with technical and political challenges. This article offers a framework to characterize regulatory sandboxes in any sector, involving a blend of (1) approval regulation with broad‐based standards, (2) restricted discretion by the regulator for specific norms, (3) process‐oriented regulation, (4) an outcomes‐orientation, and (5) structured regulator–regulatee information sharing or dialogue. Using this model, the article outlines issues in compliance and legitimacy, including in trust and accountability, responsive enforcement, the politics of participation, and post‐sandbox oversight. The article concludes by calling for greater scrutiny when considering implementing a sandbox instrument, with attention to sector‐specific concerns, and offering directions for empirical evaluation of regulatory sandboxes.

Suggested Citation

  • Walter G. Johnson, 2023. "Caught in quicksand? Compliance and legitimacy challenges in using regulatory sandboxes to manage emerging technologies," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 17(3), pages 709-725, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:wly:reggov:v:17:y:2023:i:3:p:709-725
    DOI: 10.1111/rego.12487
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/rego.12487
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/rego.12487?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wly:reggov:v:17:y:2023:i:3:p:709-725. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://doi.org/10.1111/(ISSN)1748-5991 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.