Regulatory domain and regulatory dexterity: critiquing the UK governance of 'fracking'

This article provides a critique of the UK government's regulatory response to ‘fracking’. It shows how government has adopted two distinct schemas of regulation, which may usefully be classified under the headings ‘regulatory domain’ and ‘regulatory dexterity’. These schemas rely on very different interpretive conventions and are in many ways contradictory. Yet, government uses both ‘domain’ and ‘dexterity’ arguments simultaneously in order to advance its policy in favour of fracking. The article explains how two seemingly different regulatory approaches work together towards the same policy goal, and highlights the role of law in facilitating technological development

Innovation types and regulation: the regulatory framing of nanotechnology as 'incremental' or 'radical' innovation

The regulatory literature has long been concerned with the challenges of technological innovation, yet it says relatively little about what we understand as “innovative” and how innovation “types” impact on regulation. This article unpacks the concept of “innovation” and analyses its significance for the development of regulatory strategy. It shows that innovation types – such as “incremental” and “radical” innovation – are not clear-cut, but involve differences of interpretation. This interpretive flexibility makes them powerful discursive resources in regulatory decision-making. Through a study of the EU’s regulation of nanotechnology, the article shows how arguments of “incremental” and “radical” innovation can be mobilised to very different effect. These different ways of conceptualising new technology affect decisions on: (i) the desirability of legislative reform; (ii) the evidence-base for regulation; and (iii) the use of the precautionary principle. The study also shows how the framing of technology as “incrementally” innovative can contribute to a strategy of “deliberate regulatory ignorance”. The article concludes by arguing that the incremental/radical distinction can be put to more positive use, so that regulatory choices take account of the different techno-scientific and socio-economic dimensions of innovation

Futurescapes of Planning Law: Some Preliminary Thoughts on a Timely Encounter

The concept of the future has been studied in many different disciplines but has not received the same detailed attention in legal scholarship. This is especially curious in a field like planning law, which has a strong and obvious future-orientation. My aim here is to make a case for treating planning law more seriously as an important site of future-making, and to encourage more systematic thinking about the role of law in determining how the future is engaged in the present. One way of achieving this is by introducing a ‘futurescapes’ perspective to legal analysis, to capture the different temporal features of law that shape how the future comes to be understood, legitimated and acted upon. Forging those links helps to address the future not as a backdrop to law but as a key means through which law operates. The discussion illustrates the kinds of questions that might usefully be asked about how law never simply represents the future but actively produces the futures it then seeks to govern