Self-regulation as policy process: The multiple and criss-crossing stages of private rule-making

Self-regulation has come of age. In governments and in intergovernmental organizations, as well as among many private organizations in business and civil society, self-regulation is seen as an alternative to market and state. At the programmatic level it is argued that self-regulation can solve a number of problems more effectively and more legitimately than traditional public "command and control" regulation in a variety of domestic and international settings. Thus, many recent public-sector reports have been commissioned to explore the potential of self-regulation, and new self-regulatory arrangements have been launched that add to existing ones that have already accumulated a substantial history.