Research

This research theme explores how organisations (and the organisation of multiple organisations) anticipate and respond to system crisis. It explores what assumptions regarding the motivation and the capacity of organisations underpin system-related regulatory regimes that are supposed to ensure system functioning. Furthermore, this research theme is interested in the ways in which instruments and institutional arrangements respond to system crisis and apparent failure.

This research theme is interested in the risk regulation of new technologies as well as the devel-opment of new technologies of risk regulation. These issues arise in particular in relation to themes of sustainability, defined here as making decisions for the ‘long term’ by seeking to require a minimum of resources Innovation and sustainability are therefore both about the outcome as well as the character of the regulatory instruments themselves. This research theme is interested in the core area of sustainability, namely the environment, but also how these ideas travel to other domains, such as finance.

One of the key emerging themes in the contemporary literature has been reputation, in particular the way in which organisations seek to maintain and enhance their reputation through particular responses to challenges from their environment. Reputation (and the related interested in blame) is thus inherently linked to issues of legitimacy and various means through which organisations are held to account. This research theme will look at reputation and legitimacy at the organisational level, but will move the focus on reputation to the inter-organisational level, namely how systems or ‘fields’ seek to maintain their reputation.

Cross-cutting these three themes is a shared interest in comparative work that explores regulatory regimes on the basis of their multi-level problem-solving capacity that continues the existing CARR interest in systems of measurement, standardisation and valuation. Further, these themes built on the existing interest in both operational and institutional design dimensions. These three themes are overlapping and this overlap gives rise to a set of related research concerns in their own right.

City Government Innovation for Crises, Risks and Emergency Governance

The world of emergency governance in cities is fundamentally changing and requires government innovation at multiple scales. Existing risks require updating in terms of their impact and probabilities. Examples include recent extreme weather events leading to devasting flooding or fires. New areas of uncertainty emerge where impact and probabilities are difficult to estimate (e.g. recent discussions of ‘climate whiplash’ facing cities). In addition, we are dealing with an unprecedented period of “ignorance” in which emerging issues inevitably expose tightly coupled social systems to potential complex emergencies. For example, the climate crisis’ impact on different social systems is recognised, but there is little understanding of interdependencies and their effects. More details here

Between Economy and Democracy: Reorganizing Research Evaluation through Metadata in the Digital Era

This project provides a new perspective into the effects of commercial versus open data analytics on local research evaluation practices and research cultures and develops policy recommendations for universities, other research organizations, funders, and higher education ministries. Dr Andrea Mennicken, Kings College, is the Principal Investigator and leads an international team from CARR, MinesTech Paris, York University, DZHW and the Weizenbaum Institute.

This project is funded by a grant from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the 8th Open Research Area (ORA).

Translating Nature into Risk

This project explores how organizations translate complex ecological data into financial risk categories, and how these translations shape both organizational and societal understandings of nature. It aims to focus specifically on the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) as a key example of a data-driven governance framework for managing and disclosing nature-related risks. More details here

AI in regulation

While much attention has been given to the potential problems of regulating AI, less focus has been placed on the challenges of regulating with AI. This collaborative research, conducted with colleagues at FGV Rio de Janeiro, particularly Professor Alketa Peci and Carr research associate Flavia Donadelli, explored cross-national engagement with regulators and how regulatory organisations incorporate AI into their work.  A key focus was on the triggers that prompt AI adoption in regulatory tasks, encompassing both intentional regulatory projects and less formalised use of AI tools.  The research also examined areas where AI adoption has occurred and the extent to which AI tool evaluations have been conducted.

The research was supported by the British Academy’s evidence-informed policy-making grant scheme, Epg/100750

The risks of risk-based inspections

This research explored how the requirement for a ‘risk-based’ approach introduces risks to regulatory regimes.  It focused on various inspection regions in England and examined how a risk-based regime impacts the regulated system.  The research highlighted the tensions arising from a ‘risk-based’ system, considering different sectoral dynamics and the varied rationales behind adopting ‘risk-based’ approaches within inspection methodologies.  Furthermore, it delved into how debates about being ‘risks-based’ are intertwined with broader domain-specific discussions about the nature of inspections.

This research was supported by LSE’s RISF scheme, award 111292.

Reconnect

RECONNECT investigates how calls for more ‘responsive’ administrative state institutions have developed – both among citizens and politicians – and how the administrative state has sought to become more responsive, especially when simultaneously faced with expectations of neutrality and impartiality. More details here

Regulatory Capitalism and Development in Latin America: The Mexican Experience in Comparative Perspective 

Supported by the British Academy’s Newton Advanced Fellowship programme, this research project seeks to build collaborative research capacity between the Centro de Investigación y Docencia Económicas (CIDE) in Mexico-City and CARR. Led by Mauricio Dussauge-Laguna (CIDE), this project brings together international researchers in regulation to advance research into regulation and development as well as a series of seminars and workshops at CIDE and at CARR. More details here

 Information Cultures in Food Safety Cultures

CARR and the Food Standards Agency (FSA) promoted research co-production through the shared funding of post-doctoral researchers. This agreement started with the ESRC-secondment of Dr Julien Etienne and was subsequently continued through co-financing by LSE and the FSA of a two year-position for Dr Jeremy Brice (2016-18), followed by Dr Jose Bolanos (2018-2021). The funding encouraged issue-specific and cumulative work that applies research directly to practice and is part of the wider FSA programme on Regulating Our Future. Watch a video here 

Food in the Platform Economy | Jose A Bolanos

Quantification, Administrative Capacity and Democracy (QUAD)

This project is being conducted in collaboration with the Centre de Sociologie de l’Innovation at Mines ParisTech (France), the Faculty of Sociology at Bielefeld University (Germany), the Department of Management Accounting and Control at Helmut-Schmidt University Hamburg (Germany) and the Institute of Political Science at Leiden University (Netherlands). More details here

TransCrisis

This Horizon2020-funded project explored the transboundary leadership capacity of the European Union across sectors and levels of governance. More details here

Regulation in Crisis

This ESRC-funded seminar series advanced the debate about (i) regulation in sectors in crisis, (ii) regulation as source of crisis, and (iii) regulation as a field of study in crisis. More details here

Organizing for Societal Security and Crisis Management (GOVCAP)

This project considered national institutions and capacities to manage societal security. This project was led by the University of Bergen and was funded by the Norwegian Research Council. More details here

Risk Culture Project

This project increased understanding of ‘risk culture’ by focusing on the ‘cultural drivers’ that influence the risk taking and control activities of banks and other financial institutions. More details here

• Research 2010-2013

• Research 2005-2010

• Research 2000-2005

Organizing Risk Group (ORG) is an international and interdisciplinary academic network of researchers in management and other social sciences interested in risk and risk management. Their research covers a variety of topics including riskwork and risk management practices, crisis management and business continuity, internal controls and auditing, decision-making and risk regulation.

Find out more here