The global financial crisis that started in 2007 sparked several academic debates about the role that financial sector regulators played in the crisis and prompted policy reforms in the financial supervision architectures of several countries. This book focuses on the question of what accountability, independence, transparency and, more generally, governance mechanisms applicable to financial regulators can better contribute to building responsive, responsible and effective regulatory and supervisory frameworks that tackle the weaknesses of the pre-crisis regimes. It re-visits the concepts of accountability and independence of financial regulators as well as the main economic theories underlying financial services policy-making, in light of the crisis experience. In addition, it critically examines the post-crisis institutional frameworks of financial regulation and supervision in the EU, the US and Canada with a view to assessing whether the financial regulators of the post-global financial crisis era are well suited to effectively address the challenges and threats that global financial markets pose to the stability, integrity and good functioning of financial systems as well as to the protection of consumers, investors and society at large.

Drug problems present sharp challenges for policing and democracy in the European Union. Across Europe, there has been a 'harmonisation' of tougher anti-trafficking measures (exceptional legal powers, more intrusive policing methods, cooperation on intelligence). Yet there is diversity in national and city-level policies on drug users (often stressing social integration rather than punishment). These hard/soft policies towards traffickers/users collide at 'open drug scenes', invoking disparate and often volatile responses. The collection presents vivid experiences of drug policy-making at city, regional, national and Union levels. It goes on to examine future prospects for drug control within the EU, in confederal and intergovernmental contexts, following the Union's 1996 Conference. Finally, international dimensions are examined. Action against money laundering is both commended and criticised. EU policies on trade, development and drug control in the Andean region are examined, together with the somewhat mixed prospects for drug enforcement in the context of EU enlargement.

In the early 1980s teenage drinking had become one of the many foci for expressions of concern about young peoples’ morals, health and discipline. Yet we knew very little about how most young people drink – the qualitative aspects of youthful drinking. The research emphasis had hitherto been upon the level of drinking, neglecting the social forms, styles and associated meanings of specific drinking practices such as round-buying. Originally published in 1983, the core of this book reports upon an ethnographic study of the circumstances, cultures and drinking practices of one particular stratum of youth. The service sector had become an increasingly important area of employment, but little was known about service sector youth cultures. The author shows how mixed-sex round buying arises in such a culture and how it differs from the drinking practices of other groups. The study goes on to develop a general model for understanding drinking practices in diverse strata of youth, and draws out implications for health and social education. Drink education is related to the increasingly important, and contentious, area of education about ‘working life’ and to sexual divisions in society. Introducing these sections is a review of the historical origins of concern about public drinking. Originating in yearly Vagrancy Acts and elaborated over 500 years, the state’s policies about production, distribution, and consumption of alcohol are an integral part of its general economic and social policies, and will continue to be framed by them.

Controlling Capital examines three pressing issues in financial market regulation: the contested status of public regulation, the emergence of 'culture' as a proposed modality of market governance, and the renewed ascendancy of private regulation. In the years immediately following the outbreak of crisis in financial markets, public regulation seemed almost to be attaining a position of command - the robustness and durability of which is explored here in respect of market conduct, European Union capital markets union, and US and EU competition policies. Subsequently there has been a softening of command and a return to public-private co-regulation, positioned within a narrative on culture. The potential and limits of culture as a regulatory resource are unpacked here in respect of occupational and organisational aspects, stakeholder connivance and wider political embeddedness. Lastly the book looks from both appreciative and critical perspectives at private regulation, through financial market associations, arbitration of disputes and, most controversially, market 'policing' by hedge funds. Bringing together a distinguished group of international experts, this book will be a key text for all those concerned with issues arising at the intersection of financial markets, law, culture and governance.

Controlling Capital examines three pressing issues in financial market regulation: the contested status of public regulation, the emergence of 'culture' as a proposed modality of market governance, and the renewed ascendancy of private regulation. In the years immediately following the outbreak of crisis in financial markets, public regulation seemed almost to be attaining a position of command - the robustness and durability of which is explored here in respect of market conduct, European Union capital markets union, and US and EU competition policies. Subsequently there has been a softening of command and a return to public-private co-regulation, positioned within a narrative on culture. The potential and limits of culture as a regulatory resource are unpacked here in respect of occupational and organisational aspects, stakeholder connivance and wider political embeddedness. Lastly the book looks from both appreciative and critical perspectives at private regulation, through financial market associations, arbitration of disputes and, most controversially, market 'policing' by hedge funds. Bringing together a distinguished group of international experts, this book will be a key text for all those concerned with issues arising at the intersection of financial markets, law, culture and governance.

Financial markets have become acknowledged as a source of crisis, and discussion of them has shifted from economics, through legal and regulatory studies, to politics. Events from 2008 onwards raise important, cross-disciplinary questions: must financial markets drive states into political and existential crisis, must public finances take over private losses, must citizens endure austerity? This book argues that there is an alternative. If the financial system were less 'connected', contagion within the market would be reduced and crises would become more localised and intermittent, less global and pervasive. The question then becomes how to reduce connectedness within financial markets. This book argues that the democratic direction of financial market policies can deliver this. Politicising financial market policies - taking discussion of these issues out of the sphere of the 'technical' and putting it into the same democratically contested space as, for example, health and welfare policies - would encourage differing policies to emerge in different countries. Diversity of regulatory regimes would result in some business models being attracted to some jurisdictions, others to others. The resulting heterogeneity, when viewed from a global perspective, would be a reversal of recent and current tendencies towards one single/global 'level playing field', within which all financial firms and sectors have become closely connected and across which contagion inevitably reigns. No doubt the democratisation of financial market policy would be opposed by big firms - their interests being served by regulatory convergence - and considered macabre by some financial regulators and central bankers, who are coalescing into an elite community. However, everyone else, Nicholas Dorn argues here, would be better off in a financial world characterised by greater diversity.

Financial markets have become acknowledged as a source of crisis, and discussion of them has shifted from economics - through legal and regulatory studies - to politics. Events from 2008 onwards raise important, cross-disciplinary questions: must financial markets drive states into political and existential crisis, must public finances take over private losses, must citizens endure austerity? This book argues that there is an alternative. If the financial system were less 'connected', clearly contagion within the market would be reduced, and crises would become more localised and intermittent, less global and pervasive. The question then becomes how to reduce connectedness within financial markets. This book argues that the democratic direction of financial market policies can deliver this. Politicising financial market policies - taking discussion of these issues out of the sphere of the 'technical' and putting it into the same democratically contested space as, for example, health and welfare policies - would encourage differing policies to emerge in different countries.Diversity of regulatory regimes would result in some business models being attracted to some jurisdictions, others to others. The resulting heterogeneity, when viewed from a global perspective, would be a reversal of recent and current tendencies towards one single/global 'level playing field', within which all financial firms and sectors have become closely connected and across which contagion inevitably reigns. No doubt, the democratisation of financial market policy would be opposed by many big firms - their interests being served by regulatory convergence - and considered macabre by globetrotting financial regulators and central bankers - who are coalescing into an elite community. However, everyone else, Nicholas Dorn argues here, would be better off in a financial world characterised by greater diversity.

This collection presents vivid experiences of drug policy-making at city, regional, national, and Union levels.

Contents:
Acknowledgments. Introduction. PART 1: DRUG TRAFFICKERS. 1: The Good Old Days: reciprocity and public service. 2: Going for Cover: trafficking as a sideline. 3: Things Get Nasty: enter the criminal diversifier. 4: Contested Streets: retailing into the 1990s. PART 2: ENFORCEMENT STRATEGIES 5: Policing Localities: street operations. 6: Inner City Drug Squads: surveillance and but operations. 7: Policing Localities: street operations. PART 3: KEY ISSUES IN DRUG ENFORCEMENT. 8: Informants and Stings: tradition and innovation in plainclothes work. 9: Intelligence Rules: the centralisation of British policing. 10: The Punishment Illusion: your money and your life?. Conclusion: A Little Knowledge. Appendix: Extracts form ACPO's `Broome Report'. Bibliography. Subject Index. Author Index.

Traffickers presents new findings into the most mythologised and least understood area of crime and law enforcement. The chamelion reality of the world of drug trafficking is described in the words of traffickers and detectives. Drug enforcement combines the banal and spectacular in surveillance, covert operations and criminal intelligence. The war on drugs is a harbinger of wider changes in the organisation of policing and international cooperation. Traffickers explores the struggle that transforms policing and punishment as it stimulates the imagination.