Pragmatic Regulation in Dangerous Times

Abstract

The book that is the subject of this Review, Risk Regulation at Risk. Restoring a Pragmatic Approach, by Professors Sidney Shapiro and Robert Glicksman, is, first and foremost, an effective effort to correct this imbalance by articulating and defending the principles that justify protective risk regulation. Shapiro and Glicksman argue not only that the statutes make sense, but also that the vitality of the existing regulatory state must be restored by making some targeted improvements. The book is important because it represents one of only a handful of recent efforts to rationalize the foundation of laws that were passed in the 1970s and 1980s and that remain, virtually untouched, on the books. Conservatives should welcome this development as enthusiastically as progressives, and democrats (with an emphatically small "d") should welcome it most of all.