Meta Governance of Path Dependencies: Regulation, Welfare, and Markets

Abstract

Regulation, welfare, and markets grow interdependently, shaping, reinforcing, and supporting each other: markets allow for the expansion of welfare states, and welfare states create demand for regulatory state services that help to solve perceived welfare problems. Crises can drive this path dependency because they create opportunities for growth in markets, regulation, and welfare institutions. The momentum toward interdependent risk of ecological crises, economic crises, and security crises is formidable, but regulatory-welfare-market path dependencies might be mustered to counter it. This article proposes a meta governance of path dependence, emphasizing multiple interactions in the regulation-welfare-market system and suggesting that meta governance can steer path-dependent regulation, welfare, and markets in the governance of crises. I discuss whether patterns of path dependence explain why regulation, welfare, and markets interdependently persist and grow.