Doctoral Dissertation Resaerch: The Legal Incorporation of Private Regulation: Transforming Ratings in Finance and Healthcare

伊丽莎白·戈尔曼Joris Gjata弗吉尼亚大学评级已成为信息调节生活力量的象征。它们是呈现有关人员、组织或其产品和活动的信息的浓缩方式。它们采取不同的形式，来自不同的来源。然而，这些评级中只有一些在评估对某些行为标准的遵从性时，获得了对个人和组织生活的巨大监管权力。多数学者和分析师关注评级？监管权力是对日益增长的市场扩张和不确定性条件做出的不可避免、自然和有效的反应.这个项目考察了美国两大行业-金融和医疗保健-的评级及其来源的演变。在这两个领域，具有监管权的评级都来自几家专门的私人机构。法律承认这几个专门的私营机构--分别是信用评级机构和医院认证机构--作为评估组织的合法信息来源？价值，是这两个领域评级历史上的关键时刻。具体的私营机构如何以及为什么被确认为合法的评级来源，而不是替代的政府或专业监管形式？评级是如何获得对医疗保健和金融机构的监管权的？在评级作为一种新机构的出现中，国家和法律扮演了什么角色？随着时间的推移，它们的含义发生了怎样的变化？这些问题的答案将突出机构配置，但不会忽视使其维持、变化和稳定成为可能的因素。它们还有助于揭开新监管形式的神秘面纱，因为这是不确定条件和日益扩大的市场所必需的不可避免的、自然的和功能性的结果。对两个不同领域的比较有助于揭示不同领域的相互依存关系，以及政策制定者在塑造新的监管形式方面发挥的关键作用：使监管合法化，促进监管的实施，并调停监管塑造社会生活的力量。这个项目将结合国会记录的数据和关于联邦立法正式承认某些专门的私人机构为评级、组织历史和账户的合法来源、对特定领域出版物的检查和报纸数据的听证会的数据，以追踪信息监管在美国两个主要活动领域作为一种新的制度形式出现的过程。它使用制度涌现理论来审视围绕某些专门的私人机构评级作为信息监管的出现，以及协会或政府机构等替代评级来源被排挤出去的政治和文化斗争。该项目旨在澄清评级的含义，评级构成的条件，信息监管，？并为审查其他新兴监管形式提供了一个更连贯的框架。

SES- 1603041Elizabeth Gorman Joris GjataUniversity of VirginiaRatings have become a symbol of the power of information to regulate lives. They are condensed ways of presenting information about people, organizations, or their products and activities. They take different forms and come from different sources. However, only some of these ratings have gained tremendous regulatory power over the lives of individuals and organizations as they evaluate compliance with certain standards of behavior. Most scholars and analysts regard ratings? regulatory power an inevitable, natural and functional response to conditions of increasing market expansion and uncertainty. This project examines the evolution of ratings and their sources for two large sectors - finance and healthcare - in the United States. In both fields ratings with regulatory power come from a few specialized private agencies. The recognition by law of those few specialized private agencies - credit rating and hospital accrediting agencies respectively - as legitimate sources of information to evaluate organizations? worth, is a key moment in the history of ratings for both fields. How and why were specific private agencies recognized as legitimate sources of ratings instead of alternative governmental or professional forms of regulation? How did ratings gain their regulatory power over healthcare and financial organizations? What was the role of the state and law in the emergence of ratings as a new institution? How did their meaning change over time? The answers to these questions will highlight institutional configurations without neglecting the agents that make possible their maintenance, change and stability. They also contribute to the demystification of new regulatory forms as inevitable, natural and functional outcomes necessitated by conditions of uncertainty and increasing market expansion. The comparison of two different fields helps reveal the interdependences of different fields and the crucial role policy makers play in shaping new forms of regulation: legitimizing them, contributing to their implementation, and mediating their power to shape social life. This project will combine data on congressional records and hearings about the formal recognition in federal legislation of certain specialized private agencies as legitimate sources of ratings, organizational histories and accounts, examinations of field specific publications, and newspaper data to trace the processes through which regulation-by-information emerged as a new institutional form in two major fields of activity in the US. It uses theories of institutional emergence to examine the political and cultural struggles surrounding the emergence of ratings by certain specialized private agencies as regulation-by-information and the sidelining of alternative sources of ratings like associations or government agencies. The project aims to clarify the meaning of ratings, the conditions under which they constitute ?regulation-by-information,? and present a more coherent framework for examining other emerging forms of regulation.