Observers regularly assert that government regulations are captured—meaning the content of the regulation is diverted away from the public interest and toward the interests of regulated industry. I argue that the label of regulatory capture is often applied differently by policy losers than by policy winners. I hypothesize that when an entity is unsuccessful in achieving its goals during regulatory policy making, that entity is more likely to deem the process captured. With data from 41 FDA regulations and guidance documents, I find that—even when provided a common definition—those interest groups engaged in the same rulemaking vary as to whether or not they would categorize the process as captured. Moreover, this variation is negatively associated with whether the entity achieved its policy goals during the rulemaking. These findings imply that scholars ought to reassess capture's occurrence, as well as the political and policy implications attached to its invocation.

中文翻译：

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监管捕获的自助服务应用程序

观察家经常断言，政府法规被捕获——这意味着法规的内容偏离了公共利益而转向了受监管行业的利益。我认为，政策输家和政策赢家通常以不同的方式使用监管捕获的标签。我假设当一个实体在监管政策制定期间未能成功实现其目标时，该实体更有可能认为该过程已被捕获。根据 41 份 FDA 法规和指导文件中的数据，我发现——即使提供了一个共同的定义——参与相同规则制定的那些利益集团在是否将流程归类为捕获的过程中也存在差异。此外，这种变化与实体在规则制定期间是否实现其政策目标呈负相关。