Agency Basics
These bodies develop and enforce rules and regulations in an assigned area
What are independent regulatory agencies?
This branch enforces laws, and independent regulatory agencies fall organizationally within it
What is the executive branch?
This was the first independent agency created in the United States
What is the Interstate Commerce Commission?
This quality helps agencies make decisions based on knowledge of the issues they oversee
What is expertise?
Some critics say agencies may lack this because Congress has delegated authority and they are not directly accountable to the president
What is democratic responsiveness?
These are often too complex to regulate through laws and statutes alone
What are areas of responsibility supervised by independent regulatory agencies?
This branch creates independent regulatory agencies through legislation
What is Congress?
This year marks the creation of the Interstate Commerce Commission
What is 1887?
Agency independence can allow decisions without bowing to these immediate influences
What are immediate political interests?
Agency independence may result in less of this with other branches of government
What is coordination?
This is what independent regulatory agencies help ensure when they monitor whether laws are followed
What is compliance with laws?
Congress grants agencies authority to regulate this
What is a particular area?
This industry was the Interstate Commerce Commission’s original area of regulation
What is the railroad industry?
When agency heads remain through multiple presidential administrations, this quality can carry forward in policy areas
What is continuity?
Agencies may experience these when their decisions differ from those of other branches
What are conflicts in decision-making?
These agencies can help protect these rights and maintain these standards
What are consumer rights and safety standards?
Congress outlines how much authority agencies have to create and enforce these within their designated areas
What are regulations?
Communications, elections, and labor are examples of these assigned areas
What are areas assigned to independent regulatory agencies?
This may increase when the public trusts the regulations and rules agencies create
What is public trust?
An agency’s expertise may make it vulnerable to this from the industries it oversees
What is undue influence?
Rather than being politicians, these kinds of workers bring specialized knowledge to agency responsibilities
What are experts?
Though organizationally part of the executive branch, independent regulatory agencies are not subject to the control of this official
Who is the president?
This is the number of employees encompassed by the executive branch, according to the reading
What is more than 4 million?
Regulating financial markets or telecommunications can help prevent this outcome and support fair practices
What is the concentration of power into just a few hands?
The reading says this is crucial to making independent regulatory agencies beneficial to citizens and the constitutional republic
What is the balance between autonomy and oversight?