Origins and Implications of the Divergences Between Economic Structures and Policy Approaches: Insights From the Uk and the Us Natural Gas Sectors

Abstract Policy is often seen as the synthesis of economic and political interests of the most influential players operating in material economic structures such as industrial sectors and markets. However, this is not always the case as the formation of policies often depends only partially on the inputs from economic structures, while greater influence is exercised by the internal logics of policy processes and by shared beliefs among policymakers and the society. This paper explores this issue through a comparison of the UK and US liberalisation policies of the natural gas sector.