Time for a reality check: Is business willing to support a smart mix of complementary regulation in private governance?

In recent years, scholars and policymakers have become interested in the idea of a smart mix of voluntary and regulatory measures in private governance. If public and private actors are to share the work load of governing the commons, this presupposes that both sides can agree on this compromise formula but can they? So far, we have limited knowledge of firms and business associations' regulatory preferences in this realm. As a ground-clearing exercise my article aims to help fill this gap and expose some of the underappreciated fault and conflict lines within private governance. Its thrust is that existing literature is excessively optimistic about business's willingness to support regulation. The article surveys the EU's non-financial disclosure Directive and half a dozen other attempts to regulate CSR or non-financial disclosure across the world, and finds that public authorities' more ambitious attempts at regulation met with vigorous business opposition. Even after the financial crisis, most business associations and firms reject a smart mix in favor of voluntarism and soft law without hard sanctions. (C) 2016 Policy and Society Associates (APSS). Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.