Chevron Deference and Corporate Concentration in the American Financial System, 1968-1987

Extant narratives on deregulation underscore the importance of the legislative and executive branches. This paper argues that judicial and administrative mechanisms were equally important to the weakening of regulatory programs. It looks at transformations to financial regulation during the 1980s, and suggests that judicial deference to agency discretion was an instrumental policy tool conservatives used to chip away at the regulatory state.