ABSTRACT
Prior to the publication of my 1995 paper Twin Peaks: A Regulatory Structure for the New Century, 1 the institutional structure of regulation received little attention in either academic or policy circles. To the extent that issues of institutional structure were noticed at all, they were viewed as at best a second order issue that made little practical difference to the quality or effectiveness of supervision. However, the publication of Twin Peaks gave rise to a vigorous debate in the UK around issues of regulatory structure that was soon replicated in other countries. In the latter half of the 1990s this policy debate began to be mirrored in practical developments and a strong trend towards institutional reform gathered pace in many advanced and developing economies. Australia, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Germany, Ireland, Korea, Japan and several other countries introduced or announced changes to their structures of regulation in the years that followed.
