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This chapter discusses the contributions and challenges involving regulatory technology (regtech) in financial services. It explores the salient areas where regtech can and should focus, observing existing and forthcoming industry, technology, and legal developments. This chapter outlines regtech use cases to clarify the shaping of that industry sector. It draws on developments in industry and academia, where significant research sets the tone and direction of technological solutions and regulatory drivers. A brief critical account of the benefits and challenges in regtech is offered. This chapter presents potential future directions, focusing on the salient areas of environmental, social, and governance (ESG), cryptocurrency, and decentralized compliance.

Published in June 2020, the European Union (EU) Taxonomy Regulation is an important tool for the reorientation of capital flows toward sustainability, establishing a classification system that enables investors to identify green economic activities. Confronted by the reporting demands of this regulation, companies are caught in a sustainability economic revolution. This study seeks primarily to understand firms’ responses to the EU taxonomy, and whether they recognize value creation opportunities by aligning market and nonmarket strategies with the taxonomy goals. For that, we conducted expert interviews and adopted a conceptual framework based on institutional theory, dynamic capabilities view and nonmarket strategy research. Our findings indicate that most firms respond reactively, while firms with sustainability-driven business models tend to respond in an anticipatory way, and firms with high greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and low taxonomy eligibility in a defensive way. We also find evidence for mimetic isomorphism related to the influence of consulting and auditing services. Further, high levels of uncertainty, ambiguity and lack of clarity has a great impact on firms’ responses and motives. Finally, this study highlights the EU taxonomy considering a paradigmatic shift toward sustainability, which is not recognized by most firms. To this end, we find that most companies have not identified opportunities arising from nonmarket integration and, rather, see the taxonomy only as an extra regulation to be compliant with. Hence, we argue that it is crucial that firms contextualize the taxonomy within its larger institutional paradigmatic shift to capture the importance of going beyond mere compliance.

Informal settlements are frequently located in hazardous areas with a high risk of natural disasters. Upgrading informal settlements can be difficult due to the time and expense needed to complete the process. This chapter advocates using a management framework of public services in informal settlements. In doing so, it addresses 17 of the 17 UN sustainable development goals (SDGs). The study reviewed the literature to investigate current ways of managing environmental enterprises in informal settlements in South Africa. Thereafter, the challenges of managing public services were explored, and a conceptual framework for managing public services by social enterprises in such communities was developed. The chapter found that environmental enterprises are classified as ‘green spaces’ and infrastructure, water and sanitation services, energy systems, and recycling initiatives. Essential aspects of sustainable community-based facilities management (SCbFM) for managing public services are maintenance, governance, community project management, environment service delivery, service performance, governance, community project management, environment service delivery, service performance, well-being and health and safety, disaster management, and finance. Some of the problems of managing public services in informal settlements include the limited skills of managers, the focus of government on new projects rather than managing existing projects, not choosing the right indicators to measure service performance, and limited guidelines for the health and safety of managers and disaster management. Thus, a new conceptual framework was needed and developed based on the principles of social capital and capability for managing services in informal settlements in South Africa.

This chapter analyzes the French Citizens Convention for Climate (CCC), a democratic experiment in public policy cocreation, responding to climate change and the democratic crisis. The CCC, involving 150 citizens, aimed to propose measures for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Despite producing 149 proposals, the government's limited implementation led to widespread dissatisfaction, which highlights the complexities of policy cocreation. Through textual statistics analysis, the study reveals the “wicked” nature of cocreation, intensified by diverse values and interests among participants. It underscores the critical need for the government's political readiness and absorptive capacity in cocreation processes. While citizens showed commitment and capability, political-administrative elites displayed resistance, indicating a policy capacity gap. This resistance not only undermined the CCC's efforts but also exacerbated public distrust in political processes. The CCC's experience suggests that future cocreation initiatives in public policy must better integrate with political decision-making. The balance between standardization and contextual adaptation is key to effectively addressing complex societal issues. This chapter advocates for close monitoring of cocreation applications in public policy to assess their effectiveness in resolving societal challenges.

Financial technologies form the heart of considerable disruptive innovation. Fintech is the emerging financial infrastructure for modern business. Big data are the feedstock for artificial intelligence (AI) that drives many fintech sectors – start-up finance, commodities and investment instrumentation, payment systems, currencies, exchange markets/trading platforms, market-failure response forensics, underwriting, syndication, risk assessment, advisory services, banking, financial intermediaries, transaction settlement, corporate disclosure, and decentralized finance. This chapter demonstrates how analyzing big data, largely processed through cloud computing, drives fintech innovations, scholarship, forensics, and public policy. Despite their apparent virtues, some fintech mechanisms can externalize various social costs: flawed designs, opacity/obscurity, social media (SM) influences, cyber(in)security, and other malfunctions. Fintech suffers regulatory lag, the delay following the introduction of novel fintechs and later assessment, development, and deployment of reliable regulatory mechanisms. Big data can improve fintech practices by balancing three key influences: (1) fintech incentives, (2) market failure forensics, and (3) developing balanced public policy resolutions to fintech challenges.

Creating our built environment is largely the responsibility of the dynamic and complex construction industry. This business is made up of a wide range of people who work together to construct buildings and infrastructure projects, from contractors and labourers to architects and engineers. Aside from its observable results, the construction sector has a particular culture and atmosphere that are formed by a special fusion of history, creativity and teamwork. The culture and environment in which the construction industry functions are the main topics of this section of the book.

This chapter takes an overview look at open digital infrastructures for financial services: what they are, why they are important for digital financial landscape, and thus why the central banks might need to take an active role to promote them. This chapter also reviews some concrete examples of open digital infrastructures in various jurisdictions to give some context.

The primary objective of this research is to identify and analyze the influence of digital marketing practises on performance of business of manufacturing enterprises in Delhi-NCR. A quantitative and descriptive research design was implemented in this study. 368 participants from various enterprises were chosen. Questionnaires were used to collect data on the benefits and challenges which are perceived of digital marketing, as well as usage and business performance of these enterprises. SPSS v24.0 is utilized to carry out statistical analysis on the collected data. The study discovered that advantages and problems of digital marketing practices influenced the usage of digital marketing. Furthermore, the execution of digital marketing had a prominent influence on sales and total number of customers of these enterprises, and this relationship was moderated by type and size of businesses. It was discovered that using digital marketing strategies increased business profits by raising digital marketing awareness among consumers and various industries. It made digital marketing easier to implement in various businesses. However, research should be conducted for appropriate generalization in a larger scale.