In most parts of the world, the regulation of private gun ownership is usually an issue of rather low salience. However, the topic implies the potential to become subject to controversial and morally charged political debates, especially in the aftermath of tragic events like mass shootings. Against the background of those regular spikes in public attention, it is surprising that political scientists have largely ignored the policy field, at least outside of the United States.
Drawing on novel empirical data from the MORAPOL project, this paper addresses this research gap and provides a first systematic descriptive overview of the regulatory trends and patterns in the firearms sector. It adopts a comparative perspective and traces the development and calibration of regulatory instruments both across time and space. Based on several policy indicators, the countries are located on a dimension of restrictiveness and their movements on this scale are reproduced. This proceeding enables a comparative evaluation both of the degree and the direction of policy change. As an additional contribution, the paper analyzes the mix of regulatory instruments that affect the demand side (the gun owner) and the supply side (the gun dealer). It also takes into account information on the relative severity of penal sanctions.
The basic goal of the data exploration is the identification of common trends and outlier cases, in order to provide fertile ground for further comparative case studies. More specifically, the paper seeks to assess the extent to which countries display systematic patterns of policy convergence and if so, which type of convergence we can observe. Approaching the subject from such an empirical angle should also facilitate theory building on the potential driving forces behind the identified patterns, in particular policy learning from external shocks and processes of international harmonization.
