Insurance regulators struggle with change all over the world.

Insurance regulators throughout the world are wrestling with fast-changing expectations about capital adequacy, while trying to keep up with efforts by international organizations to harmonize the myriad regulatory systems in place in various countries.

At the inaugural meeting of the World Risk and Insurance Economics Congress, regulators from several countries discussed issues of capital adequacy and finance, and the critical role of regulation in ensuring the strength of insurers.

"Regulation to insure the financial soundness of the insurance industry is the key to the industry's success," said Yoshihiro Kawai, secretary general of the International Association of Insurance Supervisors. IAIS, with 180 member countries and several more as observers, is gaining importance in the insurance regulatory world, said Kawai. With international financial standards such as Basel II for banking and Solvency II for insurance in the works, international coordination will become more important in the near future, he said. But that harmonization will take a lot of effort. "International regulations for capital requirements at this stage do not have much meaning," he said. "Evaluation of liabilities and the definition of capital varies widely country by country."

Terri Vaughan, a professor at Drake University and former Iowa insurance commissioner, said there is a global trend toward capital standards that are more risk-sensitive.