Are aviation regulators generally slower to issue orders affecting their "own" aircraft manufacturers? It did not fail to escape the attention of commentators that the US Federal Aviation Authority was amongst the last aviation regulators to issue an order grounding the 737 MAX. 

Is there evidence to show that this is a pattern - that US, European, Russian (or other) regulators tend to be slower to issue orders or directives that concern aircraft made by manufacturers within their own country or bloc?

What would count as an answer

"Evidence" in this case would be based on figures showing time to respond by different agencies in multiple cases (enough to indicate a pattern).

What does not count as an answer

I am not asking for opinions on whether the FAA or EASA or other agencies are politically sensitive (I am sure they are). 

Though I am willing to bet that it will turn out to be the case that agencies tend to be slower to act when it would affect interests that are closer to home, I don't need to read speculation about why; I don't think it will be any more illuminating than the interminable exchanges about how Airbuses are better than Boeings or vice-versa.

Similarly, although questions have been raised and concerns expressed about the FAA's inspection regime and the degree to which it allowed Boeing to self-certify aircraft, that (and the regimes and processes of other regulators) is not the question here.



I should have guessed that this would quickly descend into ra-ra declarations about superior American pilots and ways, backward and corrupt non-western political systems, and so on. I wouldn't want to deny anyone their fun, but it's exactly what is not an answer to the question.
I was many years in the industry with an OEM and have had various minor peripheral roles in certification and continuing airworthiness projects at the system level, giving me a kind of ring side seat.  And I would say that you tend to get more hair-trigger reactions from non-western regulators (China/Russia et.al), and that this is because there is a way lower level of trust between the regulator and OEM than with Western regulators.  

Now, although it all went to hell in this case with respect to Boeing/FAA, there has to be some level of trust or else the regulator would have to constantly audit the manufacturer every time they scratched their butts.  It doesn't mean that the FAA just lets Boeing do whatever it feels like, but it does mean that they will tend to accept reports and analysis submitted without too much cross examination if things seem reasonable, and that's how situations like this can slip through.

Unfortunately the trust relationship broke down in the MAX case because Boeing perhaps could be said to have abused its trust relationship with the FAA.  Having been burned, you can be sure the FAA will tighten up its oversight of Boeing quite a bit, for a while anyway.

In non western countries the trust relationship is not very robust, so regulators will pull the trigger quite quickly.  This can cause its own problems.  You also have the tendency of non-western regulators to have much more severe punishment regimes, to the point of jail time for mistakes made in good faith.  This encourages people to hide their mistakes (a major problem in both China and Russia in manufacturing, maintenance and flight operations). So in the long run, in spite of the MAX fiasco, the low trust regime is much worse.