The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision and the composite wider legal and institutional environment to which it is part provide a useful case study to illustrate how complexity is addressed in the public policy realm. As its central proposition, this article argues that it is possible to identify a specific pattern and logic underlying the governance of global banking today. The pattern concerns the institutional dimension of global banking regulation, particularly with respect to the distribution of regulatory powers among the various actors involved, and the legal relationships between these actors. The overall pattern seems to follow a certain logic, which will be explored and explained borrowing the military distinction between strategy, operations, and tactics.