Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2brh9 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T08:06:30.196Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Better Regulatory Impact Assessment

Making Behavioural Insights Work for the Commission's New Better Regulation Strategy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Kai P.- Purnhagen  and
Peter H. Feindt
Kai P.- Purnhagen
Affiliation:
Wageningen University
Peter H. Feindt
Affiliation:
Wageningen University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The European Commission's (Commission) Better Regulation Strategy (BRS) is the major guideline for the Commission to assess legislation. It draws on regulatory impact assessment (RIA) via cost–benefit analysis (CBA), expert advice, and simplification in EU law–making. Yet, the practice of RIA by the Commission as well as in EU member states, while unavoidably incomplete, has shown avoidable shortcomings. The Commission's New Better Regulation Strategy of 2015 (NBRS) contains language that appears to address these shortcomings. If pursued consequentially, it would require an approach that resembles what has been called responsive behavioural regulation. At the same time, global initiatives from inter alia the World Bank emerge to include behavioural insights into policy analysis in the form of responsive regulation. This piece assesses potential models of RIA that can help to articulate the behavioural assumptions which are implied by NBRS as enshrined in the policy document “Better regulation for better results”. The methodological implications of the NBRS require a significant departure from the reliance on classical CBA, which is characteristic for the previous “Better Regulation” documents submitted by the Commission and which we term Old Better Regulation Strategy (OBRS).

Type
Special Issue on the Better Regulation Package
Information
European Journal of Risk Regulation , Volume 6 , Issue 3 , September 2015 , pp. 361 - 368
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Hertin, Cf. Julia, Turnpenny, John, Jordan, Andrew, Nilsson, Mats, Russel, Duncan and Nykvist, Bengt. Rationalising the policy mess? Ex ante policy assessment and the utilisation of knowledge in the policy process. 41 Environment and Planning A (2009), pp 1185 et sqq.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Wiener, Jonathan B., “Better Regulation in Europe”, 59 Current Legal Problems (2006), pp. 447 et sqq.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

3 Commission Communication Better regulation for better results – An EU agenda, COM(2015) final.

4 Purnhagen, Kai, “Why Do We Need Responsive Regulation and Behavioural Research in EU Internal Market Law?” in: Klaus Mathis (ed), European Perspectives of Behavioural Law and Economics (New York et al: Springer, 2015), pp. 51 et sqq., at p. 53.Google Scholar

5 World Bank, “World Development Report 2015 : Mind, Society, and Behavior”, available on the internet at http://www.worldbank.org/en/publication/wdr2015 (last accessed on 1 July 2015).

6 Baldwin, Robert and Black, Julia, “Really Responsive Regulation”, 71 Modern Law Review (2008), pp. 59 et sqq.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

7 Commission, supra, note 3.

8 See Commission Communication - Better Regulation for Growth and Jobs in the European Union, COM 2005 97 final; Commission Communication Smart Regulation in the European Union, COM 2010 543final. We may view the documents accompanying the “simplification agenda” also as part of “Old Better Regulation”, see Commission Communication Action Programme for Reducing Administrative Burdens in the European Union, COM(2007) 23 final and particularly its accompanying document SEC(2007) 84, which stipulates the most detailed requirement of RIA at the Union level from the Commission's perspective.

9 Hertin, Julia, Jacob, Klaus, Pesch, Ulrich and Pacchi, Claudio. The production and use of knowledge in Regulatory Impact Assessment: An empirical analysis. 11 Forest Policy and Economics (2009), pp. 413 et sqq CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10 Cf. Mandelkern Group on Better Regulation, Final Report, 13 November 2001, p. 20.

11 Communication from the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament - Better Regulation for Growth and Jobs in the European Union, COM/2005/0097 final, p. 5.

12 Commission Communication Accompanying Document on the Action Programme for Reducing Administrative Burdens in the European Union, SEC(2007) 84.

13 Smismans, Stijn “Policy Evaluation in the EU: The Challenges of Linking Ex Ante and Ex Post Appraisal”, European Journal of Risk Regulation 2015, p. 11 Google Scholar. Smismans also gives splendid account of the respective policy instruments to assess evaluation in the EU, their impact and application in practice, which for this reason do not need to be recalled here.

14 Wiener, supra, note 2, at p. 452.

15 Wiener, supra, note 2.

16 See the summary at Wiener, supra note 2, at p. 474.

17 Driesen, David, “Is Cost–Benefit Analysis Neutral?” 77 University of Colorado Law Review (2006) pp. 335et sqq.;Google Scholar Ackerman, Frank, Heinzerling, Lisa, and Massey, Rachel, “Applying Cost–Benefit to Past Decisions: Was Environmental Protection ever a Good Idea?” 57 Administrative Law Review (2005) pp. 155 et sqq.Google Scholar

18 Franck, Jens–Uwe and Purnhagen, Kai, “Homo Economicus, Behavioural Sciences, and Economic Regulation: On the Concept of Man in Internal Market Regulation and its Normative Basis”, in: Klaus Mathis (ed.), Law and Economics in Europe: Foundations and Applications (New York et al: Springer, 2014), pp. 329 et sqq., at 357–359.Google Scholar

19 See, e.g, Nielsen, Laura Beth, “The Need for Multi–Method Approaches”, in Peter Crane and Herbert Kritzer (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Empirical Legal Research (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), pp. 952 et sqq., at 955.Google Scholar

20 Jolls, Christine, Sunstein, Cass R. and Thaler, Richard H., “A Behavioral Approach to Law and Economics”, 50 Stanford Law Review (1998), pp. 1471 et sqq., at p. 1500.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

21 See on the term “act” in the EU Kai Purnhagen, The Politics of Systematization in EU Product Safety Law (New York et al: Springer, 2013), pp. 194 et sqq. Google Scholar

22 Id, pp. 198 et seqq.

23 Such a case would in essence touch upon the issue of transferring of powers as decided on a similar issue in the “Meroni” case of the ECJ, see Case 9/56 Meroni v High Authority [1957 and 1958] ECR 133.

24 This is also emphasised in the Commission's NBRS, supra, note 3, p. 3 “Better Regulation … can never replace political decisions.”

25 Commission, supra, note 3, p. 6.

26 Art. 35 CFR.

27 Art. 38 CFR.

28 Art. 37 CFR.

29 See for this requirement of the precautionary principle Kai Purnhagen, “The EU's Precautionary Principle in Food Law is an Information Tool!”, 26 European Business Law Review (2015), pp. 912 et seqq.Google Scholar

30 Jolls, Sunstein, Thaler, supra, note 20.

31 Führ, Martin, Feindt, Peter H. and Bizer, Kilian, “Politisches Entscheiden: Wie kann die Wissenschaft dazu etwas beitragen?” in: Martin Führ, Kilian Bizer and Peter H. Feindt (eds.), Menschenbilder und Verhaltensmodelle in der wissenschaftlichen Politikberatung. Möglichkeiten und Grenzen interdisziplinärer Verständigung (Baden–Baden: Nomos, 2007), pp. 9–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

32 See Art. 3 (3) subpara 4 TEU; Smits, Jan, “Law Making in the European Union: On Globalization and Contract Law in Divergent Legal Cultures” 67 Lousiana Law Review (2007), 1181;Google Scholar Helleringer, Geneviève and Purnhagen, Kai, “On the Terms, Relevance and Impact of a European Legal Culture” in Geneviève Helleringer and Kai Purnhagen (eds.), Towards a European Legal Culture (München, Oxford, Baden–Baden: C. H. Beck, Hart, Nomos, 2014), pp. 4 and 12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

33 Michael Gibbons, Camille Limoges, Helga Nowotny, Simon Schwartzman, Peter Scott and Martin Trow. The new production of knowledge: The dynamics of science and research in contemporary societies. Sage; Westra, Laura, Lemons, John, Funtowicz, S. O., & Ravetz, Jerome R, (1995) Science for the Post Normal Age, Perspectives on Ecological Integrity 5 (New York et al.: Springer, 1995), pp. 146 et seqq.CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Jasanoff, Sheila, (ed.) States of knowledge: the co–production of science and the social order. (London: Routledge, 2004).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

34 Stirling, Andy: “’Opening Up’ and ‘Closing Down’: Power, Participation, and Pluralism in the Social Appraisal of Technology” 33,2 Science, Technology & Human Values (2008), pp. 262–294.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

35 Commission, supra, note 3.

36 At least with respect to fundamental rights, see Commission, supra, note 3, p. 6.

37 Commission Communication Smart Regulation in the European Union, COM 2010 543final.

38 See Communication from the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament - Better Regulation for Growth and Jobs in the European Union, COM/2005/0097 final, p. 5.

39 Martin Führ and Kilian Bizer, “REACh as a paradigm shift in chemical policy - responsive regulation and behavioural models.” 15 Journal of Cleaner Production (2007), pp. 327 et seqq.; Kilian Bizer and Martin Führ, “Sustainable Behavioral Governance: Responsive Regulation for Innovation” sofia-Diskussionsbeiträge zur Institutionenanalyse Nr. 15-2, 2015. Bizer, Kilian and ühr, Martin, “Sustainable Behavioural Governance: Responsive Regulation for Innovation”, in: Frank Beckenbach and Walter Kahlenborn (eds.), New Perspectives for Environmental Policies Through Behavioural Economics (New York et al: Springer, 2015), pp. 277 et sqq. Google Scholar

40 Kilian Bizer and Martin Führ, “Kompaktleitfaden: Praktisches Vorgehen in der interdisziplinären Institutionenanalyse” sofia- Diskussionsbeiträge 17-7, available on the internet at <http://www.sofia-darmstadt.de/fileadmin/Dokumente/Diskussion/2014/Netzversion_Stufenheuristik.pdf> (last accessed on 1 July 2015).

41 Steps 2 and 3 are influenced by Herbert Simon's insights into the importance of ‘bounded rationality’ and ‘satisficing’ (rather than utility–maximising) behaviour.

42 Step 4 relates to insights from, inter alia, social psychology and the sociology of everyday decisions.

43 For example impulsive purchasing behaviour, but also anger in the face of unwanted regulation. The role of emotions in the formulation and implementation of public policy is underresearched. 44 As for example shown in game experiments where participants forfeit own utility to enforce fairness norms.

45 E.g., in the SEBEROC project on responsive regulation of products containing nanomaterials, see: Bernd Steffensen, Nicola Below, Peter H. Feindt, Joop de Boer, Elizabeth Vogelezang–Stoute, Manfred Klade, Armin Spoek, Riina Pelkonen and Helena Valve, “Simulating and Evaluating a Better Regulation of Converging Technologies – project report”, available on the internet at http://dare.ubvu.vu.nl/handle/1871/48950 (last accessed 1 July 2015).