Regulatory impact assessment and its evolution in Greece and Cyprus

During the recent years an increasing demand emerged to improve the existing law systems through procedures that support the standards of better regulation. Such processes are the regulatory impact assessment (RIA) systems through which researchers, administrators and decision/policy makers can assess the economic, social and environmental impacts of any given legislation. Every country implementing RIA uses different tools to measure potential and expected impact. However, the key objectives that lead to the adoption of RIA are the same for all countries across Europe. The aim of this paper is to introduce to the readers the impact assessment procedure and especially RIA. Also, it describes the RIA systems and presents their evolution in Greece and Cyprus with some empirical results on the observed patterns of tools' use at the level of individual policies. The paper has been developed in the framework of the FP7 research project Linking Impact Assessment Instruments to Sustainability Expertise - Network of Excellence (LIAISE).