Guaranteeing socially-adequate policies

Newsletter 2008-5

Publication date : 2009-03-03

With Slovakia in the process of developing a unified assessment methodology to help its Ministries evaluate the financial, economic, social and environmental impact of new policies, the Peer Review hosted by the Slovakian Ministry of Labour, Social Affairs and Family on 6-7 November 2008 focused on the relevance and effectiveness of social impact assessment schemes (see Terminology explained on p. 4) and the exchange of best practices.

Indeed, although social impact assessment has been around for some time, the Review revealed that there is still much room for improvement. Despite legal frameworks being in place in many countries, it seems that often, too little is done in practice.

Lessons learned

Within this context, the countries and stakeholder networks partaking in the meeting identified a series of factors crucial to ensuring quality social impact assessment. First and foremost is the need for political will to ensure evaluations are more than a mere ‘paper exercise’. A shared definition of social inclusion/protection is also a key factor of success and social objectives must be explicitly laid down in impact assessment guidelines so as to serve as evaluation criteria. Substantial investment in human resources, training, data sources, tools and analytical capacity is necessary.

Assessments should be based on both qualitative and quantitative analysis and examine potential impacts on a broad range of vulnerable/target groups, rather than simply looking at the average impacts on the population as a whole. In order to ensure quality exante assessments need to be followed up with continuous and ex-post assessments of the policy/measure in question.

However, participants also underscored the need to keep the process manageable. Methodologies may be demanding and proportionality should apply. Some policies can be adequately addressed through a quick test procedure, while others require a full-scale assessment. Indeed, even ‘light’ assessments are better than nothing, so long as they promote a critical reflection on the objectives, risks and potential impacts of the policy.

Participants further stressed the importance of effective stakeholder involvement, noting that time constraints can represent a major obstacle to quality participation. Another issue is that it is not always obvious to policy-makers whom they should consult. Indeed, often, various NGOs are active on the same issue. And, while consulting NGO umbrella organisations can provide a solution, direct consultation of those people actually experiencing poverty remains essential. Although participants agreed that independent experts can provide strong addedvalue, they also underlined the need for policy-makers to bear the final responsibility for the process as they must ultimately be accountable for their policies.

The Review also highlighted the crucial role that Parliaments can play, as they have the power to insist that legislative proposals be accompanied by social impact assessments in order to be submitted. The Commission was also seen as playing an important part, namely through the dissemination of existing methodologies and the funding of research. In particular, participants expressed their interest in the results – due next year – of a study commissioned recently by the Commission on ‘Social impact assessment as a tool for mainstreaming social protection and social inclusion concerns in public policy in the EU Member States’. They further suggested the Commission be more active in recommending social impact assessments of specific reforms proposed by Member States in their National Reform Programmes for Growth and Jobs.