Regulating for innovation? : insights from the Finnish Presidency of the Council of the European Union

Abstract

Should the European Union (EU) take into account the impact on research and innovation while developing or updating policy? According to the European Council the answer is positive. In May 2016 in fact the Council supported the innovation perspective in the regulatory process following a policy debate on how to tweak the better regulation strategy of the EU in order to strengthen competitiveness. The same idea of using regulatory policy to support innovation, competitiveness and growth appeared in a 2016 staff working paper of the European Commission. The Commission Industrial Policy Strategy refers more precisely to the Innovation Principle (IP), thus upgrading the “perspective” on innovation to a principle, ie a foundation of regulatory and policy choice. The same IP is found in the law establishing European Horizon. Innovation is also mentioned in the better regulation toolkits of the Commission #20 and #21 – here as inclusion of elements of innovation in the Impact Assessment process. Granted that there are no objections to innovation as important means to the ends of competitiveness and growth, the political question is whether the EU is now poised to embrace the IP as a foundation of regulatory and policy choice. In a few words: innovation can be a policy perspective of “frame of reference” for policies, a binding or non-binding principle. Where does the new Commission stand? And is this the same position adopted by the Council? What is the new agenda about, and does it re-define the relation between innovation and the Treaty-based precautionary principle?