Hitting the target, but missing the point” in better regulation agenda

Current research highlights that Regulatory Impact Assessments (RIAs) might be used for several purposes by political actors, including regulatory bureaucracy. In 2020, Brazilian Federal Government adopted a mandatory RIA requirement, shifting from a voluntary diffusion to a mandatory usage of the instrument. In this research we assessed RIAs carried out by federal regulatory agencies to evaluate a) the presence of the elements that are part of the conceptual model of RIAs; b) the degree of the quality of the RIAs produces after the mandatory requirement. Our findings that the obligation to prepare the RIA indiscriminately in the regulatory process induces more formalization, which, in turns, reduces RIAs potential to provide subsidies to the regulatory decision-making processes. In other words, the latest advances in adopting a mandatory regulatory impact assessment agenda may hinder the qualities of RIAs being produced by regulatory agencies.