The Regulatory Guillotine as a Mechanism for Deregulation and Anti-Corruption

Abstract

The article examines the implementation of the “regulatory guillotine” reform as a method of state deregulation, reduction of administrative barriers to economic activity, elimination of excessive and outdated mandatory requirements that can cause corruption risks in the interaction of regulatory authorities and business. The main aim of the study is to assess the system of state deregulation measures implemented in certain areas within the framework of the regulatory guillotine, including the development of new structures of state regulation in certain areas and types of state control (supervision), the development of new mandatory requirements in terms of ensuring the connection of mandatory requirements with potential risks of harm, damage, protected values and sources of risk. The article also aims to identify the main risks of implementing the reform. The source of empirical data was Federal Laws No. 247-FZ and 248-FZ adopted on July 31, 2020, drafts of normative legal acts containing mandatory requirements, drafts of new regulatory structures in certain areas developed by regulatory agencies and control and supervisory bodies, methodological materials, positions of scholars and economists on the prospects for the reform, foreign experience of deregulation and implementation of the regulatory guillotine in particular. The article presents the countries’ experience of implementing the regulatory guillotine (South Korea, Croatia, Kenya, and some deregulation initiatives in the USA) in order to analyze the possibility of its application in domestic practice. Based on the research, a number of conclusions are made about the implementation of the reform in terms of deregulation, institutional measures to combat corruption, the “bottlenecks” of the implementation of the reform, the risks of not achieving the goals, and possible ways to minimize them.