Independence of regulators increases quality of regulation (CERRE)

From a discussion posted on the Smart Regulation LinkedIn Group (same editor as this blog) : the Centre on Regulation in Europe (CERRE) has published a new study demonstrating the link between greater independence and accountability of national regulatory authorities (NRAs) and the perceived quality of their regulation. The study has been carried out by Prof. Pierre Larouche, former CERRE Joint Academic Director and professor at Tilburg University and the College of Europe, Dr Chris Hanretty, researcher and lecturer in Politics at the University of East Anglia, and Prof. Andreas Reindl, professor at Leuphana University.
The CERRE site contains several other publications of great interest to smart regulators (examples : Enforcement and judicial review of decisions of NRAs ; Quantitative techniques for regulatory benchmarking).
The study is well timed, as there is renewed interest, inter alia in OECD, in assessing the relevance and performance of economic regulators, much of the ground work having already been published some years ago (example : « designing independent and accountable regulatory authorities for high quality regulation » 2005)
Among the comments, a suggestion for reading on regulatory reform : Regulation and Its Reform (1984) the best overview of the topic since Alfred Kahn's Economics of Regulation (197O).