Moderator:
Lesya Ilchenko-Syuyva,  Economic Policy Department, National Academy of Public Administration, Office of the President of Ukraine
 E-mail: lesya@rocketmail.com

During the last 10-15 years, as a part of public administration reforms, a significant effort has been made to improve decision making within the public sector by developing capacity in policy analysis in CEE, Central Asia and Caucasus counties. Among the principal achievements in developing policy capacity in the CEE countries are the following:

- translation and publication in local languages of manuals on policy analysis;

- training of lecturers and trainers in policy analysis within TA projects;

- development and launch of basic courses in policy analysis in educational institutions;

- development and establishment of specialized or concentrated academic programs in policy analysis (for example, the specialization in Policy Analysis within the MPA program in the NAPA in Ukraine);

- development of training courses for in-service training of public servants;

- adoption of procedures within governments based on elements of policy analysis in some of the mentioned above countries, namely by the implementation of procedures for drafting policy papers as an instrument of decision making;

- reform of government institutions, particularly at the centers of government, that put in place and implement policy analysis within government;

- development of policy networks within government in which policy analysts in ministries may work together to put forward policy proposals.

Although this potential does not have enough energy for further development without donor assistance in the majority of those countries and implementation of policy analysis tools slowed down.

Thus, taking into account urgency of the issue as well as the developments and achievements of Panel Sessions conducted in the framework of 2008, 2007 NISPAcee Annual Conferences the WG will continue discussions of which factors restrict further development of policy analysis, who are potential stakeholders of policy analysis, how current stage of policy analysis in a particular country impacts on economic, social and political environment, how those challenges can be overcome (i.e. through upgrading academic, training and retraining programs).

The Working Group will primarily focus on main challenges the CEE, Central Asia and Caucasus countries presently face:

1. methods and tools of public policy analysis on various government levels: supranational (i.e. EU experience), national and local;

2. experiences in developing and circulation of policy communication documents (i.e. white papers, green papers, policy papers etc.);

3. institutional framework of regulatory impact assessment (hereinafter - RIA)procedures;ex-post policy analysis (policy monitoring and evaluation).

You may see the accepted  presentations scheduled
in the Preliminary Conference Programme