A Next-Generation Assessment Framework for Examining the Impact Assessment Act

• Author: Robert B Gibson, A John Sinclair, an d Meinha rd Doelle
• Pages: 32-52

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 2

A Next-Generation Assessment Framework

for Examining the Impact Assessment Act

Robert B Gibson, A John Sinclair, and Meinhard Doelle

A. INTRODUCTION

In this book, the new Canadian federal assessment law is considered in

light of global and national expectations for advanced impact assess-

ment regimes. Both global and national expectations are rooted in what

we can learn from past failures, oversights, and evident best practice,

as well as what is needed to address current and looming challenges.

These considerations are well documented in academic and profes-

sional journals, reported case material, and the broader literature on

the contexts in which assessment regimes should operate.1 No sin-

gle compilation prevails. Authorities dier on how the key compon-

ents should be dened and organized into a conceptual framework,

how their interactions should be recognized, and how they should be

adjusted for application in dierent jurisdictions. Nonetheless, it is

not dicult to identify the core components of next-generation impact

assessment regimes or to specify these requirements as criteria for the

1 See, for example, David P Lawrence, Environmental Impact Assessment: Practical Solu-

tions to Recurrent Problems, 2d ed (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley and Sons, 2013); Richard K

Morgan, “Environmental Impact Assessment: The State of the Art” (2012) 30:1 Impact

Assessment and Project Appraisal 5; Alan Bond, Angus Morrison-Saunders & Richard

Howitt, eds, Sustainability Assessment: Pluralism, Practice and Progress, 1st ed (London,

UK: Taylor and Francis, 2012); Christopher Wood, Environmental Impact Assessment: A

Comparative Review, 2d ed (Harlow, UK: Pearson Education, 2003).

A Next-Generation Assessment Framework for Examining the Impact Assessment Act | 33

design, implementation, and evaluation of assessment law and policy

for Canada at the federal level.

This chapter outlines a next-generation assessment framework that

incorporates international learning as well as key themes in the Can-

adian deliberations surrounding the assessment law and policy reform

process that led to the Impact Assessment Act (IAA).2 Several authors of

chapters in this book have contributed to developing the framework and

its components, which inuenced the structure and content of PartII of

the book. Many of the chapters in Part II also deal specically with key

components of next-generation assessment; others touch on them. We

also apply the framework at the end of the book in considering how far

the IAA moves us to the next generation.

B. BACKGROUND TO THE NEXTGENERATION ASSESSMENT

FRAMEWORK

Legislated impact assessment requirements were introduced over

y years ago with the National Environmental Policy Act in the United

States3 and have since spread to approximately 160 jurisdictions around

the world. Forms have varied widely, reecting the global diversity of

socio-ecological and governance systems and associated issues, trad-

itions, capacities, ambitions, and power structures. Over time, assess-

ment laws, policies, and structures have also evolved, devolved, and

shied in many directions, in part due to changes well beyond the

realm of assessment law, policy, and practice.

Among the key inuences have been expansions in the scale of con-

cerns and opportunities. Assessment issues in the 1970s were primarily

local matters, oen involving tensions between desires for expansion

of economic activities and fears of adverse contamination, resource

depletion, and community disturbance. Over the following decades,

assessments increasingly faced regional and international issues as well.

Especially since the beginning of the twenty-rst century, assessment

regimes have been immersed in a world that is increasingly complex,

demanding, and, in some ways, uncertain. The current global context

for assessments is enormously richer in nancial and technological

capacities but also burdened by deeper concerns about unsustainable

2 SC 2019, c 28, s 1.

3 42 USC § 4321 et seq.