Statutory objectives & criteria - what are we trying to achieve here?
Legislation is enacted for a reason, or for multiple reasons. It seems entirely sensible that the legislation contain, within its own provisions, an explicit statement of that reason, or those reasons. This is common, though the form of the statement varies (it might, for example, be in a preamble or in an early provision setting out the law's objectives).
Many statutes create organisations (often called statutory authorities), or confer functions on existing bodies. It is common for the organisation to be given objectives, which, if achieved, will help towards achievement of the objectives of the law. It is also common for individual decisions to be given criteria which, again, are consistent with the objectives of the Act.
It might seem that specific decisions should be based on narrow criteria which are easily measured, giving feedback on the quality of the decision. However, is possible for decision-making criteria to be set at quite a high level, even for quite specific decisions of limited scope. For example, under the UK Highway Act 1980 a seemingly mundane decision (creating a public path) is to be made having regard to high level concept (the needs of agriculture and conservation considerations).
For organisational performance objectives, similar options arise. It would be possible, for example, to set the road administrator the objective of poverty reduction. While transport investments generally benefit the poor as well as the non-poor, the nexus is not invariable – different investments have different poverty impacts. A road administrator given the objective of "poverty reduction", for example, would need to consider those impacts devising an investment strategy.
At one level lower, criteria might refer to one or more of the three main channels of poverty impact of roads (Gachassin et al 2010): the human capital channel (to facilitate provision of basic needs of the poor), the market access channel (to increase productivity by lowering transport costs) and the labour activities channel (to create employment). In rural Africa the application of such criteria may lead to the conclusion some roads should not be tarred (as found by Gachassin et al 2010): a conclusion that would be difficult to reach if the road authority’s measure of success is kilometres of tarred road.
The decision about how high decision-making criteria should be set is affected by the administrative and legal system in which the decision is to be made – in some jurisdictions legislation is expressed in very general terms. It also depends on law-makers’ assessment of the honesty and competence of the decision-maker.
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