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May 25, 2011
Dear Colleague,
It was just five years ago that the Evaluation Gap Working Group published its final report. Looking back, it is remarkable to see how much has happened and to note the roles played by many of the Working Group members in advancing the generation of good evidence for policy. It is much more common today to find research that engages directly with policymakers as Esther Duflo discussed in her recent Sabot Lecture. However, getting from evidence to action is still a challenge as noted in Miguel Szekely’s recent working paper. And many evaluations still suffer from limitations created when programs are started without good data collection strategies, as noted in a recent study of school feeding in The Gambia. It’s good to stop once in a while and celebrate how far we’ve come even if the road is still bumpy.
Regards,
William D. Savedoff
Senior Fellow
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Where are they now? |
Five years ago, May 2006, the Evaluation Gap Working Group published its final report “When Will We Ever Learn?" The report continues to be cited regularly and is used in numerous graduate courses around the world. Working Group members have also continued to make significant contributions to their fields and many of them are playing key roles in promoting the use of impact evaluations to improve policies in developing countries. To find out how Miguel Szekely, Raj Shah, Ruth Levine, Paul Gertler, Esther Duflo and others are moving this agenda forward see "Where are they now?" |
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Can evidence play a role in the fight against poverty? |
Esther Duflo gave the 6th Annual Richard H. Sabot Lecture on April 11th, entitled “Policies and Politics: Can Evidence Play a Role in the Fight against Poverty?” Based in part on a new book that she co-authored with Abhijit Banerjee (Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty), Duflo countered criticism that impact evaluations address “small” questions and described how research provides important evidence and influences policy. The lecture can be viewed online here. |  |
Getting from evidence to action |
Why do countries underutilize the limited knowledge available regarding effective public policies? In a recent working paper, Miguel Szekely argues that this paradox derives from the interplay of actors who supply and demand evidence. Drawing on his experience as a government official in Mexico, Szekely analyzes cases in which the government sought to evaluate an anti-poverty program, publish politically-sensitive poverty data, introduce performance measurement in education, and institutionalize learning. He concludes by proposing a system for social policy design and implementation that is focused on results. |
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| Additional Resources |
- A recent evaluation of school feeding in The Gambia is set to be reviewed by the World Food Program's Executive Board in June.
- J-PAL is offering training courses this year in Pakistan, Mexico, Belgium and Argentina. In addition, it will run a two-day advanced course in running randomized evaluations at the University of Cape Town in July.
- Bill Savedoff writes about the Millennium Challenge Corporation's commitment to publishing impact evaluations despite the attendant political risks and talks to Lawrence MacDonald about how new impact evaluations are shaping development policy in a recent CGD Wonkcast.
- World Bank staff have started a lively new blog, Development Impact, for people interested in sharing thoughts, new research, puzzles and controversies related to impact evaluation.
- In an interview, Dinka Soliman, who heads the Philippine's social welfare department, explains her country's conditional cash transfer program with reference to an independent impact evaluation (Mostly in English, probably better if you know Filipino)
- Holden Karnofsky of GiveWell blogs about controversy over microcredit studies and ends with five "principles we use in interpreting academic research".
- Find out why admitting failure is good for you at admittingfailure.com, a site created by Engineers Without Borders Canada to share stories about failures so others don't have to make the same mistakes.
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