This database of publications comprises outputs from our team and partner organisations that are relevant to the areas of work in which CDI aims to be active.
November 2014
This article sets out what would be required to develop a research agenda for impact evaluation. It begins by explaining why it is needed and what process it would involve. It outlines four areas where research is needed – the enabling environment, practice, products an...
October 2014
This was an interactive workshop – supported by the Institute of Development Studies’ (IDS) Department for International Development (DFID) Accountable Grant and the University of East Anglia (UEA) – with a view to opening up the debate on ethics in impact evaluation to...
September 2014
This CDI Practice Paper is about the uses of Systemic Action Research (SAR) and Participatory Systemic Inquiry (PSI) for impact assessment.
January 2014
The short pieces in the themed debate section speak to the importance of evaluation and replication of evaluations. They can improve the quality of development policy and programmes and explain intended and unintended consequences. The pieces raise questions such as: Is...
January 2014
This CDI Practice Paper by Keetie Roelen and Stephen Devereux reflects on the methodological implications of operationalising an expanded framework for evaluating social protection programmes.
November 2013
Development economics has become increasingly quantified in recent years, reflecting the aspirations of economists to practise hard science. We argue that standard applied econometric methodology lacks one key feature of the claim of science to be scientific, namely rep...
October 2013
As the emphasis on evidence-based policymaking in international development increases, so too should the attention paid to the quality of the research on which this evidence is based. One way to encourage this is by archiving research data to enable reanalysis, but this...
October 2013
The past decade has seen an increasing emphasis on ethical procedures for international development research, drawing heavily on medical models focused on the protection of subjects (for example, informants, vulnerable groups or those in conflict/post-disaster situation...
October 2013
Policy impact is a complex process influenced by multiple factors. An intermediate step in this process is policy uptake, or the adoption of measures by policymakers that reflect research findings and recommendations.
July 2013
A common presumption holds that when there is only one unit of observation, such as in the case of a national-level policy or a small scale intervention, causality cannot be established and impact evaluation methods do not apply.Yet many development interventions have s...
May 2013
Most agency evaluations are very short both on resources and in duration, with no proper opportunity to assess impact in a valid manner.The methodology for these evaluations is based on interviews, a review of available programme literature and possibly a quick visit to...
March 2013
This CDI Practice Paper is based on an analysis of international NGO (INGO) evaluation practice in empowerment and accountability (E&A) programmes commissioned by CARE UK, Christian Aid, Plan UK and World Vision UK. It reviews evaluation debates and their implicatio...
March 2013
Natural experiments are observational studies of sharp, well-defined but unplanned changes. They hinge on identifying an uncontrolled but opportune 'intervention', typically of a kind or on a scale that could not – ethically or feasibly – be implemented deliberately, an...
January 2013
While randomized experiments can be valuable tools in evaluating aid effectiveness, research designs limit the role of qualitative methods to ‘field visits’ or description of contexts. This article suggests expanding the role of qualitative methods and highlights their...
- « first
- ‹ previous
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4