CGIAR

Evaluating complex interventions: principles and recommendations derived from experience

Leave a Comment / Evaluating complex interventions, Monitoring and Evaluation Systems / By

This article summarizes a paper written by John Mayne, Cynthia McDougall, Rodrigo Paz-Ybarnegaray and myself recently published in the journal Evaluation. There is a growing recognition that programs that seek to change people’s lives are intervening in complex systems, which puts a particular set of requirements on program monitoring and evaluation (M&E). Developing complexity-aware M&E systems within some …

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Learning to use Participatory Action Research and Theory of Change together

Leave a Comment / Agricultural Research, Partipatory Action Research, Theory of Change / By

Most people agree that there are no simple solutions to tackling rural poverty and marginalization. Increasingly, programs that wish to do so are grappling with how to effectively engage in complex systems where outcomes are emergent, resulting from the interactions between different actors in pursuit of their own agendas. The emergent nature of change makes the outcomes …

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Do systems fight back? Some lessons from agricultural research in development

Leave a Comment / Agricultural Research, Theory of Change / By

Do long-established systems have an immune system that helps them resist transformational change? If so, how does it work? These are important questions for anyone trying to change their organizations. If the system is going to strike back then knowing how and when that might happen can help save your initiative from being killed off. …

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