This publication aims to contribute to the international discussions on how different stakeholders can create synergies and partnerships to contribute to equity-focused and gender-responsive country-led evaluation systems. This book highlights in particular the strategic roles of Civil Society Organizations, notably the Voluntary Organizations for Professional Evaluation (VOPEs) are playing to promote the use of evaluation to enhance evidence-based policy-making, transparency and learning; and the role of EvalPartners, the new International Evaluation Initiative to strengthen Civil Society’s evaluation capacities through collaborative partnerships.
The book features contributions from senior leaders of institutions dealing with international development and evaluation. These are: UNEG, UNICEF and UN Women from the United Nations; the Independent Evaluation Group and the CLEAR centres from the World Bank; OECD/DAC Evaluation Network and the Government of Finland from the bilaterals; and the International Organization for Cooperation in Evaluation (IOCE) representing the global community of VOPEs.
The book’s key messages are:
- National ownership and leadership are overarching factors for ensuring relevant development outcomes
- National Evaluation Capacities should be seen as integral parts of good governance
- There is a need to create synergies based on a shared framework for National Evaluation Capacity Development
- The shared framework for National Evaluation Capacity Development is based on a systems approach, underlining the importance of strengthening both demand and supply capacities for equity-focused and gender-responsive evaluation at three levels: enabling environment, institutional capacities and individual capacities
- EvalPartners is an international collaborative partnership to strengthen civil society’s evaluation capacities to meaningfully contribute to equity-focused and gender-responsive enhanced evaluation policies and systems
- There is a growing recognition of the roles of Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) in general, and Voluntary Organizations for Professional Evaluation (VOPEs) in particular in National Evaluation Capacity Development
In addition to national governments and CSOs, different stakeholders within the international community can play helpful roles in supporting National Evaluation Capacities. For example: The United Nation Evaluation Group (UNEG) should:
- contribute to strengthening evaluation enabling environments by acting as a “neutral broker” facilitating dialogue between the demand and supply side of evaluations for evidence-based policy-making
- act as a “knowledge broker” facilitating South-South generation and sharing of good practices and lessons learned on equity-focused and gender-responsive country-led evaluation systems;
- coordinate initiatives with key partners to promote country-led evaluation systems;
- promote the professionalization of evaluation.
The OECD DAC Network on Development Evaluation should:
- promote international evaluation standards and guidance;
- implement targeted capacity building interventions;
- share evaluation plans;
- involve partner country stakeholders in evaluations, and
- fund specific ECD activities.
The CLEAR (Centers for Learning on Evaluation and Results), a multilateral partnership programme, should:
- support a network of partner countries’ academic
- institutions, to harness local innovation, knowledge, and experience;
- integrate this with international know-how in order to develop the capacity of government and civil society.
