During 2012, the UNDP Evaluation Office conducted a series of evaluations of UNDP’s global and regional programmes. This evaluation covered the Regional Programme for Africa 2008-2013, implemented by the UNDP Regional Bureau for Africa (RBA). It examined the contributions made to development results through the implementation of regional projects and various aspects of work ...» more
Library
This e-library contains more than 4500 external publications on governance, social development, conflict and humanitarian issues. It includes academic and grey literature selected for its basis in good quality research and coverage of a range of perspectives. Policy-oriented summaries of each document are provided, plus links to the full text.
Inclusion Matters: The Foundation for Shared Prosperity
The terms ‘inclusion’ and ‘exclusion’ are often used imprecisely and without clearly differentiating them from inequality or poverty. This report develops a comprehensive framework for understanding inclusion, arguing that inclusion has both intrinsic and instrumental value and is manifested through opportunities to take part in society through markets, services, and spaces. It ...» more
Planning Evaluability Assessments: A Synthesis of the Literature with Recommendations
This paper summarises the literature on Evaluability Assessments, and highlights the issues to consider in planning one. It notes that an EA should examine evaluability: (a) in principle, given the project design, and (b) in practice, given the available data and systems. It should also examine the probable usefulness of an evaluation. While there is limited systematic evidence ...» more
Summary report of the public sector governance reform evaluation
This report is the summary of an evaluation of public sector governance reform (PSGR) and donor support in developing and transitional countries over the ten years 2001-2010. During this time the flow of donor funds to PSG initiatives has been substantial. For example, between 2003 and 2007, Government Administration projects accounted for almost US$10 billion of Official ...» more
The Perils of Peacekeeping without Politics: MONUC and MONUSCO in the DRC
This Usalama Briefing Paper sets out the history of UN involvement in the eastern DRC and analyses the challenges that continue to face the mission, even as it prepares to deploy a new intervention brigade, charged with neutralizing and disarming rebel groups and bolstering Congolese state reform. It’s key findings are:The UN’s ability to play a constructive role in the Congo ...» more
“You say rape, I say hospitals. But whose voice is louder?” Health, aid and decision-making in the Democratic Republic of Congo
In the last decade, scholars and humanitarians have rightly drawn attention to the high rates of gender-based violence in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), which are associated with the high levels of conflict in the country since 1996. However, this focus detracts from the general health problems that stem from the deterioration of the health sector, which began ...» more
Explaining positive deviance in public sector reforms in development
Public sector reforms are commonplace in developing countries. Much of the literature about these reforms reflects on their failures. This paper asks about the successes and investigates which of two competing theories best explain why some reforms exhibit such positive deviance.These theories are called 'solution and leader driven change' (SLDC) and 'problem driven iterative ...» more
The Partnership of Free Speech and Good Governance in Africa
New data from Afrobarometer, collected during face-to-face interviews with 51,605 people in 34 countries during 2011-13, finds that freedom of speech is strongly linked to popular perceptions of both media effectiveness and good governance. People who indicate they are free to say what they think also report higher levels of trust in their leaders, lower levels of corruption, ...» more
Funds for Peace? Examining the Transformative Potential of Social Funds
Social funds and large-scale community driven development (CDD) programmes are a popular policy instrument in post-conflict situations. This is partly because of claims that they can generate transformative impacts, such as creating more peaceful societies at the local level and promoting trust in government. Drawing on a rigorous literature review, this practice note assesses ...» more
World Disasters Report 2013
This year’s World Disasters Report focuses on the rapid spread of technologies, especially information and communication technologies, which is changing humanitarian action and humanitarians, too. It finds that the changes are most evident in highly technological environments, such as megacities, or when disasters affect critical infrastructures, resulting in secondary ...» more
Global Gender Gap Report 2013
The Global Gender Gap Report 2013 ranks 136 countries on the gender gap in: economic participation and opportunity; health and survival; educational attainment; and political empowerment. Of the 133 countries that were measured in both 2012 and 2013, 86 improved their gender gap during this time with the area of political participation seeing the greatest progress. The world's ...» more
Assessing the Overall Impact of Civil Society at the Country Level: An Exploratory Approach
Very little is known about the wider and longer-term contribution of civil society organisations (CSOs) to development and poverty reduction. Evaluators have shied away from making judgements for lack of data: rigour has trumped relevance. This article reports on the work of a panel set up by NORAD in response to growing pressure from the public to assess the wider impact of ...» more
A Networked Response? Exploring national humanitarian networks in Asia
Networks are an increasingly prominent feature of the modern world. In the humanitarian system – characterised as it is by interdependent relationships between autonomous actors and the lack of any central authority or agreed hierarchy – they can be found organising collective action and collaboration in a multitude of settings. The aim of this research was to improve the ...» more
The geography of poverty, disasters and climate extremes in 2030
Climate change and exposure to ‘natural’ disasters threaten to derail international efforts to eradicate poverty by 2030. As temperatures warm, many of the world’s poorest and most vulnerable citizens will face the growing risks linked to more intense or lengthy droughts, extreme rainfall and flooding and severe heat waves – risks that threaten lives and livelihoods, as well as ...» more
Mapping context for social accountability
Demand-side governance and social accountability approaches (“SAcc”) have steadily gained prominence as a perceived means for achieving and improving a range of development outcomes. Today, most development agencies invest in the promotion of SAcc under the guise of “citizen participation”, “citizen demand”, “voice”, “transparency and accountability”, or, more broadly, “good ...» more
Political Economy Analysis and the Aid Industry: The Road to Nowhere?
Political economy analysis has been a favourite instrument among donors of development aid since roughly the turn of the century. The usefulness of such forms of analysis has been emphasised because donors realised that their focus on formal aspects of the social and political organisation of countries caused them to overlook important elements of the ‘political economy’ of ...» more
Pooled Funding to Support Service Delivery Lessons of Experience from Fragile and Conflict-Affected States
This is the output from DFID-commissioned research into the use of pooled funding to support service delivery in fragile and conflict-affected states (FCAS). The aim was to distil practical knowledge from existing studies and, in particular, to capture practitioner experience on the design and implementation of pooled funds, in order to produce:an updated summary of current ...» more
Voluntary organizations for professional evaluation: learning from Africa, Americas, Asia, Australasia, Europe and Middle East
During the past few decades there has been a remarkable growth in the evaluation profession as evidenced by the number of Voluntary Organizations for Professional Evaluation (VOPEs) that have formed. The number of national and regional VOPEs has risen from 15 in the 1990s to more than 155 by early 2013. The aggregate total of their memberships now surpasses 34,000.Many of the ...» more
Evaluation and civil society: Stakeholders’ perspectives on national evaluation capacity development
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 ...» more
Democracy, governance and randomised media assistance
In recent years, the use of field experiments to study the impact of development assistance on democracy and governance outcomes (DG outcomes) has grown tremendously. However, most of the DG field experiments conducted to date focus on only a few sectors, namely elections, community and local governance, and service delivery (Moehler, 2010). Experimentalists have largely ...» more
