Diversity and Complexity

Monday, January 9th, 2012

by Scott Page, 2011. Available on Google Books Princeton University Press, 14/07/2011 - 296 pages Abstract: This book provides an introduction to the role of diversity in complex adaptive systems. A complex system--such as an economy or a tropical ecosystem--consists of interacting adaptive entities that produce dynamic patterns and structures. Diversity ...

The Big Push forward: The Australian Debate (Oct 2011)

Thursday, October 27th, 2011

October 26, 2011 by Chris Roche. On 19 October 2011, Oxfam Australia hosted a ‘Big Push Forward‘ event in Melbourne with the co-conveners of this initiative – Rosalind Eyben and Irene Guijt. Sixty development practitioners, including AusAid staff and academics came together to discuss whether the concerns voiced by the Big ...

Essentials of Utilization-Focused Evaluation

Monday, September 19th, 2011

Michael Quinn Patton, August 2011. Sage publications Publisher's description: "Based on Michael Quinn Patton's best-selling Utilization-Focused Evaluation, this briefer book provides an overall framework and essential checklist steps for designing and conducting evaluations that actually get used. The new material and innovative graphics present the utilization-focused evaluation process as a complex adaptive system, ...

Innovations in Monitoring and Evaluation ‘as if Politics Mattered’,

Monday, September 19th, 2011

Date: 17-18 October 2011 Venue: ANU, Canberra, Australia Concept Note, Chris Roche & Linda Kelly, 4 August 2011 The Developmental Leadership Program (DLP)[1] addresses an important gap in international thinking and policy about the critical role played by leaders, elites and coalitions in the politics of development. At the core of DLP thinking ...

Evaluating the Complex: Attribution, Contribution and Beyond.

Wednesday, August 31st, 2011

Kim Forss, Mita Marra and Robert Schwartz, editors. Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick. May 2011. Available via Amazon "Problem-solving by policy initiative has come to stay. Overarching policy intiatives are now standard modus operandi for governmental and non-governmental organisations. But complex policy initiatives are not only reserved for the big challenges of ...

The “Real Book” for story evaluation methods

Thursday, May 26th, 2011

Marc Maxson, Irene Guijt, and others, 2010. GlobalGiving Foundation (supported by Rockefeller Foundation). Available as pdf.  See also the related website. ["Real Book" = The Real Book is a central part of the culture of playing music where improvisation is essential. Real books are not for beginners: the reader interprets scant ...

Theory of Change: A thinking and action approach to navigate in the complexity of social change processes

Sunday, May 22nd, 2011

Iñigo Retolaza Eguren, HIVOS/DD/UNDP, May 2011 Available as pdf. "This guide has been jointly published by Hivos and UNDP, and is aimed at the rich constellation of actors linked to processes of social development and change: bilateral donors, community leaders, political and social leaders, NGO’s representatives, community-base ...

GTZ/BMZ Evaluation and Systems Conference papers

Thursday, May 19th, 2011

(via Bob Williams on EvalSys) Systemic Approaches in Evaluation Documentation of the Conference on 25-26 January 2011 "Development programs promote complex reforms and change processes. Such processes are often characterized by insecurity and unpredictability, posing a big challenge to the evaluation of development projects. In order to understand which ...

Evaluation Revisited – Improving the Quality of Evaluative Practice by Embracing Complexity

Thursday, April 21st, 2011

Utrecht Conference Report. Irene Guijt, Jan Brouwers, Cecile Kusters, Ester Prins and Bayaz Zeynalova. March 2011. Available as pdf This report summarises the outline and outputs of the Conference ‘Evaluation Revisited: Improving the Quality of Evaluative Practice by Embracing Complexity’’, which took place on May 20-21, 2010. It also adds additional ...

IMPACT AND AID EFFECTIVENESS: Mapping the Issues and their Consequences

Monday, April 4th, 2011

[from the IDS Virtual Bulletin, March 2011] Introduction In this virtual Bulletin we bring together ten articles dating from across three decades. They all address Impact. From the outset, we ...