Suchergebnisse

This article develops a framework for enhancing understanding and exploring both how power manifests in the evaluation process, and the power of evaluation in relation to public policy and democratic governance. Power is conceived as a multifaceted and dynamic phenomenon that manifests, permeates, and affects evaluation in many ways. The article demonstrates how the framework can be applied to an evaluation of a Swedish teacher-training program. The tentative analysis shows how the commissioner's power-over the evaluators becomes evident when it cannot induce the evaluators to do what it wants them to do and manifests itself as constitutive power when, for example, helping shape the notion of what valid knowledge is. The power of the evaluation manifests itself as supporting key policy and governance functions.

This article discusses how democratic evaluation can manage threats to democracy, democratic renewal, and the mediatisation of public policy and governance. It considers the readiness of five democratic evaluation orientations to deal with current threats and discusses how to develop them. It demonstrates that democratic evaluation is poorly prepared to manage current threats to democracy or the mediatisation of public policy. Progressive evaluation is the only approach offering some new keys to addressing certain current threats and challenges. The other orientations have some capacity to manage threats to democracy and support democratic renewal, but need further development. The article suggests that democratic evaluation could be a constructive tool for maintaining and developing democracy in an increasingly polarised and mediatised society if evaluators gain knowledge of threats to democracy, democratic transition, and democratic renewal and, informed by mediatisation and democracy research, develop the necessary awareness and competence to deal with these challenges.

This article develops a conceptual framework for exploring the role and consequences of evaluation at the local level of school governance. It also provides a frame of reference for the articles in this special issue on the role of evaluation in local school governance in Sweden. It consists of key concepts, three models of decentralised governance (state model, local government model and multi-actor model of governance) and four types of evaluation (indicator-based monitoring and evaluation systems; stand-alone evaluations; synthesis studies; and informal, occasional or everyday evaluations). Local school governance refers to governance that occurs in a municipality and in a quasi-market where local school actors govern and influence schooling and education. It includes the efforts of actors and institutions to govern and influence matters such as school policy, education, school climate and school safety. Evaluation is used as a generic term that refers to, for example, evaluation, inspection, quality assurance, ranking and to both stand-alone evaluations and evaluation systems. The article briefly demonstrates how the framework can be applied in an analysis of the role of evaluation at the local level of school governance by providing an example, and discusses the framework's advantages and limitations. ; Utvärderingars konsekvenser för grundskolans praktik

The article develops a conceptual framework for the interplay between evaluation and governance and explores key functions of evaluation in democratic governance, mainly the accountability and improvement function. Using this framework contributes to knowledge of how governance affects evaluation and evaluation systems, and how evaluation may contribute to policy or governance change. Functions of evaluation are explored as effects of evaluative information produced by different evaluations on the one hand, and as evaluation system effects on the other. The framework can be used to map out and explore the interplay between evaluation and governance in different policy sectors. Program theory methodology is used to unpack the assumptions underlying evaluation in the state and network models of governance. The program theories can be used to illuminate and discuss how evaluation should work in different models of democratic governance, as well as for empirical research of the interplay between governance and evaluation.

The article develops a conceptual framework for the interplay between evaluation and governance and explores key functions of evaluation in democratic governance, mainly the accountability and improvement function. Using this framework contributes to knowledge of how governance affects evaluation and evaluation systems, and how evaluation may contribute to policy or governance change. Functions of evaluation are explored as effects of evaluative information produced by different evaluations on the one hand, and as evaluation system effects on the other. The framework can be used to map out and explore the interplay between evaluation and governance in different policy sectors. Program theory methodology is used to unpack the assumptions underlying evaluation in the state and network models of governance. The program theories can be used to illuminate and discuss how evaluation should work in different models of democratic governance, as well as for empirical research of the interplay between governance and evaluation.

The article develops a conceptual framework for the interplay between evaluation and governance and explores key functions of evaluation in democratic governance, mainly the accountability and improvement function. Using this framework contributes to knowledge of how governance affects evaluation and evaluation systems, and how evaluation may contribute to policy or governance change. Functions of evaluation are explored as effects of evaluative information produced by different evaluations on the one hand, and as evaluation system effects on the other. The framework can be used to map out and explore the interplay between evaluation and governance in different policy sectors. Program theory methodology is used to unpack the assumptions underlying evaluation in the state and network models of governance. The program theories can be used to illuminate and discuss how evaluation should work in different models of democratic governance, as well as for empirical research of the interplay between governance and evaluation.

This article is intended to contribute to the understanding of evaluation use in the context of policy making and governance. It does this, first, by developing a framework that sets out the prerequisites of six possible functions of an evaluation 'management response system'; and second, by analysing three aid organizations' management response systems in relation to this framework. The prerequisites of the different functions are theoretically derived. The analysis finds that response systems have contributed to organizational legitimacy and achieved many of their intended functions, but only to an extent. Two factors – the system design, and top managers' support for the system – were found to be critical for how these systems worked. The article also discusses whether a management response system meets the needs of public organizations and stakeholders operating in multi-actor policy making.

The purpose of this article is to discuss what is meant by multicultural competence in evaluation and how policies and programmes aiming at multicultural awareness and 'validity' can be evaluated. The article discusses three main ways of understanding multiculturalism and how multicultural competence in evaluation can be defined. It also develops evaluation criteria that can be used for assessing the multicultural implications of policies and programmes. The article suggests that a multiculturally competent evaluator should be well informed about minority and majority norms and also familiar with different models of multiculturalism. The multiculturally aware evaluator employs an appreciative approach to traditional cultures that is consistent with human rights and international law. A multiculturally relevant evaluation should stimulate a discussion that facilitates inter-cultural understanding and multicultural awareness. Developing multicultural awareness in evaluation can be seen as a way of developing democratic evaluation.

This article develops a conceptual framework for studying democratic accountability in decentralised governance, and discusses critical issues about democratic accountability from a citizen's perspective. First, the concept is discussed and adapted to make it useful for studying democratic accountability in different governance structures. Second, the article scrutinises conditions for democratic accountability in decentralised governance based on three models. Third, democratic accountability is discussed with reference to a case study of public reviewers operating in four municipalities in Sweden. The study indicates that municipal auditors and the local media have the greatest impact on municipal policy. On the whole, auditors improve local governments' internal control and systems for steering and monitoring municipal policy, whereas the media sometimes alter the policy agenda without changing the policy. Auditors maintain and support an elitist democratic orientation of democratic accountability, and the media maintain this democratic orientation and in addition promote democratic dialogue. Viewed from a citizen's perspective, the traditional accountability system does not work satisfactorily. State inspectors and municipal auditors – two important public reviewers in the current system – could improve their work to make it more useful to citizens' democratic control. Another way discussed to develop democratic accountability is to promote participatory policy and concrete means of accountability (e.g. on‐site visits, conducted tours and different forms of democratic dialogue). The formal way to improve democratic accountability implies more transparency, monitoring and control, which may also lead to distrust and scapegoat thinking (i.e. a surveillance society), whereas concrete modes of accountability, more associated with participatory and deliberative democracy, imply mutual responsibility and trust building. Strengthening participatory policy, active citizens, collective responsibility and democratic dialogue could be an alternative to the emerging audit society.

There are many options for elaborating democratic evaluations. This article discusses evaluation of and for democracy, and in particular three broad democratic evaluation orientations: elitist democratic evaluation (EDE), participatory democratic evaluation (PDE) and discursive democratic evaluation (DDE). The archetypes differ regarding, for example, evaluation focus, inclusion of stakeholders, dialogue and the role of the evaluator. The three orientations promote certain democratic values and are linked to the elitist, participatory or discursive notions of democracy respectively. It is argued that there is a need to become more conscious of how evaluations not labelled democratic can influence democracy and what responsibility democratic evaluators have. If commissioners and evaluators become more aware of the different democratic orientations evaluations may have, they will be better able to decide which evaluation to commission and undertake.

Because when a policy process starts, nobody knows what line of action will eventually be implemented, policy evaluation has to continuously examine the content of different policy components. In order to understand and explain public policy, different stakeholders' perceptions of the policy problem need to be scrutinized. A policy evaluation should also facilitate the interpretation of policy in a broader context. What values and order does the policy or programme promote? Using an open evaluation framework and a mix of criteria can facilitate a broader interpretation of the policy process. In this article, problems undertaking policy evaluation are discussed in relation to a Swedish medical informatics programme.

SummaryThis article explores how three evaluation systems in eldercare governance, two national and one local, operate and interact at the municipal, administrative, and service levels in a Swedish municipality. The case study focuses on the three systems' contributions to accountability and to improving eldercare quality. It is based on multiple sources, including 28 interviews with local key actors involved in local eldercare governance, and the results derive from a directed content analysis guided by four research questions.FindingsThe study demonstrates that the three evaluation systems support accountability and quality improvement in different ways and have different consequences for local actors. The systems create multiple accountability problems and have multiple constitutive effects, for example, creating different notions of what quality in eldercare means. The systems' contributions to improving eldercare quality differed: the net effect of the two national systems was negative, whereas the local system has helped improve eldercare quality without any identified negative effects so far.ApplicationsThe article broadens our theoretical understanding and knowledge of regulatory mechanisms in eldercare governance. It has significance for eldercare policy by finding that policymakers and service providers must be aware of and manage multiple evaluation systems and accountability problems. Its implication for eldercare practice is that local actors must build evaluation capacity to manage existing evaluation systems in order to improve their own practices.