Reasons for Using Mixed Methods in the Evaluation of Complex Projects

Michael Woolcock

No 348, CID Working Papers from Center for International Development at Harvard University

Abstract: Evaluations of development projects are conducted to assess their net effectiveness and, by extension, to guide decisions regarding the merits of scaling-up successful projects and/or replicating them elsewhere. The key characteristics of ‘complex’ interventions – numerous face- to-face interactions, high discretion, imposed obligations, pervasive unknowns – rarely fit neatly into standard evaluation protocols, requiring the deployment of a wider array of research methods, tools and theory. The careful use of such ‘mixed methods’ approaches is especially important for discerning the conditions under which ‘successful’ projects of all kinds might be expanded or adopted elsewhere. These claims, and the practical implications to which they give rise, draw on an array of recent evaluations in different sectors in development.

Keywords: Learning; and; Evaluation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019-03
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