Evaluation in the Practice of Development

Martin Ravallion

The World Bank Research Observer, 2009, vol. 24, issue 1, 29-53

Abstract: Standard methods of impact evaluation often leave significant gaps between what we know about development effectiveness and what we want to know--gaps that stem from distortions in the market for knowledge. The author discusses how evaluations might better address these knowledge gaps and so be more relevant to the needs of practitioners. It is argued that more attention needs to be given to identifying policy-relevant questions (including the case for intervention), that a broader approach should be taken to the problems of internal validity (including heterogeneity and spillover effects), and that the problems of external validity (including scaling up) merit more attention by researchers. Copyright The Author 2009. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development / the world bank . All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org, Oxford University Press.

Date: 2009
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (54)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/wbro/lkp002 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
Working Paper: Evaluation in the practice of development (2008)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:wbrobs:v:24:y:2009:i:1:p:29-53

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://academic.oup.com/journals

Access Statistics for this article

The World Bank Research Observer is currently edited by Peter Lanjouw

More articles in The World Bank Research Observer from World Bank Oxford University Press, Great Clarendon Street, Oxford OX2 6DP, UK. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oxford University Press ().