Against Excessive Rhetoric in Impact Assessment: Overstating the Case for Randomised Controlled Experiments

Paul Shaffer

Journal of Development Studies, 2011, vol. 47, issue 11, 1619-1635

Abstract: The recent attention afforded to randomisation, or Randomised Control Trials (RCTs), in impact assessment is a welcome development. The case for RCTs in international development, however, has been quite overstated. This article critically examines the seminal model underlying RCTs, the Holland-Rubin Framework, with a view to make four claims about RCTs: (i) they have limitations as conceptions of causation; (ii) their ‘idealised’ model of causal inference is undermined by implementation issues; (iii) they are not necessary to make internally valid statements about impact; and (iv) in general, they do not provide sufficient information for many purposes of impact assessment. The key argument is that ultimately, the choice of approach to impact assessment should be driven by the research question at hand and not by the alleged superiority of method.

Date: 2011
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DOI: 10.1080/00220388.2010.514331

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