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This briefing note looks at how the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Wildlife Asia programme has operationalised the concepts of adaptive rigour and adaptive management as part of its approach to collaborating, learning and adapting. As described by the Global Learning for Adaptive Management (GLAM) initiative, adaptive rigour is about ensuring that the data, information, methods, processes and systems that underpin adaptive management are robust, systematic and...

Healthcare systems are increasingly recognised as complex, in which a range of non-linear and emergent behaviours occur. China’s healthcare system is no exception. The hugeness of China, and the variation in conditions in different jurisdictions present very substantial challenges to reformers, and militate against adopting one-size-fits-all policy solutions. As a consequence, approaches to change management in China have frequently emphasised the importance of sub-national experimentation,...

Doing development differently rests on deliberate efforts to reflect and learn, not just about what programmes are doing and achieving, but about how they are working. This is particularly important for an action research programme like Child Labour: Action- Research-Innovation in South and South-Eastern Asia (CLARISSA), which is implemented by a consortium of organisations from across the research and development spectrum, during a rapidly changing global pandemic. Harnessing the potential...

This learning paper highlights how elements of outcome mapping were used by Save the Children Sweden in a project (2018-2020) that supports adolescents, affected by the Syria crisis, to become more resilient. The paper first outlines how the spheres of influence framework has been applied to develop an actor focused theory of change. It then describes how progress markers, as an alternative to SMART indicators, were formulated to monitor the programme’s results. The paper also outlines how...

Transdisciplinarity is not a new science per se, but a new methodology for doing science with society. A particular challenge in doing science with society is the engagement with non-academic actors to enable joint problem formulation, analysis and transformation. How this is achieved differs between contexts. The premise of this paper is that transdisciplinary research (TDR) methodologies designed for developed world contexts cannot merely be replicated and transferred to developing world...

• There is considerable interest in the concept of adaptive development and what it may look like in different sectors, including health. • Adaptive types of programming from the health sector are relatively advanced; as we work towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), experiences in health can provide useful lessons for other areas of development. • The international health community may not use the label ‘adaptive development’, but many are already conducting adaptive work....

Policy influence and advocacy are increasingly regarded as a means of creating sustainable policy change in international development. It is often also seen as a difficult area to monitor and evaluate. Yet there is an increasingly rich strand of innovation in options to monitor, evaluate and learn from both the successes and failures of policy influence and advocacy interventions. This paper explores current trends in monitoring and evaluating policy influence and advocacy; discusses...

Examining situational complexity is a vital part of social and behavioral science research. This engaging text provides an effective process for studying multiple cases--such as sets of teachers, staff development sessions, or clinics operating in different locations--within one complex program. The process also can be used to investigate broadly occurring phenomena without programmatic links, such as leadership or sibling rivalry. Readers learn to design, analyze, and report studies that...

The complexity of issues addressed by research for development (R4D) requires collaborations between partners from a range of disciplines and cultural contexts. Power asymmetries within such partnerships may obstruct the fair distribution of resources, responsibilities and benefits across all partners. This paper presents a cross-case analysis of five R4D partnership evaluations, their methods and how they unearthed and addressed power asymmetries. It contributes to the field of R4D...

Programmes that aim to tackle complex societal issues, such as the worst forms of child labour, require rich partnerships that bring together different perspectives. CLARISSA’s consortium partnership adopts an empowerment approach to the interventions we deliver and our ways of working together. Part of this approach involves ongoing reflection and learning about how we work together in our partnership, and how this can be adapted if needed. This learning note focuses on a method used in...

Calls for more ‘adaptive programming’ have been prominent in international development practice for over a decade. Learning-by-doing is a crucial element of this, but programmes have often found it challenging to become more learning oriented. Establishing some form of reflective practice, against countervailing incentives, is difficult. Incorporating data collection processes that generate useful, timely and practical information to inform these reflections is even more so.This paper...

This chapter examines good practices in implementing effective Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning (MEL) systems within complex international development Democracy, Human Rights, and Governance (DRG) programs, which are characterized by challenges of non-linearity, limited evidence of theories of change, and contextual and politically contingent nature of outcomes. The chapter presents three cases of MEL systems in complex projects implemented by Pact across distinct and diverse operating...

CLARISSA (Child Labour: Action-Research-Innovation in South and South-Eastern Asia) has a participatory and child-centred approach that supports children to gather evidence, analyse it themselves and generate solutions to the problems they identify. The life story collection and collective analysis processes supported children engaged in the worst forms of child labour in Bangladesh to share and analyse their life stories. Over 400 life stories were collected from children who worked in...

SAVI has established its own framework for assessing Value for Money in annual performance – in relation to expenditure, economy, efficiency, effectiveness and equity. Routine tracking and analysis of expenditure and economy ensure that inputs are supplied and services delivered to partners in line with SAVI’s core values, whilst also meeting DFID requirements and competing...

This paper examines adaptive approaches to aid programming in Nigeria. Through field research and desk reviews, we have investigated some of the assertions around the ‘adaptive management and programming’ approach, which has arisen in recent years as a response to critiques of overly rigid, pre-designed, blueprint and linear project plans. This is the second of three case studies in a series which explore if and how adaptive approaches, including rapid learning and planning responses, are...

when it was reduced to a subsidiary internal service lacking all kind of political attributions. The work done in those years had been formidable, but too many things had passed since, especially the 15M Spanish Indignados Movement, the raise of technopolitics… and the raise of populism and fascism all across Europe. We urgently needed a theoretical framework in which to substantiate our political strategy, so I came up with a Theory of Change of citizen participation (see Figure 1) which...

Despite a swathe of critiques of logframes and other blueprint approaches to development over the last 30 years, most aid infrastructure continues to concentrate on the design and subsequent implementation of closed models. This article does not propose an alternative to blueprints, but challenges the inflexibility of their implementation, which is inadequate given the complex nature of social change. It proposes a supplementary management and learning approach which enables implementers to...

- The United Kingdom’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO)’s standard economy, efficiency, effectiveness/cost-effectiveness and equity (4E) framework is still relevant for approaching, measuring and managing value for money (VfM) for adaptive programmes. • However, this framework needs to be reframed to capture and incentivise flexibility, learning and adaptation. • VfM appraisal and reporting should be done in a way that draws on beneficiary feedback and informs good...

Addressing 21st century development challenges requires investments in innovation, including the use of new approaches and technologies. Currently, many development organisations prioritise investments in isolated innovation pilots that leverage a specific approach or technology rather than pursuing a strategic approach to expand the organisation’s toolbox with innovations that have proven their comparative advantage over what is currently used. This Working Paper addresses this challenge of...