Your search
Results 150 resources
-
Adaptive management has become the tonic of natural resources policy. With its core idea of “learning while doing,” adaptive management has infused the natural resources policy world to the point of ubiquity, surfacing in everything from mundane agency permits to grand presidential proclamations. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to suggest that these days adaptive management is natural resources policy. But is it working? Does appending “adaptive” in front of “management” somehow make natural...
-
This paper tackles a key problem in path dependence research: how can locked-in organizations regain their scope for maneuver? Leveraging insights from two surprising and thus revelatory cases of organizations that have successfully escaped from path dependence, we develop the theoretical argument that regaining scope for maneuver can be achieved by interrupting the logic of a path’s underlying self-reinforcing mechanisms. More specifically, we argue that, through a targeted interruption of...
-
Adaptive management has been considered a valuable approach for managing social-ecological systems involving high levels of complexity and uncertainty. However, many obstacles still hamper its implementation. Law is often seen as a barrier for moving adaptive management beyond theory, although there has been no synthesis on the challenges of legal constraints or how to overcome them. We contribute to filling this knowledge gap by providing a systematic review of the peer-reviewed literature...
-
Resolving uncertainties in managed social-ecological systems requires adaptive experimentation at whole-ecosystem levels. However, whether participatory adaptive management fosters ecological understanding among stakeholders beyond the sphere of science is unknown. We experimentally involved members of German angling clubs (n = 181 in workshops, n = 2483 in total) engaged in self-governance of freshwater fisheries resources in a large-scale ecological experiment of active adaptive management...
-
Beyond high philosophy and grand themes lie the gritty details of practice.
-
The logical framework approach has spread enormously, including increasingly to stages of review and evaluation. Yet it has had little systematic evaluation itself. Survey of available materials indicates several recurrent failings, some less easily countered than others. In particular: focus on achievement of intended effects by intended routes makes logframes a very limiting tool in evaluation; an assumption of consensual project objectives often becomes problematic in public and...
-
The conventional wisdom of planning software engineering projects, using the widely cited "waterfall model" is not the only useful software development process model. In fact, the "waterfall model" may be unrealistic, and dangerous to the primary objectives of any software project.The alternative model, which I choose to call "evolutionary delivery" is not widely taught or practiced yet. But there is already more than a decade of practical experience in using it. In various forms. It is...
-
The concept of good enough governance provides a platform for questioning the long menu of institutional changes and capacity-building initiatives currently deemed important (or essential) for development. Nevertheless, it falls short of being a tool to explore what, specifically, needs to be done in any real world context. Thus, as argued by the author in 2004, given the limited resources of money, time, knowledge, and human and organisational capacities, practitioners are correct in...
-
Motivation In the last decade, a movement formed around making aid delivery more adaptive, relying on principles such as context sensitivity, flexibility, and ownership. The approaches seem promising for civil society organizations (CSOs) to fulfil their mission of fostering social transformation. While several donor agencies have started engaging with such approaches, the authors hardly see their political implications in practice. Purpose The article aims to provide evidence on an adaptive...
-
Development is going digital and INGOs like Oxfam have a vital convening role to play. This paper draws on ICT for Development in Oxfam’s programmes in the Horn, East and Central Africa to consider what this role is. In order to realise the opportunities
-
Research can improve development policies and practices and funders increasingly require evidence of such socioeconomic impact from their investments. This article questions whether information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D) research conforms to the requirements for achieving socioeconomic impact. We report on a literature review of the impact of research in international development and a survey of ICT4D researchers who assessed the extent to which they follow...
-
In fields like climate and development, where the challenges being addressed can be described as “wicked”, learning is key to successful programming. Useful practical and theoretical work is being undertaken to better understand the role of reflexive learning in bringing together different knowledge to address complex problems like climate change. Through a review of practical cases and learning theories commonly used in the areas of resilience, climate change adaptation and environmental...
-
Innovation teams must navigate inherent tensions between different learning activities to produce high levels of performance. Yet, we know little about how teams combine these activities—notably reflexive, experimental, vicarious, and contextual learning—most effectively over time. In this article, we integrate research on teamwork episodes with insights from music theory to develop a new theoretical perspective on team dynamics, which explains how team activities can produce harmony,...
-
In Australia’s Murray-Darling Basin water reform has been contentious as government attempts to reconcile historical over allocation of water to irrigation with the use of water for environmental outcomes. However, in many aspects, scientific knowledge of the environment is either imperfect, incomplete or environmental responses are unpredictable, with this uncertainty preventing definitive policy and closure of political arguments. In response to uncertainty and knowledge gaps, adaptive...
-
First Reference to Participatory Technology Development
-
This article presents evidence that–alongside the successes– many information systems in developing countries can be categorized as failing either totally or partially. It then develops a new model that seeks to explain the high rates of failure. The model draws on contingency theory in order to advance the notion of design-actuality gaps: the match or mismatch between IS designs and local user actuality. This helps identify two high-risk archetypes that affect IS in developing countries:...
-
Background: Addressing today’s sustainability challenges requires adopting a systemic approach where social and ecological systems are treated as integrated social-ecological systems. Such systems are complex, and the international development sector increasingly recognises the need to account for the complexity of the systems that they seek to transform. Purpose: This paper sketches out the elements of a complexity-aware monitoring and evaluation (M&E) system for international...
Explore
Theme
-
Adaptive Approaches [+]
- Adaptive Learning (22)
- Adaptive Management (33)
- Adaptive Rigour (1)
- Agile & Lean approaches (21)
- Design Thinking / HCD (24)
- Doing Development Differently (1)
- MSD - Market Systems Development (1)
- Other Adaptive approaches (8)
- Other sectors (13)
- Participation (2)
- PDIA (Problem-Driven Iterative Adaptation) (4)
- PEA (Political Economy Analysis) (4)
- Positive Deviance & 2 loops model (5)
- Systems Thinking / Complexity (36)
- TWP (Thinking & Working Politically) (6)
- Cases (11)
-
Development Actors Perspectives
(6)
- Canada - GAC & IDRC (1)
- China (2)
- FCDO/DFID (UK) (1)
- GIZ (Germany) (1)
- USAID (1)
- World Bank (1)
-
Geography
(13)
-
Africa
(7)
- Central Africa (1)
- Eastern Africa (5)
-
Northern Africa
(1)
- Egypt (1)
-
Southern Africa
(1)
- South Africa (1)
- West Africa (2)
-
Americas
(1)
- Central America (1)
-
Asia
(9)
-
Eastern Asia
(3)
- China (3)
-
South-eastern Asia
(4)
- Cambodia (1)
- Indonesia (1)
- Lao People's Democratic Republic (1)
- Viet Nam (1)
-
Southern Asia
(2)
- Bangladesh (2)
-
Eastern Asia
(3)
-
Oceania
(1)
-
Melanesia
(1)
- Papua New Guinea (1)
-
Melanesia
(1)
-
Africa
(7)
-
MEL4 Adaptive Management
(24)
- Evaluating Multi-project programmes (1)
- Impact evaluation (2)
- Knowledge Management (2)
- Logical Framework (2)
- Mapping Visualization Methods (1)
- MEL in International Development (6)
- Most Significant Change (1)
- Outcome Harvesting (1)
- Participatory Action Research (2)
- Participatory Evaluation (1)
- Portfolio Management (2)
- Power Analysis (1)
- Process Tracing (1)
- Qualitative Comparative Analysis (1)
- Realist Evaluation (2)
- Rubrics (1)
- Systems Mapping (1)
- Theory-based evaluations (2)
- TOC (Theory of Change) (2)
- Trans-disciplinary Research (1)
- Utilisation focused evaluation (1)
-
Practical
(2)
- Tools (1)
-
Sectors [+]
(46)
- Agriculture (1)
- Alternative Development (13)
- Citizen Engagement (1)
- Economic development (1)
- Employment (1)
- Environmental Management (5)
- Fragile and Conflict Aflicted Settings (1)
- Governance and Accountability (3)
- Health (4)
- Inclusion/Disability (1)
- Innovation (in Development) (3)
- Knowledge to Practice (3)
- Organizational Change (1)
- Research for Development (R4D) (1)
- Rural development (2)
- Scaling up / Propagating (4)
- Social Accountability (1)
- Social Change (2)
-
Technology (in Development)
(9)
- Appropriate Tech (2)
- Water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) (1)
Resource type
Publication year
-
Between 1900 and 1999
(19)
-
Between 1940 and 1949
(1)
- 1948 (1)
-
Between 1950 and 1959
(1)
- 1958 (1)
-
Between 1960 and 1969
(1)
- 1967 (1)
- Between 1980 and 1989 (7)
- Between 1990 and 1999 (9)
-
Between 1940 and 1949
(1)
- Between 2000 and 2024 (130)
- Unknown (1)