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Evaluation - "Bottom-Up" Evaluation |
Introduction Introduction "Bottom-up" evaluation describes an evaluation driven by middle-range and grass roots actors. Both middle-range and grass roots actors have a strong interest in improving the performance of conflict management projects and programs. New awareness of evaluation as an abundant source of "lessons learned" and as a means to the end of "best practices," has therefore motivated more "bottom-up" evaluations. Practitioners are middle-range actors who implement and administer conflict management projects and programs. Recently, practitioners have begun to initiate and drive ‘bottom-up’ evaluations for two main reasons. First, to improve the performance of the project or program and more specifically to develop "lessons learned" and "best practices." Second, to manage change. Evaluation is useful to the management of change by practitioners because it opens up new channels of communication with elite, middle-range and grass roots communities. For example, a funder may dictate the implementation of a project or program without proper knowledge about the environment in which it will operate. Practitioners will then be keen to evaluate the intervention to show funders the problems they are experiencing and to convince them that changes need to be made. Further, because practitioners are often interviewed during the course of an evaluation, evaluation is also a way for practitioners to propose changes to funders. Target groups are grass roots actors who directly participate in and benefit from conflict management projects and programs. These actors have a strong interest in improving the performance of interventions. Moreover, they have an important role to play in achieving improved performance and in contributing to the management of change. For example, target groups provide useful perspectives for reflection, learning and problem solving. Recently, a number of "bottom-up" approaches to evaluation have therefore been developed to engage grass roots communities in evaluation, for example, Participatory Evaluation. "Bottom-up" evaluations look different than "top-down evaluations." First, "bottom-up" evaluations are generally specific to the intervention being evaluated. That is, they are designed to provide feedback and recommendations to the project or program. In contrast, "top-down" evaluations are often cluster evaluations. This means that a number of interventions are evaluated simultaneously in order to assess their contribution towards the funder’s mandate or thematic approach. Further, "bottom-up" evaluations are likely to take place during the course of an intervention. This enables practitioners to respond to the findings of an evaluation and adjust their strategies before it is too late. "Top-down" evaluations are more likely to be carried out once the project or program is completed. This is because funders often want the evaluation to deliver a summative judgement on the intervention’s overall performance. "Bottom-up" evaluations also tend to build up the evaluative capacity of the middle-range and grass roots actors who participate in the evaluation. Practitioners as well as target groups learn to reflect on what the project or program is doing well or badly and what strategies do or don’t work. This evaluative capacity helps improve and maintain the effectiveness of projects and programs.
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