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Preface

This edited volume arises from the initial work of the Collaborative Opportunities to Value Evaluation (COVE) research group2 on the development and validation of a set of principles to guide practice in collaborative approaches to evaluation (CAE)—evaluations that implicate evaluators working in partnership with program stakeholders to produce evaluative knowledge. Such approaches are on the rise. Several types (e.g., rapid rural appraisal, participatory action research) have been practiced in international development contexts for decades. But many others have been developed more recently (e.g., contribution analysis, developmental evaluation) and provide evaluation practitioners and commissioners with a range of options that depart quite significantly from traditional mainstream approaches to evaluation. At least partly in response to this growing family, the COVE research group committed to developing and validating a set of evidence-based principles to guide CAE practice. These principles were first published in 2016 (Shulha, Whitmore, Cousins, Gilbert, & Al Hudib, 2016) and launched globally in January 2017 in English, French, and Spanish.

2 J. Bradley Cousins, Elizabeth Whitmore, Lyn M. Shulha, Hind Al Hudib, Nathalie Gilbert

The COVE research team considers the CAE principles to be an initial set and advocates for their ongoing review and revision. This volume is a contribution toward that end. The book provides an up-close look at the application and analysis of the CAE principles in a wide range of contexts. Readers interested in learning about how the principles can be applied, the benefits of doing so, and the challenges that are prone to emerge will find great value in this volume. Following a comprehensive treatment of the rationale for and development and validation of the principles, eight empirical field studies are reported. Each field study offers particular insights into collaborative practice but also provides commentary on the utility and value of the principles themselves. The final integration chapter looks across the field studies to summarize what has been learned and to foreshadow potential revisions to the principles in the not-too-distant future.

The volume will be of high interest to a wide swath of evaluation community members. In many applied fields of endeavor, following the wisdom of the late MIT Professor Donald Schön, practitioners seek to develop their reflective practice.3 Not all evaluation practitioners will engage with CAE, but for those for whom such opportunities arise, this volume will be an invaluable resource to promote reflection and practical learning. The wide range of contexts and applications of the principles published in the volume will provide valuable fodder for the consideration and planning of potential future applications, and it will be likely to stimulate ideas about such issues as methodological innovation, data quality assurance, and the utility of collaborative approaches.

3 Schön’s seminal books The Reflective Practitioner (1987) and Educating the Reflective Practitioner (1987) were internationally renowned and impacted professionals in an exceptionally wide range of communities of practice.

Members of the evaluation community wear many different hats; their interests can extend well beyond evaluation practice. Beyond seasoned evaluators, the book will have appeal to at least four other groups from this community. First, the book will be of high value to those interested in designing and implementing research on evaluation. Some of the studies included are instances of case study research and related approaches to deepening our knowledge about collaborative approaches in general. An assessment of the value of the set of principles in guiding such research will be well received by other researchers.

Second, whether through direct instruction or indirect evaluation capacity building, the pedagogical value of the CAE principles will be highly attractive to university professors, course instructors, and evaluation capacity building workshop leaders/facilitators who are interested in designing and implementing instruction related to CAE. Two of the field studies are actually grounded in pedagogical applications of the principles. Instructors in evaluation methods in practice courses as well as evaluation theory and alternative perspectives will find value in the volume.

Third, evaluation novices, be they students or professionals who are new to the field, will benefit from up-close glimpses of the complexity of collaborative practice, its benefits, and its challenges. Graduate students interested in developing their evaluation knowledge and skills as well as developing research proposals for thesis production will find great value here. The book provides a wealth of resources for this group given the range of contexts and applications of the principles and ideas about ongoing research agendas. Inasmuch as the book is grounded in empirical inquiry, it will prove to be valuable in stimulating creative ideas about research on evaluation, particularly in the collaborative context.

Finally, the book may be of substantial interest to those in program and organizational contexts where CAE is sensible and desirable. For example, in the not-for-profit sector, many acting administrators and directors of small nongovernmental organizations operate under heavy accountability demands and associated evaluation expectations. Many of these people have come to understand that evaluation can provide significant leverage for learning and the improvement of their interventions. Given limited resources, the attractiveness of CAE to such administrators is certainly strong. And in other traditionally mainstream evaluation contexts, decision and policy makers may be, in the face of complexity challenges, interested in exploring alternative approaches that will enable evaluation to truly leverage social and programmatic change. The book may provide very good insight into such possibilities.

In addition to the overarching structure of the volume, it contains several features that will help readers navigate the text and consolidate learning. The overarching structure of the book—introduction, field studies, integration—is enhanced by part introductions that provide advance organizers. The part introduction for Part B provides basic descriptive detail about the field studies to help readers identify those of high interest to them. Background details about the authors can be found at the end of each chapter. Every field study chapter begins with a short descriptive chapter overview and reference citations are presented within chapters. As a pedagogical aid, at the end of each field study, a set of questions for reflection and knowledge consolidation appears. Finally, an author and subject index appears at the end of the volume.

J. Bradley Cousins Editor

Reference

Shulha, L. M., Whitmore, E., Cousins, J. B., Gilbert, N., & Al Hudib, H. (2016). Introducing evidence-based principles to guide collaborative approaches to evaluation: Results of an empirical process. American Journal of Evaluation, 37(2), 193–215.