ABSTRACT

Argument The message of this chapter is not very optimistic. In the light of my experience as an evaluator in an area of national policy, I am forced to acknowledge what I probably always knew deep down: that the classic definition of the role of evaluation as providing information for decision-makers (Cronbach, 1963; Stufflebeam et al. , 1971; Davis, 1981) is a fiction if this is taken to mean that policy-makers who commission evaluations are expected to make rational decisions based on the best (valid and reliable) information available to them. Policy-making is, by definition, a political activity and political considerations will always provide convenient answers to awkward questions thrown up by research. Thus the ideal of rational decision-making based on information derived from research-based evaluation is probably illusory. The best that evaluators can hope to do, if they discover that their findings are at variance with the current political agenda, is to make public their evidence. This will give those who are affected by policy a chance to understand the real basis on which decisions are made, and to become aware of the alternatives, some of which may still be realized if there is a will to work in the interstices of policy, or towards changing the policy-makers by means of electoral procedures.