ABSTRACT
Recent years have witnessed growing interest in ways of strengthening the links between social science research and the ‘real-world’ problems facing policy-makers and practitioners. Attempts have been made to promote evidence-based policy and practice in a range of public services, for example education (Alexanderson et al., 2009; Levin, 2004), health care (Black, 2001; Culyer & Lomas, 2006), and crime reduction (Duke, 2001), and in many western democracies, including Australia (Marston & Watts, 2003), Canada (Howell, 2009), Ireland (Kennedy, de Brún, Brún, & MacFarlane, 2010), the Netherlands (Bekker, van Egmond, Wehrens, Putters, & Bal, 2010), New Zealand (Tenbensel, 2004), Norway (Ogden, Kärki, & Teigen, 2010), Sweden (Soydan, 2010) and the UK (Nutley, Morton, Jung, & Boaz, 2010). From the 1990s onwards, British politicians championed the idea that social science research could and should play a role in identifying which policies ‘work’ (Solesbury, 2001). Faced with a prolonged period of austerity in the wake of the global financial crisis, they have sought evidence to help inform decisions about where to reduce public spending (Nutley, Powell, & Davies, 2012), and in 2014, the UK government established a network of What Works Centres to identify which social policy interventions are the most cost-effective.
