Democratic Knowledge Production as a Contribution to Objectivity in the Evaluation of Development NGOs

Abstract

Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) occupy an increasingly significant role in international development aid. In tandem with their increasing significance, demands for showing effects and impacts by means of rigorous, most recently experimentalist, evaluation practices have been made; especially by international donors who channel a remarkable portion of their development aid budget through NGOs. The current mainstream evaluation used by NGOs is based on logical framework approaches, which subscribe to measurability and objectivity in evaluation. There has been substantial criticism of such approaches for not being adequate in the context of complex and uncertain development situations. Furthermore, these methods tend to work against NGOs' own value commitments. In this article, we argue for a methodological middle road in terms of the contemporary epistemological and ethical debate. We base our argument on pragmatist philosophy, which considers democratic knowledge production as a contribution to objectivity. We propose a pragmatist approach for the phenomena of evaluations in NGOs, while acknowledging and treating the challenge of power relations in such an evaluation.

Audit Culture

“…Developing performance and evaluation measures that better reflect the experiences and goals of agencies and facilitators could potentially improve staff commitment to monitoring and evaluation requirements. As we and others have argued elsewhere, service providers often have different ways of assessing program effectiveness beyond the number of clients reached (Holma & Kontinen, 2012; Owczarzak & Dickson-Gomez, 2011; Owczarzak & Dickson-Gomez, 2012). Developing systems in which these experiences and observations are taken into account and supplement numerical data may increase the perceived value of monitoring and evaluation to providers and decrease the negative consequences from an emerging audit culture.…”

“…Some have argued that current monitoring and evaluation approaches based primarily on measurable, well-defined indicators may unintentionally cause organizations to distance themselves from aspects of their work that are difficult or impossible to measure by the means of evaluation required by donors (Holma & Kontinen, 2012). For example, when the appropriate questions are not asked in evaluation, activities, and programs that aim to increase empowerment, foster social change, and develop collaborative relationships may go unrecognized.…”

Growth Into Citizenship: Framework for Conceptualizing Learning in NGO Interventions in Sub-Saharan Africa

“…However, to be adequate, this framework should be used in a way that is sensitive to the issue of power. In our previous research (Holma & Kontinen, 2012, 2015) we have pointed to some of the challenges in relation to (the lack of) the conceptualization of power in Dewey, building on Hildreth’s (2009) suggestion of how the conceptualization of power implicit in Dewey’s philosophy can be reconstructed as explicit. In the context discussed in this article, the issue of power is evident—especially in terms of the postcolonial legacy, authoritarian regimes, asymmetries in international development, and local hierarchies.…”

Ethical, Managerial and Methodological Perspectives in Knowledge Creation in Two Finnish Civil Society Organisations

“…However, the application of HRBA at the level of individual organisational management practices is an ongoing process, and requires novel ways of knowledge creation. These new approaches require a successful combination of knowledge perspectives of management, methodology and ethics (Holma/Kontinen 2012;Jauhola/Kontinen 2014), which all set slightly different standards for what is considered relevant and adequate 'knowledge'.…”