evidence-informed policy

Superforecasters exist: they are people who are ready to challenge their own ideas

Leave a Comment / evidence-informed policy, policy /

The illusion of controlling the future has always been with us designing and implementing development projects and programmes. Tool after tool we have had an uncomfortable relationship with the idea that development is very messy, risky, prone to failure as well as success. Forecast and planning are key activities in our work: theories of change, logframes, the old zopp, outputs, outcomes, goal. All this to maintain some control […]

Superforecasters exist: they are people who are ready to challenge their own ideas Read More »

Doing Development Differently, 30 years ago

3 Comments / complexity, evidence-informed policy, governance, management, political economy, project, quotes /

I was sixteen when the excerpts I post below were published. For thirty-two years (and probably longer than that)  development practitioners, researchers, academics, experts, technocrats, civil servants, elected officials have tackled the uncertainty of development processes. The answer thirty-two years ago as well as today seems to be the same: embrace uncertainty, make the most out of it.

Doing Development Differently, 30 years ago Read More »

Media and politics: what is the space for research evidence?

Leave a Comment / evidence-informed policy, media /

  Lately I have been thinking that when one works, like I do, in the area of policy processes and how they can be better informed by knowledge and research evidence it is easy to think that the demand for evidence comes mainly (or only) from one side: government institutions. Government institutions at national and

Media and politics: what is the space for research evidence? Read More »

#data4policy conference in Bali: two days about pushing the boundaries of data innovation and policy making

Leave a Comment / complexity, data innovation, democracy, digital technology, evidence-informed policy, governance, Indonesia, policy /

In 2004 the Overseas Development Institute organized a seminar in London to discuss the following question: Does Evidence Matter? One of the speakers was Vince Cable, at that time the shadow minister for trade and industry with the Lib Dem party. Cable spoke at that workshop about some of the gaps that separate the political and

#data4policy conference in Bali: two days about pushing the boundaries of data innovation and policy making Read More »

Big data, big decisions: the Indonesian way

Leave a Comment / data innovation, democracy, digital technology, economy, evidence-informed policy, governance, Indonesia, policy /

I published this blog post on ODI\’s website: The writer Elizabeth Pisani recently told an anecdote about asking 50 random people in Covent Garden, London, to point to Indonesia on a small plastic globe. Only a few pointed to the right spot. This confirmed, she said, that a country as vast, populated and diverse as

Big data, big decisions: the Indonesian way Read More »

The unbearable lightness of research evidence

1 Comment / democracy, evidence-informed policy, governance, policy /

Can a politicians resign from public office because of insufficient use of evidence in policy making? Apparently yes. This is what Norman Baker has done by leaving his Home Office minister post in early November: Norman Baker resigns as Home Office minister with parting shot at May. Norman Baker is a Liberal Democrat. His party

The unbearable lightness of research evidence Read More »

Into the future? The rise of President Jokowi and the expectations about reforming the research sector in Indonesia

1 Comment / complexity, decentralisation, democracy, economy, evidence-informed policy, governance, Indonesia, Jakarta, policy, political economy, research /

Indonesia\’s 7th President, Joko Widodo, or Jokowi, was inaugurated just two weeks ago. Last weekend he presented his new cabinet, which includes eight women in the post—the highest representation of women in the cabinet so far in Indonesia’s history.  This is a time of fast change. There is a positive mood and many expectations. I watched some of the the images broadcasted

Into the future? The rise of President Jokowi and the expectations about reforming the research sector in Indonesia Read More »