Over the past ten years the UK’s Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) has adopted a systematic approach to improving how it sources and uses evidence to inform policymaking. DEFRA has implemented two five-year evidence investment strategy processes that ensured the resources it invested in evidence were better directed towards both long- and […]
The Productivity Commission is one of Australia’s most prolific and influential government advisory bodies, providing evidence-based policy advice on a wide spectrum of social and economic issues aimed at raising living standards across society. The paper aims to show how the Commission has become such a prominent actor in Australian policy making, highlighting its origins
Australia\’s Productivity Commission some interesting insights for Indonesia Read More »
The Knowledge Sector Initiative has posted four video podcast interviews with the authors of working papers and stories of change that document international and Indonesian experiences with processes and systems that can help to strengthen the demand and use of evidence in policy making. Investing Evidence in Policy Making Over the past ten years, United
Video podcasts on demand and use of evidence Read More »
A couple of weeks ago I sat with Robert Kirkpatrick, the head of the UN Global Pulse Initiative who was over from the UN headquarter in New York and Diastika Rahwidiati a consultant at PulseLab Jakarta. We had an interesting chat about things that are important to us: data, big data, evidence, demand of evidence,
Don’t be scared of big data! Read More »
I contributed with Widya Sutiyo to this review written by Jessica Mackenzie of different models of government think tanks. Key points from the paper: Government think tanks have several benefits over external think tanks, including their strong understanding of government programs and priorities (which helps them to tailor advice to actual needs) and an ability to coordinate across government departments. There is
Establishing Government Think Tanks Read More »
“There’s a frustrating gap there so policy makers need skills to enable them to listen to the science and probe it for reliability.\” Here an interesting article published some time ago in The Guardian but still very relevant: Top 20 things politicians need to know about science
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 »
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