Evaluating Communication for Development: A Framework for Social Change

"Building on current arguments within the fields of C4D and development, the authors reinforce the case for effective communication being a central and vital component of participatory forms of development, something that needs to be appreciated by decision makers. They also consider ways of increasing the effectiveness of evaluation capacity development from grassroots to management level in the development context..."

This book presents a framework for evaluating communication for development (C4D) that critiques instrumental, upward accountability-based approaches to development and evaluation and offers an alternative holistic, participatory, mixed methods, learning-based approach. Based on systems and complexity thinking and other key concepts, the framework focuses on power relations, gender, and other differences and social norms. This approach is supported by examples and case studies from a number of action research and evaluation capacity development projects undertaken by the authors. These examples demonstrate the rigour and importance of participatory evaluation approaches to processes of sustainable social change and development. The book is designed for students, scholars, and professionals researching or working in development, communication and media, applied anthropology, and evaluation and programme planning.

The framework presented in the book emerged from several participatory action research and evaluation capacity development projects conducted in South Asia and Australia over the past 15 years, as well as the development of various resources for evaluating C4D. They include the following projects:

• The development of Ethnographic Action Research (EAR), which was designed to help people understand, evaluate, and continually improve their C4D initiatives. EAR takes a holistic approach through the concept of communicative ecologies, which enables a focus on the actual use of, and interaction with, media and information and communication technology (ICT) in the wider context of people's lives and social and cultural structures.
• The Assessing Communication for Social Change project, conducted in collaboration with the non-governmental organisation (NGO) Equal Access Nepal (EAN), which developed a participatory methodology and monitoring and evaluation (M&E) systems and processes to assess the impacts of C4D radio programmes made by EAN. This project provided learning about evaluation capacity development in complex and challenging development contexts, and resulted in a toolkit for evaluating C4D initiatives which has recently been made available here.
• The development of a United Nations (UN) Inter-agency Resource Pack for Researching, Monitoring and Evaluating C4D for use by the UN and its partners. This project included a literature review and consultations with an Expert Panel and C4D Focal Points or M&E specialists in various UN agencies. This resulted in the development of a set of principles for effective, appropriate, and sustainable evaluation of C4D and an initial framework that incorporated these principles.

Contents of the book include:

• Chapter 1: Introduction - introduces C4D and the participatory, learning-oriented, critical, and complexity-based approach of the framework presented in the book, which is seen as vital to sustainable development. It outlines the origins of the framework and lists the general principles underpinning the framework.
• Chapter 2: Framework for Evaluating Communication for Development - sets out in detail the seven key components of the framework for evaluating C4D - participatory, holistic, complex, critical, emergent, realistic, and learning-based - and the principles for each of these key components. It highlights similarities and differences between the framework and four related evaluation frameworks.
• Chapter 3: New Thinking and Trends (related to how the evaluation of C4D and sustainable processes of social change are conceptualised) - provides explanations of systems thinking and complexity theory in relation to development and evaluation, as well as the "simple, complicated, and complex" typology. It reviews some critical approaches to understanding and evaluating social change, and considers the implications and value of these approaches for the evaluation of C4D.
• Chapter 4: Challenges, Issues and Strategies - introduces a number of contextual, structural, institutional, and organisational challenges to evaluating C4D. It proposes a range of strategies to address these challenges, including innovative and creative approaches to evaluation, new conceptualisations of evaluation, and shifts in evaluation practice.
• Chapter 5: Evaluation Capacity Development - explains the concepts "creative capacity development" and "evaluation capacity development" (ECD) and makes the case for the holistic, participatory, learning-oriented approach to ECD, highlighting challenges, issues, and strategies related to building evaluation capacities in development contexts and in C4D in particular.
• Chapter 6: Key Approaches, Methodologies and Methods - critically reviews various research and evaluation approaches and methodologies in terms of how effective and appropriate they are for evaluating C4D. They include: developmental evaluation, feminist approaches, and methodologies such as ethnographic action research and outcome mapping. Issues related to identifying and using indicators in C4D evaluations, challenges with using indicators, and alternatives to indicators are also considered.
• Chapter 7: Conclusion and Implementation - summarises the many complex challenges, tensions, and contradictions that affect the evaluation of C4D. Proposes strategies to help overcome these challenges, including using the framework to improve the effectiveness and sustainability of C4D. Sets out practical ideas, processes, and questions for implementing the framework.