The emergence of government evaluation systems in Africa: The case of Benin, Uganda and South Africa

African Evaluation Journal

 
 
Field Value
 
Title The emergence of government evaluation systems in Africa: The case of Benin, Uganda and South Africa
 
Creator Goldman, Ian Byamugisha, Albert Gounou, Abdoulaye Smith, Laila R. Ntakumba, Stanley Lubanga, Timothy Sossou, Damase Rot-Munstermann, Karen
 
Subject Evaluation; Evaluation; Uganda; Benin; South Africa
Description Background: Evaluation is not widespread in Africa, particularly evaluations instigated by governments rather than donors. However since 2007 an important policy experiment is emerging in South Africa, Benin and Uganda, which have all implemented national evaluation systems. These three countries, along with the Centre for Learning on Evaluation and Results (CLEAR) Anglophone Africa and the African Development Bank, are partners in a pioneering African partnership called Twende Mbele, funded by the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development (DFID) and Hewlett Foundation, aiming to jointly strengthen monitoring and evaluation (ME) systems and work with other countries to develop ME capacity and share experiences.Objectives: This article documents the experience of these three countries and summarises the progress made in deepening and widening their national evaluation systems and some of the cross-cutting lessons emerging at an early stage of the Twende Mbele partnership.Method: The article draws from reports from each of the countries, as well as work undertaken for the evaluation of the South African national evaluation system.Results and conclusions: Initial lessons include the importance of a central unit to drive the evaluation system, developing a national evaluation policy, prioritising evaluations through an evaluation agenda or plan and taking evaluation to subnational levels. The countries are exploring the role of non-state actors, and there are increasing moves to involve Parliament. Key challenges include difficulty of getting a learning approach in government, capacity issues and ensuring follow-up. These lessons are being used to support other countries seeking to establish national evaluation systems, such as Ghana, Kenya and Niger.
 
Publisher AOSIS
 
Contributor DFID Hewlett Foundation
Date 2018-03-29
 
Type info:eu-repo/semantics/article info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion — Participant observation
Format text/html application/epub+zip application/xml application/pdf
Identifier 10.4102/aej.v6i1.253
 
Source African Evaluation Journal; Vol 6, No 1 (2018); 11 pages 2306-5133 2310-4988
 
Language eng
 
Relation
The following web links (URLs) may trigger a file download or direct you to an alternative webpage to gain access to a publication file format of the published article:

https://aejonline.org/index.php/aej/article/view/253/425 https://aejonline.org/index.php/aej/article/view/253/424 https://aejonline.org/index.php/aej/article/view/253/426 https://aejonline.org/index.php/aej/article/view/253/419
 
Coverage Uganda; Benin; South Africa 2008+ —
Rights Copyright (c) 2018 Ian Goldman, Albert Byamugisha, Abdoulaye Gounou, Laila R. Smith, Stanley Ntakumba, Timothy Lubanga, Damase Sossou, Karen Rot-Munstermann https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
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