How relationship and dialogue facilitate evidence use: Lessons from African countries
African Evaluation Journal
| Field | Value | |
| Title | How relationship and dialogue facilitate evidence use: Lessons from African countries | |
| Creator | Amisi, Matodzi M. Awal, Mohammed S. Pabari, Mine Bedu-Addo, Dede | |
| Description | Background: This article shares lessons from four case studies, documenting experiences of evidence use in different public policies in South Africa, Kenya, Ghana and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).Objectives: Most literature on evidence use in Africa focuses either on one form of evidence, that is, evaluations, systematic reviews or on the systems governments develop to support evidence use. However, the use of evidence in policy is complex and requires systems, processes, tools and information to flow between different stakeholders. In this article, we demonstrate how relationships between knowledge generators and users were built and maintained in the case studies, and how these relationships were critical for evidence use.Method: The case studies were amongst eight case studies carried out for the book entitled ‘Using Evidence in Policy and Practice: Lessons from Africa’. Ethnographic case studies drawn from both secondary and primary research, including interviews with key informants and extensive document reviews, were carried out. The research and writing process involved policymakers enabling the research to access participants’ rich observations.Results: The case studies demonstrate that initiatives to build relationships between different state agencies, between state and non-state actors and between non-state actors are critical to enable organisations to use evidence. This can be enabled by the creation of spaces for dialogue that are sensitively facilitated and ongoing for actors to be aware of evidence, understand the evidence and be motivated to use the evidence.Conclusion: Mutually beneficial and trustful relationships between individuals and institutions in different sectors are conduits through which information flows between sectors, new insights are generated and evidence used. | |
| Publisher | AOSIS | |
| Date | 2021-12-09 | |
| Identifier | 10.4102/aej.v9i1.559 | |
| Source | African Evaluation Journal; Vol 9, No 1 (2021); 9 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/559/1009
https://aejonline.org/index.php/aej/article/view/559/1010
https://aejonline.org/index.php/aej/article/view/559/1011
https://aejonline.org/index.php/aej/article/view/559/1012
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