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Evaluation Systems in the Western World

4 important questions on Evaluation Systems in the Western World

Which evaluation systems have Leeuw & Furubo inventarised in the western world?

Leeuw & Furubo have inventarised the following evaluation systems in the western world:

the system of performance monitoring;
the systems of performance audit, inspection and oversight;
the system of (quasi-)experimental evaluations and the evidence-based policy movement;
the accreditation and evaluation system;
the monitoring and evaluation system.

How did the system of performance monitoring come about?

Under the heading of New Public Management, the many different ideas and reform projects within political and administrative systems have been an important impetus to the development of performance monitoring systems.

Results-based management is a concept that is linked to performance monitoring; performance monitoring enables organizations to check to what extent the results agreed upon have been realized.

What are the underlying assumptions with performance monitoring?

The underlying assumptions with performance monitoring are:

Government and society will benefit if performance measurement systems are put in place and ‘do their job';
Once the performance data are available, politicians, parliamentarians,
managers and leaders do ‘work’ with them, use the information and
built decisions on them;
There are no (important) unintended side effects, like the ‘performance paradox’ (Van Thiel and Leeuw, 2002).

What can you tell us about the system of Quasi-Experimental evaluations and the evidence-based policy movement?

The experimentalists in evaluation have a long history (1930's USA and 1950's UK). Over the last 15 years there has again been a boom, now affiliated with the ‘evidence-based policy’ movement, the ‘what works’ tradition.
The Maryland Scientific Methods scale is an example of a study which illuminates the epistemology of the Quasi-Experimental evaluations and the evidence-based policy movement. It distinguishes between five types of evaluation designs, with correlation at the bottom and the experimental method (randomized control trial) at the top.

The question on the page originate from the summary of the following study material:

Evaluation Systems What Are They and Why Study Them?

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