In projects that CIPE funds, my job is to look for impact. The major question I like to ask my colleagues is, “What are we trying to achieve?” Working in the development world, you see different projects, and when you assess them, you see which ones succeeded and which ones didn’t. This morning I read an article from by Homi Kharas and Abdul Malik of Brookings Institution, “Short Term Fixes for Development Assistance”
The authors refer to the new Global Monitoring Report of the World Bank and the IMF that states “that the world is failing well short of the global development goals set for 2015.” The report and author’s interpretation of it is that the system development assistance is failing the poor. The authors further go into details on why aid is failing in the development countries, referring to such reasons as the lack of monitoring and accountability resulting in corruption, poor planning, and execution of projects. Of particular interest is the lack of vision and achievable goals, which usually results in project failures.
Project evaluation conducted independently presents transparency; gives a clear picture of what works and what doesn’t; and actually gives a better view of how to make aid more useful. Countries that receive the aid are being blamed for poor accountability, but this is exactly where we need monitoring and evaluation. Evaluation will monitor our own performance and assess our own capabilities, and lead us to monitoring the performance of donor receivers, and how their actions result in positive outcomes for the countries that receive the aid. If evaluations were put in the beginning of designing the project activities, there would be fewer problems with how aid is being spent.
CIPE has a rich tradition of conducting evaluations to document the measurable impact and results of efforts to foster democratic and economic reforms where they are most needed throughout the world. To record the impact, it has been very important for CIPE staff to develop projects that ensure high quality evaluations. An important part of CIPE’s project design is to follow SMART objectives (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Results – oriented, and Time-limited) as well as consider such factors as addressing country conditions in each evaluation and compliance with donor requirements. CIPE’s evaluation unit continues to improve its mechanisms in order to enhance CIPE’s efforts to bring about democratic and economic reforms in a wide range of political and economic systems and diverse cultures.
Check out CIPE’s Annual Report 2007 for recent examples of CIPE impact worldwide.
Published Date: April 17, 2008