Evaluation emerged as a distinct area of professional practice in the post-war years in North America. Three strands that were most important in that early period were the evaluation of educational innovations (e.g., the effectiveness of new curricula in schools); linking evaluation with resource allocation (e.g., through a Planning, Programming and Budgeting system); and the evaluation of anti-poverty programmes (e.g., the Great Society experiments of the 1960s). These different strands already defined some of the main evaluation traditions that continue to this day and included quantitative and experimental studies using control groups as the basis for educational testing experiments; cost benefit and economic appraisal methods; and participatory and qualitative indicator methods involving the intended beneficiaries of programmes in the evaluation process.
Underpinning these different traditions are four main groups whose interests sometimes compete with each other in defining evaluation priorities. These include:
- policy makers, e.g., elected officials and politicians;
- professional and specialist interests, eg. teachers in education or scientists in research;
- managers and administrators, e.g., civil servants and managers of local public agencies;
- citizens and those affected by public action, e.g., the presumed beneficiaries of planned interventions.
Each of these groups makes assumptions about how evaluation can help them. For example, policy makers tend to see evaluation as a tool to ensure the accountability and justification for policy decisions; citizens are more likely to regard evaluation as a tool for democratic accountability and an opportunity to shape public interventions to their needs; managers and administrators are often concerned with the delivery of policies and programmes how well they are managed and organised; while professionals often regard evaluation as an opportunity to improve the quality of their work or even the autonomy of their own professional group.
This does not mean that evaluation - in the broadest sense the application of systematic social and economic research - was entirely absent from Europe or other parts of the world. However, it was probably strongest in Northern Europe and in those parts of Europe, in particular, that had close links with the United States and Canada. From the 1970s onwards evaluation began to take root in different European countries but often with distinctive traditions and emphases. In Scandinavia for example, where there is a strong commitment to democratic governance, evaluation followed in that tradition. In France evaluation has, until recently, mirrored the characteristics of the French state with a formal structured approach at a central government level and a more diverse and dynamic practice at regional and local levels. However, evaluation has not been static in any of these countries. For example, French evaluation practice evolved considerably with the requirements of budgetary reform after 2000. In many countries the focus and scale of evaluative activity has reflected the changing policies of the different governments. For example, in the UK evaluation expanded considerably with the change of government in 1997.
European Structural Funds have been a major driver for spreading or ongoing the practice of evaluation throughout the EU. At every stage of the programming cycle (ex-ante, mid-term or ongoing, ex-post), there are clearly stated aims and responsibilities. It is commonly acknowledged that the introduction of evaluation into many countries in Southern Europe occurred as a result of the requirements of Structural Fund regulations. From modest beginnings in 1988, there is now an elaborated Structural Fund evaluation approach
This approach includes:
- a legal obligation for programme sponsors and managers to evaluate;
- shared responsibility between different tiers of government for the overall evaluation process;
- a linked multi-stage evaluation process (ex-ante, mid-term or ongoing, ex-post);
- the involvement of many partners in programmes and in their evaluation;
- clear links between evaluation on the one hand and programming and resource allocation on the other.
Over recent years there has been an evolution in Structural Fund regulations concerning evaluation (see Box The Evolution of Structural Fund Regulations ).
Some of the main transitions have been:
- from externally imposed evaluation obligations to internally driven demand for evaluation coming from programme managers and policy makers themselves;
- from evaluation that is bolted on to programmes at the end of a programme cycle to evaluation that is fully integrated into programmes from the beginning;
- from the expectation that evaluation results need to be disseminated largely for accountability purposes to a concern for the systematic use of evaluation throughout the implementation of a programme;
- from a view that the management of evaluation was essentially a matter of contract administration to an interest in the way evaluation can contribute to knowledge management.
These changes have been accompanied by shifts in responsibility between the different actors at European, national and regional levels and with the extension of the partnership principe. The range of potential stakeholders in evaluation has therefore expanded to include, for example, local authorities, social partners and civil society groups.
The reform of the Structural Funds Regulations (see Annex B) for the third generation of programmes (2000-2006) whilst devolving many obligations for evaluation to responsible authorities in Member States, required that these evaluations were used both at the ex-ante stage and again at the mid-term. The updates of the mid term evaluations were sometimes termed final evaluations. This combination of devolved responsibilities with external scrutiny by higher tiers of government is also typical of national evaluations of socio-economic development.
Based on the experience of the 2000-2006 period, the major innovations of the 2007-2013 evaluation provisions are the introduction of the principle of proportionality and the encouragement by the Commission of an approach to ongoing evaluations based on the needs of Member States and regions. These provisions re-inforce the trend towards evaluation as a management tool to improve the design and the implementation of programmes in the overall context of accountability and a strong focus on delivering results.
In recent years there has also been a strong move towards public management reform and the introduction of performance management concepts in many European countries as well as in the European Commission itself (see Sound and Efficient Management - SEM 2000; and Spending more Wisely Implementation of the Commissions Evaluation Policy ).