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‘ Aiding the Peace’ - multi-donor evaluation of support to conflict prevention and peacebuilding in Southern Sudan 2005-2010. Background on the evaluation:
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‘Aiding the Peace’ - multi-donor evaluation of support to conflict prevention and peacebuilding in Southern Sudan 2005-2010 • Background on the evaluation: • Evaluation commissioned in 2009 by 9 donors, 6 multilateral agencies and the Government of Southern Sudan (Ministry of Finance & Economic Planning – GoSS/MoFEP) • Evaluation conducted from November 2009 – July 2010 by a team of independent international, regional and Sudanese evaluators • Evaluation results needed to be useful for future policymaking and programming following the outcome of the Referendum on Independence in January 2010 • Draft report ready by October 2010 with final report issued in December 2010
Governance structure • Governance structure: • Needs to be conform with ‘good practices’ for joint evaluation • Should allow appropriate involvement, cooperation and ownership of the stakeholders • Should safeguard the independence, credibility and quality of the evaluation • Should allow an efficient and effective evaluation process • Management model: • Evaluation Steering Committee (ESC = commissioning agencies) • Evaluation Management Group (3 members appointed by ESC) • Reference Group Southern Sudan (constituted and chaired by GoSS/MoFEP with field-level donors, government & non-government stakeholders as members)
Management model • Functions of Evaluation Steering Committee (ESC): Approves: - Management Group’s membership - ToR and budget for the evaluation Reviews: - draft reports of the evaluation as to quality, credibility and clarity (and adopts when these aspects are satisfied) - NB. evaluation team responsible for report content! • Functions of Evaluation Management Group (EMG): • Develops ToR and budget for the evaluation and criteria for selection of independent evaluation team (consultants) • Selects evaluation team (international competitive bidding) • Oversees and guides the work of the evaluation team (control of quality, credibility and clarity) • Facilitates evaluation team where needed (through Chair of EMG)
Management model (continued) • Functions of Reference Group in Southern Sudan: • Serves as a resource for and provides feedback to evaluation team • Facilitates access of evaluation team to documents and personnel • Assists in the organisation of kick-off and feedback workshops during the evaluation’s fieldwork • Would be engaged in evaluation findings workshop once report was published
What worked well • Responsibilities and tasks of ESC and EMG generally well understood by members and adhered to in practice • Good relationship between ESC and EMG with sufficient devolvement of responsibilities to EMG (No micro-management by ESC) • No (political) interference by ESC or EMG with independence of evaluation team • Interaction between EMG and evaluation team intense but fruitful in guiding and supporting the work of the team • Contributing factors: i) ESC & EMG stable composition; ii) ample preparation time for ToR; iii) transparent & frequent communication between EMG-evaluation team and EMG-ESC; iv) clear decision-making; v) useful collaboration between evaluation & policy departments
Challenges: What did not work so well • Token (no active) engagement of a number of ESC members in the evaluation with one member withdrawing on unsubstantiated grounds • Expectations of function to be played by Reference Group in Southern Sudan not fulfilled • Lack of interest & participation of GoSS institutions in Reference Group (due to lack of interest in the evaluation, and/or preoccupation with more important issues – prior to Referendum?) • Engagement between EMG and evaluation team: no ‘micro management’, but in reality much more intense than expected • Evaluation plan resulted in limited time available for desk and especially field investigations • Producing an evaluation of sufficient quality in time proved difficult
How were challenges overcome? • Not all challenges could be overcome by remedial action • Reference Group Southern Sudan: EMG and evaluation team stepped-up engagement with Chair of Reference Group. Did not work due to lack of power of Chair to engage other government institutions • Engagement of ESC-members: EMG Chair tried to realise more active participation. Did not work. Issues: ESC members providing timely inputs incl. comments. What is a ‘silent partner’ in a joint evaluation? • Relation between EMG and evaluation team: Differences in expectations concerning evidence-based evaluation resolved by more intensive interactions leading to high transaction costs on both sides • Limited time available for desk and field investigations: was treated as unavoidable, but resulted on pressure on evaluation team and required flexibility in planning the field work making use of a brief window of opportunity (4 weeks prior to elections in March 2010)
