Call for Papers - Performance, Evaluation, and Accountability amidst Networks, Transitions, and other Complexities

Performance assessment, evaluation, and accountability are core elements of a good functioning system of governance and policy. Policy evaluations allow policy makers to learn what is working and what not. Performance management helps to improve the output and impact of public organisations and public services. And accountability is a crucial element of a well-functioning democratic system and the expenditure of public means.

However, many issues of our time stretch the limits of the established practices and methods for performance assessment, evaluation, and accountability. This is a reality for any governance setting anywhere in the world, but given the political economy issues layered on top of technical performance aspects and lack of institutional maturity below it, the challenge of performance, evaluation, and accountability is even more critical in societies suffering from poverty and inequality.

Therefore, in order to maintain the important functions of performance assessment, evaluation, and accountability, it is necessary to develop more appropriate practices. In that way, the practice of ‘measurement’ can be realigned with the emerging practice of governance. It is necessary to further explore new and emerging principles for evaluation, accountability, and the measurement of performance. Such new principles should be appropriate in two fields; they should fit the underlying principles and values for measurement, evaluation, and accountability; while they also should fit the context of complexity in which many policy issues evolve. This has to be a dual fit.

In this conference we look for new methods that suit the context of complex policy issues, but not all issues are complex. There are many policy issues for which the current practices of measurement, evaluation, and accountability apply perfectly. We argue for a more focused approach, where a particular type of issue is matched by the appropriate type of method for measurement, evaluation, and accountability. In that sense, we are looking for an extension of the current repertoire for measurement, evaluation, and accountability. So that there is a richer choice available for policy makers to find the appropriate method and process to assess the performance of their policy or their governance.

The conference is organized in a workshop format that allows for a powerful, action-orientated debate around several key themes (performance, evaluation, and accountability) in order to develop concrete answers to the current issues in designing and implementing context-specific practices in the face of complexity. 

Call for Papers - Performance, Evaluation, and Accountability amidst Networks, Transitions, and other Complexities

This workshop-style conference explores new ways and means for accountability, evaluation and performance measurement amidst a context of networks, transitions and other complexities. We invite papers that explore these new ways and means, and especially welcome papers that combine conceptual work with empirical studies.

The conference will be held at The University of Stellenbosch, in Stellenbosch SA, from 15-17 April 2020.

Deadline for Abstracts is 28 February 2020.

R 3900.00 per participant for the 3 day conference.

For more info, contact either Werner Burger, wernerb@sun.ac.za
Or: prof. dr. Martijn van der Steen, vandersteen@essb.eur.nl