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Program Evaluation's Path to Greater Policy Relevance: Learning From Rossi's Iron Laws.
- Source :
-
Evaluation review [Eval Rev] 2024 Jun; Vol. 48 (3), pp. 403-409. Date of Electronic Publication: 2024 Mar 04. - Publication Year :
- 2024
-
Abstract
- In a 1987 article, Peter R. Rossi promulgated "The Iron Law of Evaluation and Other Metallic Rules." The Metallic Laws were meant as an informal (and humorous) overstatement of the weakness of contemporary evaluations of social programs. Rossi' s underlying worry was not so much about the state of evaluation technology in the abstract, but, rather, in its inability to advance our broad understanding of social problems and what to do about them---in other words, to make evaluation policy relevant. Rossi attributed the continuing failure to develop successful "large-scale social programs" to the failure to build a strong knowledge base for this kind of "social engineering." The qualities of studies that enable such accumulated learning are variously labeled "external validity," "generalizability," "applicability," or "transferability." This Special Issue includes five papers that seek to explore and apply this understanding.<br />Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting InterestsThe author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
- Subjects :
- Program Evaluation
Engineering
Anxiety
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 1552-3926
- Volume :
- 48
- Issue :
- 3
- Database :
- MEDLINE
- Journal :
- Evaluation review
- Publication Type :
- Academic Journal
- Accession number :
- 38590012
- Full Text :
- https://doi.org/10.1177/0193841X241238031