Technocratic Calculation: Economy, Evidence and Experiments

2020 ◽  
pp. 173-202
Author(s):  
Anders Esmark
Keyword(s):  
Performance Management ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Evaluation Systems ◽  
Eu Governance ◽  
What Works ◽  
Evidence Based Policy ◽  
Experimental Learning ◽  
Consistent Feature ◽  
Scientific Politics

The chapter takes up the technocratic preoccupation with quantification, measurement and scientific politics. While this is a consistent feature of technocratic governance, the proliferation of performance management, accountability and evaluation systems, evidence-based policy and experimental learning also reflect a new commitment to radical incrementalism and a ‘what works’ approach, which is significantly different from earlier and industrial technocracy. The chapter illustrates the implications of this development in the cases of experimental EU governance and nudging interventions.

The search for impact in British probation: from programmes to skills and implementation

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Raynor
Keyword(s):  
Evidence Based ◽  
Quantitative Methodology ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
Qualitative And Quantitative ◽  
What Works ◽  
Evidence Based Policy ◽  
History Of ◽  
Evaluative Research ◽  
The Impact

Social scientists have often had difficulty evaluating the impact of probation services, partly because expectations and political circumstances change and partly because appropriate methodologies have been slow to develop. This chapter outlines the history of evaluative research on probation. It describes the limitations of early probation research which led to erroneous conclusions that ‘nothing works’, and goes on to show how more recent research has been based on a fuller understanding of practitioner inputs through research on programmes, skills and implementation. This is starting to lead to a better understanding of which practices are effective (‘What Works’). The chapter advocates a mixed qualitative and quantitative methodology for evaluative research which combines understanding, measurement and comparison. Finally, it points to some risks to evidence-based policy which arise from current populism and post-truth politics.

scholarly journals A What Works Centre for Probation: Challenges and possibilities

2021 ◽  
pp. 026455052110250
Author(s):  
Michael Sanders ◽  
Louise Jones ◽  
Eleanor Briggs
Keyword(s):  
Prior Experience ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Starting Position ◽  
What Works ◽  
Evidence Based Policy ◽  
Challenges And Opportunities ◽  
Methodological Approaches ◽  
Uk Government ◽  
The Uk

The What Works Movement in the UK Government has seen the establishment of 12 centres to focus on evidence-based policy in different domains. In this paper, we present the challenges and opportunities posed by a What Works Centre (WWC) for Probation, based on our prior experience of establishing WWCs in other areas. Although there are legitimate and substantial challenges to some of the methodological approaches of ‘What Works’, we conclude that Probation is in an unusually strong starting position for such a centre to thrive.

A new epistemology of evidence-based policy

2020 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 241-258
Author(s):  
Philip Sayer
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Policy Decision ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
New Approach ◽  
Socially Constructed ◽  
Process Reliabilism ◽  
What Works ◽  
Evidence Based Policy ◽  
Short Period ◽  
Policy Decision Making

In a remarkably short period, ‘evidence-based policy’ (EBP), and the associated discourses of ‘what works’, have risen to prominence as a set of organising principles for public policy decision-making. Critics of EBP frequently point to its implicit positivist assumptions by highlighting the socially constructed nature of evidence. However, the effectiveness of this critique is limited by the imprecise and often pejorative use of the term ‘positivism’. This article therefore seeks to offer a more precise account of the underlying assumptions of EBP. To do so, it draws on an epistemological position known as process reliabilism, which analyses the justification of a belief by assessing whether it has been reached by means of an epistemically reliable decision-making process or processes. Through this framework, the article advocates a new approach to EBP which is framed around the principle of avoiding error, rather than that of seeking truth.

scholarly journals Early Intervention and Evidence-Based Policy and Practice: Framing and taming

2015 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosalind Edwards ◽  
Val Gillies ◽  
Nicola Horsley
Keyword(s):  
Early Intervention ◽  
The State ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Policy And Practice ◽  
What Works ◽  
Evidence Based Policy ◽  
Intervention Policy ◽  
The Way

In this article, we highlight some critical matters in the way that an issue is framed as a problem in policymaking and the consequent means of taming that problem, in focussing on the use and implications of neuroscientific discourse of brain claims in early intervention policy and practice. We draw on three sets of analyses: of the contradictory set of motifs framing the state of ‘evidence’ of what works in intervention in the early years; of the (mis)use of neuroscientific discourse to frame deficient parenting as causing inequalities and support particular policy directions; and of the way that early years practitioners adopt brain claims to tame the problem of deficient parenting. We argue that using expedient brain claims as a framing and taming justification is entrenching gendered and classed understandings and inequalities.

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