Urgency is a word often associated with climate change. The scale and urgency of the climate crisis demands scaled-up action to prevent a range of future—and current—consequences: from extreme weather events, to poor air quality affecting the health of millions and shifting weather…

The Independent Evaluation Office of the GEF (IEO) recently organized two panel sessions at the…

Policy analysts have a new addition to their toolbox, one that recognizes the importance of deep uncertainty and the resulting need for adaptive planning approaches. The use of adaptation pathways, as this new addition is known, supports the development of adaptive policies and programmes. These…

Are we ready, will we ever be? The conversation about professionalization in evaluation has a long history, and often raises much concern and interest. Over the 25 years that I have spent working in evaluation, there have been moments when I thought "haven't we discussed enough?" but come to…

As multilateral development banks, private sources and governments gear up to fill massive infrastructure gaps in Asia, we must not miss a unique opportunity. With trillions of dollars envisaged for constructing dams, bridges and roads, all with long lifespans, this is the chance to make…

We're all knowledge brokers. As social beings we naturally pass around information, filtering it and combining it with other bits of information that we think are relevant or interesting, then communicating that to others. In this way knowledge moves from one person to another, whether it's the…

I recently had an informal meeting with the kind people of the University of Maryland's Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center, who focus on environmental decision-making under…

A few weeks ago I wrote a book review of Philip Eubanks' book titled The Troubled Rhetoric and Communication of Climate Change: The argumentative situation. A second book on my desk, edited by Lorraine Whitmarsch, Saffron O'Neill and Irene Lorenzoni, is titled Engaging…

Evidence produced from research and evaluation plays an important role in shaping how we address international development challenges. For example, conditional cash transfers are now used all over the world as an important lever in the fight against poverty, thanks in part to the rigorous (and…

There is a steady stream of reports on using innovation to address climate change,…