Editorial Foreword - revisiting ‘values’ in evaluation in times of crisis

Abstract

While writing the Editorial foreword for our December special issue on ‘values’, I discovered a feature article by Ernest House in 1996, published in this journal, on this very topic. While my December foreword referenced a later work by House on values published in the American Journal of Evaluation (House, 2001), I could not resist digging up this earlier piece from the EJA archives, written five years prior, to round out this second and final special issue on ‘values’ in evaluation. In the 1996 feature entitled ‘The Problem of Values in Evaluation’, House grapples with the practitioner’s task of making evaluative judgements to determine the oft-cited ‘merit, worth, or value of something’ (see Scriven, 1980, 1991). “How does one arrive at evaluative judgements legitimately, noting that the evaluator’s task is not an easy one . . . ? ” he asks, acknowledging that “many evaluative judgements are contestable by their nature” (p6). While there are professional techniques which help with collecting, interpreting, and weighing evidence, there are other relative judgements. House suggests that distinguishing the major audiences and stakeholders for an evaluation also helps with deciding evaluative criteria to employ (House, 1996, p8). In doing so, the evaluator must also consider conflicting interests. He acknowledges that evaluation does not eliminate conflict, rather, the evaluator produces the best judgement to be arrived at in the situation, given conflicts (House, 1996, p12). Other theorists – intentionally or otherwise – have adopted, explored and challenged aspects of this thinking. Nonetheless, issues that House raises remain crucial considerations in evaluation practice: determining the criteria for making evaluative judgements, distinguishing the values and preferences of audiences and stakeholders, and managing conflicting values. More than two decades on, what might newer ‘values’-thinking add to what is already known? How might contemporary debates and movements in the evaluation field (too numerous to capture here) benefit or redouble? On these matters, there is more work to be done. If – as a number of authors in this June issue of the EJA suggest – we are to be more explicit about values in evaluation, what does this look like? To cherry-pick a few examples within this issue: Blaser Mapitsa et al’s study, drawing on examples from parliaments in Southern and Eastern Africa, suggests that values both influence the 932697 EVJ0010.1177/1035719X20932697Evaluation Journal of AustralasiaEditorial editorial2020