A Glimpse into Equity in Evaluation Practice: GENSA Turns One
By Shreya Agarwal
The Gender and Equity Network South Asia (GENSA) is a special interest group of the Community of Evaluators — South Asia (COE-SA). GENSA provides aspiring researchers, knowledge seekers, and others a platform to learn from and collaborate with experts and professionals from South Asian countries in the field of gender equity and inclusion. The one-year anniversary of the network’s launch was July 2021. I attended its webinar “Surfacing Inequity and Being the Change: Gender and Power in Evaluation Practice and Impact,” held on July 29, 2021 as a commemoration of the organisation turning one. This blog post discusses what I, an emerging scholar, learnt from that webinar.
The evaluation of an intervention, whether that be a programme, practice, or initiative, is an important process involving a systematic method of study to determine the intervention’s effectiveness in achieving its stated goal. It also provides a way to demonstrate the impact of the intervention to funders and stakeholders. Additionally, the process of evaluation can suggest improvements of an ongoing effort, garner financial and other aid for the continuation of the programme, and help determine whether an approach is replicable for others with similar needs (Rural Health Information Hub, n.d.).
Feminist approaches to evaluation aim to improve the processes of policy making and increase inclusion by addressing gender and social inequalities (Nandi & Nanda, 2017). Feminist evaluation is a way of thinking about evaluation, rather than a defined framework of evaluation. It is often described as “fluid, dynamic, and evolving” (Seigart & Brisolara, 2002). It emphasises participatory, empowering, and social justice agendas, and has its roots in feminist research. The central focus of feminist evaluation is on gender inequalities that lead to social injustice and discrimination. The goal is to overcome the systemic and structural inequalities in society through policymaking, research, and evaluation.
Feminist evaluators Sharon Brisolara, Denise Seigart, and Saumitra SenGupta have spoken in detail about their role as evaluators in Feminist Evaluation and Research: Theory and Practice, which the three edited. As programme evaluators, they say in the editors’ preface, they are bound to operate in the liminal space between research and evaluation, given the nature of their work and the complexity of the field of feminist evaluation (Brisolara et al., 2014, p. vii). Evaluation can become a political activity owing to the politicised nature of the contexts in which it operates. The personal experiences, perspectives, and biases of evaluators influence their evaluations, thus bringing a political stance into their work. It is thus important to make the process of evaluation as inclusive and diverse as possible. This is where organisations like GENSA come into the picture — they nurture the interests of aspiring researchers and evaluators from the Global South and allow for context-specific learning and networking. Giving a platform to evaluators from the Global South to infuse their own evaluations, whilst maintaining a self-awareness of their biases, is a way to redress the imbalance caused by biases inherent in evaluations carried out by researchers from the Global North.
The guest speaker for the event was Katherine Hay, Deputy Director of Gender Equality at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Hay has been working in the field of gender equity and inclusion for over two decades. In her presentation, she spoke about the growing inequity across the world despite there being economic growth in developing countries. She spoke in depth about evaluators being “disruptors” of the norm and challenging preexisting systems that perpetuate patriarchal values, even in research. She emphasised the difference between being an involved, aware evaluator as opposed to being detached from the process. An outsider evaluator may lack the ability to correctly contextualise the findings of an evaluation, as they do not experience the realities in the same way as the impacted community. This may compromise the quality, effectiveness, and efficiency of the evaluation. Hay emphasised that detached evaluation is an illusion — one that does not challenge the system, takes an outsider approach to evaluation, and propagates biases that may lead to incorrect or inappropriate evaluations. The fundamental purpose of evaluation is attributing value to a piece of work. Thus, part of the evaluator’s role is to ask, “What are my values that can bias my judgement?” and “What is it that I am valuing?” The evaluator must be aware of their own values and acknowledge that these might influence their judgement. This ensures that the evaluation is more critical and nuanced. Thus, one way to go about making evaluations more “disruptive” would be to utilise the feminist approach of evalutaion — an approach that is highly contextual, inclusive, politically charged, and diverse.
The biggest takeaway for me from this session was that it is important to recognise, acknowledge, and appreciate where one comes from. Our social, cultural, and political environments play a huge role in how we approach critical evaluation and research and it is important to inculcate these values into our work rather than detach from them. As Hay elucidated, the rigor in evaluation does not come from high-level analyses or the use of tools, rather it comes from the acknowledgement of one’s own biases. Equitable research or equity that is in general an afterthought in evaluation practice, should be at the forefront of any kind of analysis. Not only will this inform better evaluation and research practices, but will also help the impacted communities improve their environmental, political, and social contexts.
It was also a great experience to hear from the people who make up GENSA. They were primarily individuals from South Asia — India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Nepal — who utilise the network to collaboratively work towards gender inclusion and equity in the region. This approach to research and inclusion — by involving and empowering local scholars to design, plan, and implement strategies of inclusion — mirrors the values and mission of Includovate, a feminist research incubator for inclusive innovation in the Global South, where I am currently working as a research intern. It is thus exciting to see other organisations creating their own pathways towards inclusion by involving passionate and curious individuals. I am looking forward to seeing how GENSA grows as an organisation and creates impactful work.
References
Andrews, N., Greenfield, S., Drever, W., & Redwood, S. (2019). Intersectionality in the Liminal Space: Researching Caribbean Women’s Health in the UK Context. Frontiers in Sociology, 4, Article 82. https://doi.org/10.3389/fsoc.2019.00082
Brisolara, S., Seigart, D., & SenGupta, S. (Eds.). (2014). Feminist Evaluation and Research: Theory and Practice. The Guilford Press.
Nandi, Rajib, & Nanda, Rituu B. (2017). Integrating Feminist Approaches to Evaluation — Lessons Learned from an Indian Experience. In R.D. van den Berg, I. Naidoo, & S.D. Tamondong (Eds.), Evaluation for Agenda 2030: Providing Evidence on Progress and Sustainability (pp. 187–204). IDEAS. https://ideas-global.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Chapter-12.pdf
Rural Health Information Hub. (n.d.). Importance of Evaluation. Retrieved July 29, 2021, from https://www.ruralhealthinfo.org/toolkits/rural-toolkit/4/evaluation-importance
Seigart, D., & Brisolara, S. (2002). Editors’ notes. New Directions for Evaluation, Issue 96 (Winter 2002), 1–2. https://doi.org/10.1002/ev.61
About the author
Shreya graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and Economics from FLAME University in India. Her undergraduate experience, specifically studying Econometrics, got her interested in research in the field of social sciences. As a certified mental health counsellor and an advocate for gender equality, she hopes to bring about a change through action-oriented, evidence-based research.
Includovate is a feminist research incubator that “walks the talk”. Includovate is an Australian social enterprise consisting of a consulting firm and research incubator that designs solutions for gender equality and social inclusion. Its mission is to incubate transformative and inclusive solutions for measuring, studying, and changing discriminatory norms that lead to poverty, inequality, and injustice. To know more about us at Includovate, follow our social media: @includovate, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram.
