{"title":"Diagnostics and field experiments","authors":"Maarten Voors","doi":"10.1016/j.njas.2017.10.002","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Field experiments have been embraced in development economics and political science as a core method to learn what development interventions work and why. Scientists across the globe actively engage with development practitioners to evaluate projects and programmes. However, even though field experiments have raised the bar on causality, they are often too narrowly defined and lack focus on structural development problems. Researchers and development practitioners should do more to improve the diagnostic process of the problem under study. Rodrik’s (2010) diagnostic framework provides a useful tool to improve the design and relevance of field experiments. Specifically, more should be done to seek coordination across studies, broaden the scope for interdisciplinary collaborations and seek peer review to increase validation and verification of evaluations. Only then can we increase knowledge aggregation and improve development policy making.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":49751,"journal":{"name":"Njas-Wageningen Journal of Life Sciences","volume":"84 ","pages":"Pages 80-84"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2018-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1016/j.njas.2017.10.002","citationCount":"4","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Njas-Wageningen Journal of Life Sciences","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1573521417300209","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"Agricultural and Biological Sciences","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 4
Abstract
Field experiments have been embraced in development economics and political science as a core method to learn what development interventions work and why. Scientists across the globe actively engage with development practitioners to evaluate projects and programmes. However, even though field experiments have raised the bar on causality, they are often too narrowly defined and lack focus on structural development problems. Researchers and development practitioners should do more to improve the diagnostic process of the problem under study. Rodrik’s (2010) diagnostic framework provides a useful tool to improve the design and relevance of field experiments. Specifically, more should be done to seek coordination across studies, broaden the scope for interdisciplinary collaborations and seek peer review to increase validation and verification of evaluations. Only then can we increase knowledge aggregation and improve development policy making.
期刊介绍：
The NJAS - Wageningen Journal of Life Sciences, published since 1952, is the quarterly journal of the Royal Netherlands Society for Agricultural Sciences. NJAS aspires to be the main scientific platform for interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research on complex and persistent problems in agricultural production, food and nutrition security and natural resource management. The societal and technical challenges in these domains require research integrating scientific disciplines and finding novel combinations of methodologies and conceptual frameworks. Moreover, the composite nature of these problems and challenges fits transdisciplinary research approaches embedded in constructive interactions with policy and practice and crossing the boundaries between science and society. Engaging with societal debate and creating decision space is an important task of research about the diverse impacts of novel agri-food technologies or policies. The international nature of food and nutrition security (e.g. global value chains, standardisation, trade), environmental problems (e.g. climate change or competing claims on natural resources), and risks related to agriculture (e.g. the spread of plant and animal diseases) challenges researchers to focus not only on lower levels of aggregation, but certainly to use interdisciplinary research to unravel linkages between scales or to analyse dynamics at higher levels of aggregation.
NJAS recognises that the widely acknowledged need for interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research, also increasingly expressed by policy makers and practitioners, needs a platform for creative researchers and out-of-the-box thinking in the domains of agriculture, food and environment. The journal aims to offer space for grounded, critical, and open discussions that advance the development and application of interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research methodologies in the agricultural and life sciences.
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