Evaluating Social Policies: Principles and U.S. Experience

Invariably, studies, proposals, and plans for social programs contain a strong recommendation for evaluation and monitoring. Reliable information about what works and why is clearly vital for improving existing programs or designing future ones. Making such assessments requires effective methods of evaluation. Policymakers who use these evaluations require effective methods of evaluation. Policymakers who use these evaluations need to know about the methods--the pitfalls to watch for and the relative advantages and disadvantages of different techniques in different situations. This article describes these evaluation methods and the experience accumulated in the United States in applying them in practice. Copyright 1994 by Oxford University Press.