Independence: When, why and how it matters for evaluation credibility

The purpose of the note is to clarify when independence is required to ensure evaluation credibility. The key message is that independence is needed to ensure credibility if those that commission or conduct the evaluation are perceived to have a stake in specific evaluation findings or recommendations, and if the evaluation is to be used by a different stakeholder group for accountability purposes.

If independence is required, we argue that both commissioners and evaluators need to be independent. This is because perceived bias may arise both during the decision phase of what and when to evaluate, and when the evaluation is carried out.

The reflection note will focus on the role of credibility and independence, and will not, or only to a limited extent, address other key issues that are important for evaluation quality, such as ethics, usefulness, the evaluation process and so forth.