EvalParticipativa is the Community of Practice and Learning in Participatory Evaluation and Inclusive Approaches with global reach. It started in 2019 as a joint initiative between PETAS (Research Program on Employment, Environment and Society) at the National University of San Juan (Argentina) and the German Institute for Development Evaluation (DEval) through their development cooperation projects for capacity building in evaluation (Focelac 2019 – 2024 and EvalConnect 2025-2026). Starting in 2025, given the new guidelines of Germany’s development cooperation sector, which require a regional and thematic reorientation, DEval no longer continue as a partner of EvalParticipativa.

This community emerges from the increased interest and practice of evaluation both regionally and worldwide. In recent decades, there has been an increase in theoretical and methodological production, as well as the emergence of national evaluation policies in countries across all continents, a growing institutionalization of evaluation, and the consolidation of various initiatives aimed at professionalizing this practice.

Moreover, the Sustainable Development Goals reflect a new agenda of priorities for evaluation at the global level, which includes the prominent role of civil society in such efforts and the incorporation of diverse perspectives that highlight the inclusive dimension as a central aspect of evaluative practice. This is how concepts such as “participation,” “support,” “stakeholder perspective,” “empowerment,” and other similar phrases have therefore become frequently heard in evaluative endeavours.

However, the notion of participation of different actors and the integration of diverse perspectives takes on different connotations in various contexts. Conventional evaluation practices do not always reflect this participatory and inclusive “vocation”. Generally, the specific context of the target population is not taken into account, which hinders the incorporation of local knowledge and perspectives.

Often, programs and projects aimed at stimulating participation and incorporating diverse perspectives become a symbolic simulation, particularly when they ignore the reality of power redistribution that animating an inclusive process implies. In those cases, practices with supposedly participatory elements tend to be limited to a mere consultative instance, without offering local actors the possibility to influence decisions related to the evaluation agenda and thus enrich its products and impact.

It is true that the theoretical and instrumental deficit that characterizes such practices is neither clear nor evident, nor are the conditions and mechanisms that facilitate and obstruct effective citizen participation and the incorporation of diverse perspectives in evaluation processes. Therefore, without unveiling these issues, it will not be possible to overcome the weaknesses of most inclusive evaluation approaches.

Thus, we believe it is relevant and fitting to foster a Community of Practice and Learning on Participatory Evaluation and Inclusive Approaches with global reach that allows for creative exploration of these matters through the knowledge and analysis of concrete evaluative experiences. By doing this, we will disseminate methods and tools and maximise their influence.

As a community of practice, we emerge from the conviction of the potential of peer-to-peer work as a mechanism to deepen knowledge and experience through different interaction instances (training, meetings and tool fairs, webinars, publications, etc.). By “peers” we understand all those who in one way or another are involved in an evaluative process: evaluators, decision-makers who request an evaluation, civil society organizations that are users of programs and projects, among others.

Our aim is to create online and/or face-to-face spaces where people who are interested in evaluation with social inclusion can reflect upon and improve their practices; be supported in their efforts; and build products together (methodologies and tools) which help professionalise this type of evaluation.

Our character as a learning community is given by the dialogical framework, in which the facilitator’s role aims for each participant to contribute their knowledge by offering concepts, methodologies, and tools. We foster an open exchange environment where different perspectives and individual experiences are valued, which do not necessarily reflect the institutional positions of participating organizations.

Objectives

The community of practice and learning around Participatory Evaluation and Inclusive Approaches with global reach has as its main objective the strengthening and inclusive involvement of diverse actors in evaluative processes and thus the integration of diverse perspectives. To achieve this, we want to:

1. 1. Identify and analyze experiences of participatory and inclusive evaluation in different regions of the world and the keys that mark the facilitation of these processes.
   2. Create a virtual repository of learning materials on participatory and inclusive evaluation: validated manuals, guides, and tools.
   3. Strengthen the participatory and inclusive evaluation approach through a regional training program directed at actors from the public sector, NGOs, and civil society.

This community of practice and learning seeks to bring together all those who have experience and interest in Participatory Evaluation and Inclusive Approaches worldwide. We are interested in advancing toward achieving the mentioned objectives through horizontal and generous exchange among its members. This is an open-door community, a meeting place that vindicates the desire to share among peers to learn more and improve our practice. Sharing implies taking and leveraging everything that EvalParticipativa can offer and providing feedback with what each person can contribute from their experience.

We are convinced of the importance of horizontal and collective learning. Together we attempt to develop theoretical and practical knowledge about evaluation approaches with social inclusion, exchanging learnings based on common reflection on concrete experiences with diverse approaches and methodologies.

How we work at EvalParticipativa

We have adopted the model of a community of practice and learning. The underlying concept is that we can develop specialised knowledge by forming a group with a special interest in this issue and come together to reflect on specific professional experience and practice.  Our aim is that this space can be used to socially and collectively build knowledge on Participatory Evaluation and Inclusive Approaches, without the need for an “expert” or “trainer”. We will also host spaces for capacity building which will feature educational training moments developed as dialogue-based, horizontal learning processes which will address conceptual and methodological issues around participatory evaluation.

The methodology of this initiative is based on joint reflection around evaluations with a strong participatory and inclusive notion and the adoption of novel methodologies and tools to enhance the development of such experiences in different regions. We are interested in identifying and valuing existing initiatives, as well as promoting new practices from which it is possible to build knowledge from the regions and with global reach. We want this community of practice and learning to guarantee the inclusion of multiple actors at the global level as an initiative capable of:

• • training on these topics, knowledge exchange from experiences and documentation of good practice in order to enable the sharing of lessons learned and prompt new initiatives;
  • supporting and accompanying projects, programs or interventions that have as their methodological axis a participatory and inclusive approach in any of its variants and levels;
  • gather and disseminate theoretical and practical knowledge from experiences in different countries by providing access to the vast range of existing materials available and by generating new ones;
  • developing skills in both the public sector and civil society organizations for adopting participatory and inclusive evaluation approaches;
  • strengthen alliances between and within regions, institutions and between various organisations including academia and evaluation training programmes;
  • favoring the creation of necessary conditions for participatory and inclusive evaluation processes to become regular practice in different regions and globally; that is, sensitizing main actors, encouraging participants, demonstrating benefits and the need to institutionalize this practice.