Process Tracing is a method used to understand causal chains in single case analysis settings. It is the systematic analysis of contribution claims through explicit investigation of how pieces of evidence support or undermine a particular hypothesis or claim.
Written by our CECAN PhD Researcher, Betheney Wills, this report details the main findings from her research on the Marine Pioneer, a government pilot programme which tested key principles from the 25-Year Environment Plan.
This course covers the theory and practice of diagnostic evaluation and Bayesian Updating. It addresses its epistemological and mathematical basis, its appropriateness and strengths/weaknesses in comparison with other methods, and its application steps.
This course is an introduction to Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA). QCA is a method for the comparative study of cases and is used to analyse qualitative social data systematically.
On 22nd September 2020, Professor Robert MacKay, hosted our CECAN Webinar: Trophic Analysis of Directed Networks.
System Dynamics is a mature, model-based policy design and evaluation method which has been used to harness the power of complexity on a wide range of policy issues, both in the UK and elsewhere, over the past 60 years.
Between March and July 2020 Brian Castellani and Pete Barbrook-Johnson became part of the COVID-19 Community Health and Social Care Modelling Team at Durham University.
Process Tracing is a method used to understand causal chains in single case analysis settings. It is the systematic analysis of contribution claims through explicit investigation of how pieces of evidence support or undermine a particular hypothesis or claim.
Directed networks are used in many domains. Particularly relevant examples to evaluation and appraisal are systems maps and influence maps. Trophic analysis indicates how far up or downstream each node is and computes a quantity called trophic incoherence, but perhaps better called circularity, which indicates the extent to which the network fails to line up with each node feeding to nodes at the next level.
This course is an introduction to Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA). QCA is a method for the comparative study of cases and is used to analyse qualitative social data systematically.
At a time of system shocks, significant underlying challenges have been revealed in current approaches to delivering infrastructure, including the need for holistic assessment and that infrastructure users in many societies feel distant from nature. In this seminar, I will present methods for integrated land use planning and sustainable water management.
This 1-day course introduces participants to influence mapping, within the context of evaluation or as a general introduction.
System Dynamics is a mature, model-based policy design and evaluation method which has been used to harness the power of complexity on a wide range of policy issues, both in the UK and elsewhere, over the past 60 years.
This post is the 5th of several devoted to addressing the complex challenges of modelling the coronavirus as a public health issue. It is also about clarifying for a wider audience how and why such modelling is important, as well as the value and power of complex systems thinking and computational modelling for public health policy.
From April – June 2019, Betheney Wills, a PhD Researcher from CECAN/University of Surrey undertook a policy internship with the Marine and Fisheries Team at the Department for the Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).
The Industrial Strategy established Grand Challenges to “put the UK at the forefront of the industries of the future, ensuring that the UK takes advantage of major global changes, improving people’s lives and the country’s productivity”. These are developments in technology that are set to transform industries and societies around the world, and in which the UK has the opportunity to play a leading global role. The Future of Mobility is one of these Grand Challenges, with the aim of the UK becoming a world leader in the way people, goods and services move.
Complex systems are all around us. Their characteristics make their behaviour hard to predict and they present challenges to policy making and evaluation. CECAN was invited to produce a supplementary guide on complexity for the 2020 revision of the Magenta Book – UK Government’s central guidance on how to evaluate policies, projects and programmes.
HM Treasury has today (Wednesday 1 April 2020) updated the Magenta Book, UK Government’s central guidance on how to evaluate policies, projects and programmes.
The Centre for the Evaluation of Complexity Across the Nexus (CECAN) has produced supplementary guidance for the 2020 revision of the Magenta Book, published on 1st April.
This post is the 4th of several devoted to addressing the complex challenges of modelling the coronavirus as a public health issue. It is also about clarifying for a wider audience how and why such modelling is important, as well as the value and power of complex systems thinking and computational modelling for public health policy.
This post is the 3rd of several devoted to addressing the complex challenges of modelling the coronavirus as a public health issue. It is also about clarifying for a wider audience how and why such modelling is important, as well as the value and power of complex systems thinking and computational modelling for public health policy.
This post is the 2nd of several devoted to addressing the complex challenges of modelling the coronavirus as a public health issue. It is also about clarifying for a wider audience how and why such modelling is important, as well as the value and power of complex systems thinking and computational modelling for public health policy.
In response to these advances, the current post is meant to be the first of several addressing the complex challenges of modelling the coronavirus as a public health issue. It is also about clarifying for a wider audience how and why such modelling is important, as well as the value and power of complex systems thinking and computational modelling for public health policy. Still, this does not mean modelling will answer all of our questions; nor does it mean that all models are equally useful!
Pete Barbrook-Johnson, Alex Penn and Ben Shaw have begun a new CECAN case study working with DfT to support their work on ‘Mobility-as-a-Service’ (i.e. using data and software, such as apps, to manage and access transport services).
The Centre for the Evaluation of Complexity Across the Nexus (CECAN) has produced supplementary guidance for the 2020 revision of the Magenta Book. The Magenta Book, published by HM Treasury, is the official government guide about policy evaluation.
On 9th January 2020, Dione Hills (Tavistock Institute) and Pete Barbrook-Johnson (University of Surrey) delivered training on how to conduct evaluations in complex settings to a mixed group of practitioners and policy teams working on public health issues in London.
Alex Penn and Pete Barbrook-Johnson (CECAN Senior Research Fellows based at University of Surrey) and colleagues from Mott McDonald ran the first of three Participatory Systems Mapping workshops in the Eden river catchment in Cumbria on 15th January 2020.
Like the rest of the UK, Northern Ireland has experienced weak productivity growth since the 2008 Financial Crisis despite broader economic recovery. Consequently, boosting productivity has been a central goal of contemporary economic policy even to the extent that both UK and Northern Ireland industrial strategies have been described as productivity policies.
On 4th October 2019, CECAN held a briefing and workshop session with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) on dealing with complexity in policy evaluation.
Pete Barbrook-Johnson, a UKRI Innovation Fellow hosted by CECAN, has published the first report from his 3-year fellowship. The report reviews innovative public-private partnerships working in the UK on food-energy-water- environment ‘nexus’ domains.