Questions & Answers: What is participatory evaluation (PE) and what are its roots? Upshur, C.C.; Barreto-Cortez, E. Produced by: The Evaluation Exchange: Emerging Strategies in Child and Family Services, Harvard Family Research Program (HFRP) (1995) Short overview of 3 traditions of participatory evaluation: The participatory action research model based on the Freirian theories of education (Fals-Borda, Tandon, Hall) grew out of the contradictions of using coercive, non-participatory field research methods in the largely participation-oriented field of adult education. In this tradition, issues of building power and promoting liberation and social justice are central. The participatory action research model drawn from the action research tradition (Whyte) is based on the contradiction between management and workers in organizational decision-making. In this model, participation is aimed at increasing front-line workers' sense of empowerment, though not necessarily at changing the basic power relationships among members of the organization. Participatory evaluation (PE) notes the contradiction between an evaluation's design and findings, and the lack of usefulness or relevance the information has for primary consumers and stakeholders (Cousins and Earl, 1992). PE draws from either or both of the previous traditions for its theoretical basis, but is distinctly evaluative in its purpose and design. [Full text available at the Eldis site, via the link found on the following page: http://nt1.ids.ac.uk/eldis/hot/pm1.htm

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