A new guide to the evidence on crime by Sense About Science will help the public understand some of the dubious promised made politicians to ‘tackle’ crime, says Alex Thompson, research and policy officer at Sense About Science....

A decade ago, writes Louise Shaxson, Research Fellow at the Overseas Development Institute’s Research and Policy in Development (RAPID) Programme, the UK’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) began to grapple with the challenge...

Let’s learn from the evidence in the devolved jurisdictions Whatever happens after the general election, we can be sure about one thing. Wellbeing and the evidence ecosystem will be at the heart of social policy making not...

The rise of “evidence-based policy” has resulted in confusion regarding its definition, writes Ron Haskins Co-Director of the Center on Children and Families at the Brookings Institution, Washington, DC. This makes it the responsibility of those...

Canada’s ‘evidence-based revolution’ may be in its infancy but it’s picking up steam, writes Katie Gibbs, Executive Director of Evidence for Democracy. Faced with a hostile federal government organisations like Evidence for Democracy are mobilising public...

Focusing on finding the best method for evidencing impact is distracting, argues Helen Wheatley, Assistant Director Research and Evaluation at Catch22. We should be focusing on using mixed methods to capture data on the rich and...

In a recent survey, politicians claimed to value the views of constituents and expert opinion over randomised controlled trials (RCTs) and other forms of evidence, writes Suzi Gage, Postdoctoral research associate at the University of Bristol....

Across the world there are increasing calls for evidence to play a greater role in government policy. In the US, Results for America are leading the rallying cry. In this blog, Michele Jolin, their CEO and...

This was the question behind a recent Wellbeing Roundtable held in Belfast. Input from a range of senior policy makers from across the UK suggested that it can, or at least, it could. Internationally, policy makers...

In this blog Howard White, co-chair of the Campbell Collaboration, shares his perspective from the international development sector that, as is often the case for those working at the local and national level, continuity is the...

This new paper from the Alliance argues that governments need to adopt an experimental ethos. What does this mean? It means systematically testing out policies on a smaller scale so that impact can be measured, successes replicated...

Building on the increased profile of evidence in policymaking, Sense About Science have launched their Evidence Matters campaign. In this blog Prateek Buch, policy director of the campaign, explains how it will celebrate good uses of...