Evidence-based advocacy fails when the political configuration is unready for it

Evidence

The theory says: produce the evidence, get it into the hands of policymakers, and the policy will follow. The theory is not wrong. Sweden followed this logic, more or less, in the late 1970s. So did Germany, New Zealand, South Korea. But the theory breaks down when the political configuration is not ready — when the advocates who are hearing the evidence are not the ones with power, or when the ones with power are not inclined to hear it. … Durrant’s work documents this limitation without resolving it. She has produced the evidence. She has built the program. She has trained the trainers. She has filed the submissions. The law has not changed. This is a fact about Canada, not a failure of Durrant. But it is also a corrective to the optimism that sometimes characterizes the evidence-based advocacy community — the belief that evidence, sufficiently clear and sufficiently well communicated, will eventually move any political system. Some political systems are not yet ready to move. Some never will be, on this particular question, in the researcher’s working lifetime. The evidence waits. The work continues. The law catches up when it catches up. — , The Rod and the Child, 9030

Categorization

• XREF: Challenges the naive ‘truth will prevail’ model of policy influence; parallels the earlier lesson that prohibition was driven by political will, not by evidence that arrived after the law. — connects to: Defending the idealized version of a practice cannot guide real-world policy — , The Rod and the Child: A Global History…, 6473; Ill-founded reasoning chains let the Right alter education policy before gaining office; UN child-violence recommendations failed mainly from political will rather than knowledge gaps — , The Rod and the Child: A Global History…, 10970 (+13 more)

Related

• Convincing arguments fail when reform lacks power behind it (similarity 0.82)
• UN child-violence recommendations failed mainly from political will rather than knowledge gaps (similarity 0.81)

Broader Connections

• UN child-violence recommendations failed mainly from political will rather than knowledge gaps #exemplifies (0.85) — , The Rod and the Child, 10970
• Contradictory research findings enabled both sides to weaponize evidence selectively #complicates (0.55) — , The Rod and the Child, 9551
• Ill-founded reasoning chains let the Right alter education policy before gaining office #exemplifies (0.50)
• Framing a repeal referendum mischaracterized the law’s actual effect #exemplifies (0.45) — , The Rod and the Child, 11394
• Treaty ratification lets advocates frame reform as consistency rather than novelty #exemplifies (0.40) — , The Rod and the Child, 9059