Bridging research, policy, and practice in African agriculture: progress and problems in confronting hunger and poverty
Policy research on African agriculture is long on prescriptions for what needs to be done to spur agricultural growth but short on how such prescriptions might be implemented in practice. What explains this state of affairs? What might be done to correct it, and, most important, how? This paper addr...
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| Format: | Artículo preliminar |
| Language: | Inglés |
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International Food Policy Research Institute
2004
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| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/10568/155709 |
| _version_ | 1855543202982920192 |
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| author | Omamo, Steven Were |
| author_browse | Omamo, Steven Were |
| author_facet | Omamo, Steven Were |
| author_sort | Omamo, Steven Were |
| collection | Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (CGSpace) |
| description | Policy research on African agriculture is long on prescriptions for what needs to be done to spur agricultural growth but short on how such prescriptions might be implemented in practice. What explains this state of affairs? What might be done to correct it, and, most important, how? This paper addresses these questions via a comprehensive review and assessment of the literature on the role and impact of research in policy processes. Six major schools of thought are identified: the rational model; pragmatism under bounded rationality; innovation diffusion; knowledge management; impact assessment; and evidence-based-practice. The rational model -- with its underlying metaphor of a 'policy cycle' comprising problem definition and agenda setting, formal decision making, policy implementation, evaluation, and then back to problem definition and agenda setting, and so on -- has been criticized as too simplistic and unrealistic. Yet it remains the dominant framework guiding attempts to bridge gaps between researchers and policy makers. Each of the other five schools relaxes certain assumptions embedded within the rational model -- e.g., wholly rational policy makers, procedural certainty, well-defined research questions, well-defined user groups, welldefined channels of communication. In so doing, they achieve greater realism but at the cost of clarity and tractability. A unified portable framework representing all policy processes and capturing all possible choices and tradeoffs faced in bridging research, policy, and practice does not currently exist and is unlikely ever to emerge. Its absence is a logical outcome of the context-specificity and social embeddedness of knowledge. A fundamental shift in focus from a 'researcher-as-disseminator' paradigm to a 'practitioner-as-learner' paradigm is suggested by the literature, featuring contingent approaches that recognize and respond to context-specificity and social embeddedness. At bottom, the issue is how to promote 'evidence-readiness' among inherently conservative and pragmatic policy makers and practitioners and 'user-readiness' among inherently abstraction-oriented researchers. |
| format | Artículo preliminar |
| id | CGSpace155709 |
| institution | CGIAR Consortium |
| language | Inglés |
| publishDate | 2004 |
| publishDateRange | 2004 |
| publishDateSort | 2004 |
| publisher | International Food Policy Research Institute |
| publisherStr | International Food Policy Research Institute |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | CGSpace1557092025-11-06T07:26:00Z Bridging research, policy, and practice in African agriculture: progress and problems in confronting hunger and poverty Omamo, Steven Were policy analysis agriculture agricultural growth research methodology knowledge management evaluation agricultural development information flow decision making scientists agricultural extension Policy research on African agriculture is long on prescriptions for what needs to be done to spur agricultural growth but short on how such prescriptions might be implemented in practice. What explains this state of affairs? What might be done to correct it, and, most important, how? This paper addresses these questions via a comprehensive review and assessment of the literature on the role and impact of research in policy processes. Six major schools of thought are identified: the rational model; pragmatism under bounded rationality; innovation diffusion; knowledge management; impact assessment; and evidence-based-practice. The rational model -- with its underlying metaphor of a 'policy cycle' comprising problem definition and agenda setting, formal decision making, policy implementation, evaluation, and then back to problem definition and agenda setting, and so on -- has been criticized as too simplistic and unrealistic. Yet it remains the dominant framework guiding attempts to bridge gaps between researchers and policy makers. Each of the other five schools relaxes certain assumptions embedded within the rational model -- e.g., wholly rational policy makers, procedural certainty, well-defined research questions, well-defined user groups, welldefined channels of communication. In so doing, they achieve greater realism but at the cost of clarity and tractability. A unified portable framework representing all policy processes and capturing all possible choices and tradeoffs faced in bridging research, policy, and practice does not currently exist and is unlikely ever to emerge. Its absence is a logical outcome of the context-specificity and social embeddedness of knowledge. A fundamental shift in focus from a 'researcher-as-disseminator' paradigm to a 'practitioner-as-learner' paradigm is suggested by the literature, featuring contingent approaches that recognize and respond to context-specificity and social embeddedness. At bottom, the issue is how to promote 'evidence-readiness' among inherently conservative and pragmatic policy makers and practitioners and 'user-readiness' among inherently abstraction-oriented researchers. 2004 2024-10-24T12:42:27Z 2024-10-24T12:42:27Z Working Paper https://hdl.handle.net/10568/155709 en Open Access application/pdf International Food Policy Research Institute Omamo, Steven Were. 2004. Bridging research, policy, and practice in African agriculture: progress and problems in confronting hunger and poverty. DSGD Discussion Paper 10. https://hdl.handle.net/10568/155709 |
| spellingShingle | policy analysis agriculture agricultural growth research methodology knowledge management evaluation agricultural development information flow decision making scientists agricultural extension Omamo, Steven Were Bridging research, policy, and practice in African agriculture: progress and problems in confronting hunger and poverty |
| title | Bridging research, policy, and practice in African agriculture: progress and problems in confronting hunger and poverty |
| title_full | Bridging research, policy, and practice in African agriculture: progress and problems in confronting hunger and poverty |
| title_fullStr | Bridging research, policy, and practice in African agriculture: progress and problems in confronting hunger and poverty |
| title_full_unstemmed | Bridging research, policy, and practice in African agriculture: progress and problems in confronting hunger and poverty |
| title_short | Bridging research, policy, and practice in African agriculture: progress and problems in confronting hunger and poverty |
| title_sort | bridging research policy and practice in african agriculture progress and problems in confronting hunger and poverty |
| topic | policy analysis agriculture agricultural growth research methodology knowledge management evaluation agricultural development information flow decision making scientists agricultural extension |
| url | https://hdl.handle.net/10568/155709 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT omamostevenwere bridgingresearchpolicyandpracticeinafricanagricultureprogressandproblemsinconfrontinghungerandpoverty |