Co-ordination among researchers, and between researchers and evidence users, can result in the production of better and more impactful evidence. Researchers working in partnership encourage the sharing of experiences and recommendations, contribute to more effective policy implementation, and foster the development of innovative approaches to addressing complex research questions. Meanwhile, partnerships between researchers, evidence brokers and governments can facilitate major reforms and enhance the likelihood of policy decisions being influenced by evidence. Further, the involvement of new global allies can help foster the institutionalisation of evidence in both donor and partner countries in addition to driving forward the locally-led development agenda. Participants noted a range of approaches that can facilitate and improve partnerships among researchers and evidence users.
“We maximise evidence use not just via robust methods, but by doing everything we can to ensure policymakers adopt evidence into their policies.”
Establishing productive relationships with evidence users. Ensuring that evidence users are involved in the process of evidence production from the outset was recognised as a powerful tool for partnership-building; understanding the aims and objectives of policymakers, designing research in collaboration with the end user, and helping decision-makers to understand findings and recommendations was positioned as tackling the twin issues of data misinterpretation and a lack of evidence use. Maintaining transparency between different stakeholders was also highlighted as key to successful partnership working, with openness seen as fostering constructive dialogue and trust between researchers and policymakers.
Developing global partnerships. The value of collaborating globally was also highlighted, with particular importance placed on incorporating voices from the global south. Asking partner countries to define specific research questions that need answering and involving local researchers and evidence users in the design phase of research projects has the potential to maximise the utility of evidence and its likelihood of being taken up by local policymakers, while funding research councils in low- and middle-income countries and building local capacity offers a route to sustaining global partnerships. Contributors also suggested recognising evidence champions at the global level – including emerging evidence producers, users, and brokers – to promote and enhance partnerships between researchers and policymakers worldwide.
Formalising experience-sharing. The regular sharing of experiences among evidence producers and policy implementors was advocated as an effective method for allowing best practice to feed back into evidence production and implementation processes. Participants highlighted a number of routes through which experiences may be effectively shared including the scheduling of regular and inclusive meetings between researchers operating in the international development arena, the maintenance of open and accessible publication processes, and the fostering of peer-to-peer networks between evidence producers and implementors.
Strengthening evidence use through global commitment. Building on these partnership efforts, representatives from 3ie introduced the Global Evidence Commitment, uniting leading development institutions in their pledge to further institutionalize the use of rigorous evidence in development cooperation. Signatories recognize that systematically integrating evidence throughout the programming and project cycle enhances the effectiveness of interventions. They commit to overcoming institutional barriers to evidence use through training, resources, incentives, processes, and leadership engagement (TRIPS). Key commitments include conducting problem diagnostics, developing evidence-based theories of change, assessing cost-effectiveness, implementing adaptive evaluations, and piloting innovative solutions. Facilitated by 3ie, this commitment fosters mutual learning among funders and invites broader participation to strengthen evidence-informed decision-making in international development.