Page - (000064) - in Evaluating Climate Change Action for Sustainable Development

there iswidespreadagreement that tomainstream, replicate, reproduce,upgradeor upscale interventions to higher levels is an essential perspective in understanding causal pathways from themicro-level to higher level goals. Garcia and Zazueta (2015) argue that at higher scales interventions should be interpreted and looked at from a systems perspective. Individual components and elementsdonotasystemmake,butwhentheystart interacting, they tend to takeon characteristics of a system, which can have its own dynamics and shifts and changes. Arguably markets operate as systems and market change is systemic change: subtle changes in supply, demand and enabling environment can lead to “tipping points”, afterwhich slow, reversible change becomes irreversible, or the point in time at which a new technology (such as hydel power) becomes mainstream. Inconclusionkeyquestionsrelatedto time leadtotherealisationthat impactcan be measured at each moment in time – ex ante as impact assessment, through modelling and calculations, real time through monitoring, experimental design, trend analysis etc. and ex post through various evaluations and studies. Key questions related to spacemake us realise that impact differs per area and that areas have different impacts. Key questions related to scale point to the need to mainstream,replicate,upscaleandbroadenthescopeofinterventionsbeforeimpact canbe achieved at higher levels. 3.5 UsingTimeandSpace to IdentifyApproaches In principle the three dimensions of time, space and scale can be used to build a three dimensional matrix in which the theory of change of an intervention, programmeorpolicy canbe represented.Thiswill enable the evaluator to identify whereaparticulardemandfor impactevidenceneeds tobeplaced,andwhatwould be appropriate analytical tools to evaluate impact. Figure 3.1 presents amatrix of time and space aspects. The time dimension goes from ex ante (designing and formulatinganewintervention) to importantmoments in real time(frominception to mid-term to end-of-project) to ex post and identifies ex post evaluation approaches. Red “balloons” signify evaluation approaches; blue onesmonitoring anddataanalysis,whereasagreenballoonidentifiesaresearchapproach.Ofcourse evaluations use and analyse monitoring data, and often use research tools and methods. Figure 3.1 just presents a possible configuration ofwhat is dominant in thematrix from an evaluation perspective. The space dimension goes from local throughnationalandregional toglobal,buthasanextra rowforecosystems,which overlapwith other rows. The ex ante column is occupied by ex ante evaluation and impact assessment, whichisalivelycommunityofpractice thatusesvariousmethodsandtools tocome toconclusionsonthepotential impact thatdifferent scenariosmayhave throughout time. These impact assessments tend to usemodelling as their preferred tool and may present several scenarios that would lead to different impacts. The ex post 44 R.D. vandenBerg