Thematic Evaluation of Three GF Partner Approaches

Governance Facility (GF) was established in August 2014 as a joint mechanism between three donors (the embassies of Denmark, Switzerland, and DFID). GF supported several projects related to Governance via 27 consortiums, involving 63 partners. GF was driven by its overarching goal of ‘accountable, responsive, and inclusive federalism’. To achieve this goal, GF designed their own Theory of Change with three key assumptions i.e. leadership processes, institutions, organizations, and beliefs and behaviors, and socio-economic wellbeing.

As GF and all of the GF supported were phasing out in December 2018, GF wanted to carry out a thematic evaluation of GF partner approaches. In this context, SW Nepal was assigned by GF to carry out this assignment.

The major objectives of this assignment were:

• To analyse the relevance, effectiveness and sustainability of change processes of the GF partners implementing various governance related projects
• To assess the GF partners’ logical framework in terms of its ability to capture relevant assumptions and SMART indicators
• To ascertain whether the GF partners can link their intended outcomes with their theories of change
• To capture the lessons learned by GF partners during their project implementation

SW Nepal carried out the following activities to meet the assignment’s objectives.

• In-depth consultation with GF partners to discern their understanding on their theories of change and lessons learned
• Consultations with GF partners to finalize the study’s methodology including sample size and sample area
• Designed quantitative and qualitative data collection tools
• Administered questionnaire surveys to GF partners’ beneficiaries

SW Nepal delivered a comprehensive final evaluation report with findings and analysis related to relevance, effectiveness, and sustainability of change processes/theories that GF partners were supporting.