This article investigates how an imbalance of institutional subsystems can influence the quality of the institutionalisation of evaluation. Building on the concept of coercive isomorphism and the recent country-comparative literature, it theorises that structural asymmetry, where the ‘political system’ administers competitive funding structures, forces practitioners in the ‘social system’ to adapt. These ideas are applied to the policy area of preventing and countering violent extremism (P/CVE), where the literature and initial empirical evidence suggests that governments’ funding power can compel practitioners not only to institutionalise evaluation, but also to adopt standardised, output-focused forms of evaluation. This latter form of coercive isomorphism, driven by the political need for quick accountability, severely diminishes the potential for organisational learning and risks reducing evaluation to a symbolic practice. Nevertheless, the article recognises an adaptive capacity for constructive dialogue and calls for future comparative research looking at different policy areas.
Lotta Rahlf (Fri,) studied this question.