Evaluation is a set of research methods and associated methodologies with a distinctive purpose. They provide a means to judge actions and activities in terms of values, criteria and standards. At the same time evaluation is also a practice that seeks to enhance effectiveness in the public sphere and policy making. In order to improve as well as judge, there is a need to explain what happens and would have to be done differently for different outcomes to be achieved. It is in this explanatory mode that evaluation overlaps most directly with mainstream social science.

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