For those on the SDOH list who followed the discussion of
'community-based' research and questions about the meaning of citizen
engagement, this article by Rachel Laforest and Michael Orsini is a must
read. Up to now it's only been available as a draft, but as of October
2005, Michael Orsini and Rachel Laforest's discussion of the marginalizing
impacts of evidence based policy making (which translate in the end to
evidence based politics, which Laforest has written something else about)
on community-based organizations in the voluntary sector will appear in
the journal, Social Policy and Administration (see the full reference and
abstract below).. The article highlights the marginalizing, silencing, and
exclusionary impacts being experienced by grassroots community activists
and community developers. These are important observations which should be
receiving much more public attention and debate than they are. Linda  
Evidence-based Engagement in the Voluntary Sector: Lessons from Canada 
Authors: Rachel Laforest and Michael Orsini 
Journal: Social Policy & Administration, 2005, October, Volume 39, Issue 5
Page 481 - 
http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-9515.2005.00451.x
The shift towards governance and greater reliance on third parties in the
design, implementation and evaluation of policy has created new pressures
to ensure that policies are designed and delivered in a consistent and
effective manner. In the interest of improving transparency,
accountability, effectiveness and efficiency, governments in Canada and in
the UK, as in many industrialized countries, have begun to emphasize the
need for evidence-based policy-making. As a result, knowledge and research
have become key assets in the production of policy. 
Yet, with their current capacity and knowledge base wanting, governments
have increasingly relied on the knowledge and information of external
actors and have afforded greater authority to them on this basis. This has
created a situation in which evidence-based inputs are given greater
weight. This shift has particular implications for voluntary sector
organizations whose basis for intervention has lain historically with the
interests that they represent. Already, in the Canadian case many national
organizations have seen their focus shift to research activities under the
impetus of new funding initiatives explicitly encouraging activities
grounded in knowledge and policy analysis. Moreover, policy guidelines
have been elaborated in order to enhance the sector's capacity to
contribute to the development of policy in a depoliticized manner. Using a
series of interviews conducted with representatives from national
voluntary organizations in Canada, this article explores the implications
of such a shift for the voluntary sector in Canada, and asks whether the
Canadian case holds some lessons for voluntary sector-state relations in
other jurisdictions

____________________________
Linda Green, OISE/UT
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