A ripple in development? - Channel Research

capacity building include technical assistance? The role of the central
administration in relation to decentralization?). Our evaluation
has hence preferred to diverge from the questions in the ToR (which
would have required data that does not exist), and focused instead on
the performance of national coordination bodies created in response
to the tsunami, using primarily three case studies, and outlining gaps
which could have been filled.
Apart from capacity building, the different chapters follow the line of questioning
as provided in the ToR, and we would encourage a scanning of the ToR
prior to reading the report to understand why the inquiry follows a particular
path. Priority was given to issues that featured in a significant
way in the interview process and when there was evidence from the literature
review (for example on conflict sensitivity). This approach was
taken to reflect stakeholder priorities and avoid evaluation biases, and
used to inform the answer to the evaluation questions. When reading
the chapters and attempting to understand the choice of evidence it will
be useful to return to the terminology in the ToR, which have not been
reproduced in the main text for reasons of space.
Limitations in the evaluation methodology include:
• Lack of a normative framework and research related to best practice
regarding such a wide variety of roles in disaster prevention and
recovery (spanning as we do here, government and the economy).
This was in particular marked by the curious absence of other evaluations
on LRRD in the response to the tsunami, while a large body
of literature now exists on the tsunami (our Document Review analysed
7,775 public documents, predominantly in English);
• An aggressive schedule (six months at the outside) to study selected cases
in depth and generalise to the entire efforts, while the literature presented
severe gaps, particularly regarding social fabric and capacity
building. Longitudinal data was often difficult to compare, while
influences extraneous to LRRD would often come into play;
• A diminishing interest in the tsunami response among the affected populations
and officials at the time of the evaluation, which led many to
refer the team to other evaluation processes which were ongoing at
the time of the present exercise (and in which some of the team
members and their organisations were fortunately also involved);
this is accompanied paradoxically by the slow launch of development
in the areas affected by the tsunami, where the larger part of
the programmes observed continue to be funded by relief and rehabilitation
funds, mostly allocated in 2005.
• The withdrawal or reform of structures and agencies that were
involved in the earlier phase, compounded by a high rate of personnel
turnover in most humanitarian organisations.
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