This is a wonderful post, basically everything you’ve said here makes sense and lines up with my (limited) experience of those in control of the aid dollars.
This sent shivers down my spine a little. I too feel there is a new wave of “Holistic” aid vibes coming through at the moment, but I’m surprised its as prevalent as you saw at the conference. ”Seemingly every talk had brought up how their NGO was adopting a new holistic approach to aid, each featuring six new buzzwords and a curious lack of measurement.”
Here’s three gems of wisdom I especially appreciated.
”What is left is fought over by hundreds, if not thousands of NGOs all looking for funding. I can’t think of any other government budget with as many entities fighting over as small a budget.
”In some sense, ‘improving the cost-effectiveness of aid’ is not really an intervention any more than ‘improving public health in Africa’ is.
”But if someone wanted to start a project similar to ours because the EV looks really good on paper, I am less optimistic about their chances.”
I have one nagging question here (no pressure to answer) - do you think 18 months was long enough to really give a good go at a project like this? So much of policy/lobbying work is about relationships, and I would doubt that anyone really could build the strength of relationships that might be needed to move the needle. And you did have some success in that short time as well. I wasn’t completely clear how much of the decision to shutdown was about results/funding vs. your energy levels and optimism.
I think “holistic” is often a way of simply “doing whatever I feel like in the first place without looking at data” or doing it on “vibes”. I think it is the opposite of rigor and evidence.
That’s right, but in the original meaning of the word, it’s actually not against EA at all. Us too would prefer sustainable interventions that lead to a better system and that do not have hidden costs. And I think rigorous RCTs that measure general markers are a good tool to find such interventions.
One of EAs anti-examples, Play Pumps, failed because it turned out not to be holistic at all.
This is a wonderful post, basically everything you’ve said here makes sense and lines up with my (limited) experience of those in control of the aid dollars.
This sent shivers down my spine a little. I too feel there is a new wave of “Holistic” aid vibes coming through at the moment, but I’m surprised its as prevalent as you saw at the conference.
”Seemingly every talk had brought up how their NGO was adopting a new holistic approach to aid, each featuring six new buzzwords and a curious lack of measurement.”
Here’s three gems of wisdom I especially appreciated.
”What is left is fought over by hundreds, if not thousands of NGOs all looking for funding. I can’t think of any other government budget with as many entities fighting over as small a budget.
”In some sense, ‘improving the cost-effectiveness of aid’ is not really an intervention any more than ‘improving public health in Africa’ is.
”But if someone wanted to start a project similar to ours because the EV looks really good on paper, I am less optimistic about their chances.”
I have one nagging question here (no pressure to answer) - do you think 18 months was long enough to really give a good go at a project like this? So much of policy/lobbying work is about relationships, and I would doubt that anyone really could build the strength of relationships that might be needed to move the needle. And you did have some success in that short time as well. I wasn’t completely clear how much of the decision to shutdown was about results/funding vs. your energy levels and optimism.
“Holistic” has to be the word that I feel is most antithetical to EA
Because of the down votes, I’ll explain why.
I think “holistic” is often a way of simply “doing whatever I feel like in the first place without looking at data” or doing it on “vibes”. I think it is the opposite of rigor and evidence.
That’s right, but in the original meaning of the word, it’s actually not against EA at all. Us too would prefer sustainable interventions that lead to a better system and that do not have hidden costs. And I think rigorous RCTs that measure general markers are a good tool to find such interventions.
One of EAs anti-examples, Play Pumps, failed because it turned out not to be holistic at all.