When Paradigms Meet: Interacting Perspectives on Evaluation in the Non‐Profit Sector

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/faam.12121
• Date: 01 May 2017
• Author: Cristina Neesham,Michelle Greenwood,Leanne McCormick
• Published date: 01 May 2017

Financial Accountability & Management, 33(2), May 2017, 0267-4424

When Paradigms Meet: Interacting

Perspectives on Evaluation in the

Non-Profit Sector

CRISTINA NEESHAM,LEANNE MCCORMICK AND MICHELLE GREENWOOD∗

Abstract: This study examines a public debate in Australia, arising from a national

government report, around how social contribution in the nonprofit sector should be

assessed. Guided by several meta-perspectives on evaluation, we identify connections

between foundational assumptions and normative positions on evaluation espoused

by non-profit organizations (NPOs), and examine the ways in which the inter-

paradigmatic context of the non-profit sector contributes to the emergence of

NPOs’ different normative positions on evaluation. We conclude that particular

paradigmatic orientations of NPOs (positivism, interpretivism, constructivism) lead

to particular perspectives on how NPOs should engage with alternative paradigms

(monism, impartial pluralism, radical pluralism).

Keywords: evaluation theory, evaluation paradigm, nonprofit sector, NPO assess-

ment, inter-paradigmatic context

INTRODUCTION

Controversy about performance measurement is often mistakenly reduced to

a mere dispute about technique or information, a position that ignores the

significance of the social and political background of measurement processes.

Agreement and disagreement about measurement can only be meaningfully

understood if consideration is given to the normative positions held by various

actors (Hall, 2014) and the paradigmatic assumptions underpinning these

views (Guba and Lincoln, 2005). Studies of the influence of new public

∗The first author is from Swinburne University of Technology, Australia. The second and third

authors are from Monash University, Australia. They are very grateful to the two anonymous

reviewers whose guidance was essential for their efforts to improve this paper.

Address for correspondence: Cristina Neesham, Department of Management and Market-

ing, Faculty of Business and Law, Swinburne University of Technology, Building BA, H23,

Cnr John and Wakefield Streets, Hawthorn, Victoria 3122, Australia.

e-mail: cneesham@swin.edu.au

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EVALUATION IN THE NONPROFIT SECTOR 193

management within the nonprofit sector (Dart, 2004; Hwang and Powell,

2009; Lewis, 2005) provide empirical evidence of actors who hold different

paradigms of evaluation being forced to interact. The case of government

outsourced social service delivery to nonprofit organizations (NPOs) (Hwang

and Powell, 2009) is a prominent example of social agents with different

evaluation paradigms interacting to discuss publicly acknowledged common

goals.

Extant theories of evaluation are useful in documenting the particular

evaluation approaches and/or instruments that should be used and the normative

position that should be adopted about how evaluation should be implemented,

as a result of particular foundational premises. For example, evaluators who

interpret social reality as objective, social knowledge as discovered, and social

intervention outcomes as having a set value will tend to take the normative view

that the purpose of evaluation is to discover a single objective truth, usually

through measurement as a technical process. Alternatively, evaluators who

regard social reality as subjective, social knowledge as constructed, and social

intervention outcomes as acquiring different value for different stakeholders will

define the purpose of evaluation in terms of a moderating process among differ-

ent but comparable claims to knowledge made by different social actors (Guba

and Lincoln, 1989). However, the connection between foundational assumptions

and normative positions on evaluation requires further investigation, in order

to more clearly account for how non-profit organizations (NPOs) deal with

competing perspectives on evaluation produced by organizations or institutions

from other sectors.

Our subsequent review of theoretical literature on evaluation paradigms

highlights the dearth of explanation available regarding the foundational-

normative link in evaluation. Additionally, a brief appraisal of empirical studies

on social assessment in NPOs identifies the need to examine and develop

new understandings of paradigm interactions among social actors. These

reviews document the focus of this study on what foundational assumptions and

normative positions on evaluation are espoused by NPOs and how the inter-paradigmatic

context of the NPO sector contributes to the emergence of different normative positions on

evaluation.

In order to address these questions, we study a public debate between

an Australian Commonwealth Government agency and Australian NPOs on

the question of how the social contribution of NPOs should be evaluated.

Using this rare opportunity of a real-life example of inter-paradigm relations

occurring among different social agents where a key normative question about

evaluation is publicly asked, the study contributes new insights into the different

paradigmatic preferences of government and NPOs. We propose that knowledge

of the different foundational assumptions and normative positions espoused by

NPOs in an inter-paradigmatic context could assist in the formulation of more

comprehensive and nuanced theories and practices of evaluation and inter-sector

communication.

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2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd