Do policy actors have different views of what constitutes evidence in policymaking?

Grace V A Piddington, Eleanor MacKillop, James Downe

Research output: Contribution to journalArticle (Academic Journal)peer-review

2 Citations (Scopus)
37 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

The role played by evidence in policymaking is hotly disputed and there is no agreement over how evidence is defined. This article examines whether policy actors have different views of what counts as evidence and which factors influence these perceptions (for example, professional background, length of service, organisation setting, cultures of evidence)? In addressing this question, we contribute to the growing research focus on the context of evidence use. Q methodology – a mixed method approach to study people’s attitudes towards a topic – is used in interviewing 67 policy actors and comparing two countries, Scotland and Wales, to find out whether there are different cultures of evidence. In both countries, we identified four distinct profiles of attitudes towards evidence: the evidence-based policymaking (EBPM) Idealist, the Pragmatist, the Inclusive, and the Political. Our research highlights important differences between the two contexts, with a greater leaning towards EBPM views of evidence in Wales, and more pragmatism in defining evidence in Scotland. We illustrate how different cultures of evidence coexist in a same context and highlight their similarities and differences. We also contribute to the understanding of the value of Q methodology research by showing that it can be used to compare two datasets collected in different countries.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)239-258
Number of pages20
JournalPolicy and Politics
Volume52
Issue number2
Early online date4 Mar 2024
DOIs
Publication statusE-pub ahead of print - 4 Mar 2024

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© Authors 2024.

Research Groups and Themes

  • SPS Centre for Research in Health and Social Care
  • SPS Centre for the Study of Poverty and Social Justice

Keywords

  • evidence
  • Evidence-Based Policy-Making
  • Q methodology
  • EBP
  • Scotland
  • Wales

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