Development Impact Evaluation

3 Credits · Level: Graduate, Undergraduate

Economic development is a process of trial and error, innovation and experimentation, success and failure. Given the right institutions, some not unfavorable resource endowments, and a bit of luck, incomes can grow, health can improve, and human development can flourish; other times, things don’t turn out so well. Given the urgency of development challenges, it is imperative that we learn quickly from our mistakes and build robustly on our successes. The hope is that by understanding what kinds of innovations and policies “work” to improve the lives of the deprived and vulnerable, and how they work, we might be better placed to accelerate the process of development more generally. But how can policy makers and development practitioners be sure they’re “making a difference?" To that end, this course will provide an overview of empirical methods and analytical techniques for assessing the impact and effectiveness of development innovations at both the product and policy levels. Core material will be available in a series of on-line animated videos created by the instructor, which will be used as the basis for selected classes. Hands on statistical exercises will be used to develop aptitude and intuition in addressing empirical challenges. Students will also be engaged in the process of identifying development challenges and developing candidate solutions that could be tested in the field, using the empirical techniques we study.