Monitoring and evaluation (M&E) of humanitarian assistance have recently become a topic of academic, practical and political concern. Various factors have led to this increased interest, including a level of disenchantment with results, the lack of organisational and institutional learning, little documented improvement of operations over the years, the ever increasing complexity of emergency situations and their problematic impact on results. Other concerns related to an overall lack of accountability to donors, the public at large and the beneficiaries. Over the last years there has been a number of valuable attempts to discuss these issues and to identify best practices to deal with the subject. This paper reviews current debates and trends and identifies the different approaches that may be deployed to address prevailing shortcomings in humanitarian evaluation.
In the first section of this paper we reiterate the need for monitoring and evaluation of humanitarian assistance and try to give an overview of the problems involved. We also identify the different developments and highlights in this area and formulate the questions and issues that require further attention. The second section deals with current practices and approaches to the monitoring and evaluation of humanitarian assistance. Starting with an analysis of the characteristics and limitations of the still dominant rational-scientific model of evaluation, five different perspectives are identified. By using metaphors their features and underlying premises are discussed. The third section addresses three selected problem areas to be tackled in evaluations of humanitarian assistance: evaluation of humanitarian policy, bringing in beneficiaries’ perspectives, and the use and follow-up of findings. In the discussion it will be explored what contributions the earlier mentioned perspectives could make to improve current practices. The paper ends with a discussion on the need and feasibility of combining different methods in evaluation.