Theories of change

logic, process and use

Abstract

Theories of change have been widely used to support formulating, implementing and evaluating public policies and social initiatives. For many authors, its effectiveness lies in the ability to make policies and initiatives results chains more explicit and technically consistent and, in this sense, to strengthen the relationships between strategies and impacts, historically fragile within strategic designs. Recovering 32 theories of change building processes facilitated and supported by the author, the article analyzes the most frequent components in the theories of change, the use of assumptions in sustaining the results chains and the dialogic processes around theories of change design. The article concludes that theories of change are able to increase the technical quality of the designs, increase implementation processes, favor science and politics articulation and contribute to relevant and successful policies and initiatives co-production.