Responsive evaluation: Its meaning and special contribution to health promotion

Responsive evaluation offers a vision and rationale for evaluation. In this vision, evaluation is reframed from the assessment of program interventions on the basis of policymakers' goals to an engagement with all stakeholders about the effectiveness of their practice. This approach is especially appropriate for the field of health promotion given emerging ideas and the congruency between the underlying values of responsive evaluation and health promotion. This article presents the theory and methodology of responsive evaluation and discusses several controversial issues among them the nature of evidence and the political question: who should determine what counts as evidence? The value and meaning of responsive evaluation are illustrated by a case example. It concerns the evaluation of an injury prevention program for students in two performing art schools.