Evaluation from Africa: Advancing integrity, inclusion, and reciprocity in global evaluation practice

Abstract

Background: Made in Africa Evaluation (MAE) has emerged as a response to the dominance of Euro-Western epistemologies in evaluation theory and practice, particularly within African development contexts shaped by externally driven funding and accountability regimes. While MAE has played a critical role in challenging epistemic injustice and advancing decolonial critique, much of the discourse remains anchored in oppositional framings of the Global North and Global South.
Objectives: This article argues that the future of Africa-rooted evaluation lies not only in resisting Western dominance but also in advancing a constructive, principled, and globally engaged practice of evaluation from Africa. It contends that a continued fixation on binaries risks limiting MAE’s transformative potential.
Method: Drawing on MAE scholarship, African Evaluation Principles, Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS), and relational African philosophies such as ubuntu and ukama, the article critically examines prevailing decolonial arguments and proposes a shift towards an African relational evaluation orientation.
Results: The article advances three interrelated principles – integrity, inclusion, and reciprocity – as foundational to evaluation from Africa. These principles reposition accountability, ethics, participation, and benefit-sharing at the centre of evaluation practice, while remaining open to global knowledge exchange.
Conclusion: By moving beyond ‘Made in Africa’ as a defensive identity marker, the article offers a forward-looking framework for evaluation from Africa.
Contribution: This article contributes substantively to global evaluation theory and practice, grounded in African values yet connected to the world.