Stakeholder conflict in an alternative sentencing program: Implications for evaluation and implementation

Abstract

Conventional approaches to evaluation research, what Chen and Rossi (1980, p. 109) refer to as the goal-fixed typically focus on identifying officially stated program goals, selecting a subset of measurable outcome measures, and assessing whether or not the program achieved the narrowly defined effects implied in the outcome measures. This conventional approach, however, has been increasingly questioned. Chen and Rossi (1980), in formulating what they term the multi-goal, theory-driven evaluation fault the conventional approach and attribute the common finding of no effects to this approach. By narrowing the evaluation focus to a small set of officially defined program goals, the evaluation study often fails to look for other program effects that may be predicted by social science theory or prior research. For example, the common finding of diversion programs leading to an increase in the net of social control (Austin & Krisberg, 1981; see Palumbo & Peterson, this volume), cannot be discerned f rom formal p rogram goals, but evaluation research informed by bureaucratic or conflict theory may build such questions into the study. As an alternative to the official-goal-fixed-approach, Chen and Rossi suggest that researchers take a multigoal, theory-driven approach to evaluation. Under this model, the evaluator does not merely investigate the effects of the program on administrator or policy maker defined goals, but attempts to design a study sensitive to evaluating the effects of the program on multiple goals and based on a theoretical understanding of the problem. A similar criticism of the conventional evaluation model, and a similar alternative approach to evaluation, is suggested by evaluators distinguishing between microand macro-evaluation (Bickman, 1987; Shadish, 1987). Most evaluation research, and particularly the official goal-fixed approach, focuses narrowly on program goals and program effects. Did the program achieve what it was supposed to achieve? This ignores broader macrolevel questions of whether the program affected either the social problem in question or the implications for social policy. For example, while an evaluation of a drug enforcement program may shed light on whether the program increased arrests of drug offenders, it typically ignores the macro-level question of whether or not the program affected the level of drug use or crime in a community or society as a whole (see Palumbo & Peterson, this volume; Schlegel & McGarrell, 1991). A third school of thought that raises questions of the conventional evaluation model is the constructionist approach to evaluation (Best, 1989; Guba& Lincoln, 1989). Briefly, the constructionist theorist questions the idea of an objective and consensually agreed upon definition of social problems and program objectives and goals. Rather, definitions of problems and the goals and objectives of programs intended to address the problems vary among different stakeholders. An example that illustrates both the role of multiple stakeholders and the