Journal of Development Effectiveness
The Journal of Development Effectiveness publishes papers reporting evidence of impact of development interventions.
The journal does not subscribe to any one approach to impact evaluation, but requires that the techniques employed be rigorously applied, with a preference for studies which have been well contextualized with an appropriate use of mixed methods.
It also publishes papers of a more conceptual nature related to impact evaluation, as well as papers covering practical aspects of conducting impact studies. The journal has an explicit policy of ‘learning from our mistakes’, discouraging publication bias in favour of positive results – papers reporting interventions with no, or a negative, impact are welcome.
Steps to promote equity and integrity in research | by the Editors-in-Chief
JDEff is taking concrete steps to support equity, inclusivity and transparency in the research it publishes. At JDEff we recognize the deep inequities that exist in funding opportunities for research in low- and middle-income countries (L&MIC). These inequities can lead to inequitable partnerships and power imbalances between researchers from high-income countries (HIC) and L&MICs, which in turn preserves differences in access to knowledge, skills, experience and recognition. These differences are a significant barrier to 3ie’s mission of equitable, inclusive and sustainable development. Read full statement
New on JDEff
The second issue of 2025 includes papers focusing on:
- Comprehensive social protection and sanitation
- Parental time poverty and child over-nutrition
- Mixed-methods impact evaluation
- Selection bias in aggregate development
Read the complete issue here.
Call for submission
The journal welcomes submissions of scholarly works on the generation and use of evidence on the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of programs and policies that are meant to improve the lives of people in low- and middle-income countries. This includes, among other contributions, impact evaluations, systematic reviews, evidence gap maps and methodological papers that address attribution through a variety of techniques, including experimental, quasi-experimental and mixed-method approaches. Papers that help users of evidence learn from null results are also welcome. We also encourage papers that help further the understanding of what it takes to ensure use of evidence to inform decision-making.
Submission guidance and instructions for authors.
Editors-in-Chief
Marie Gaarder is the executive director of 3ie, leading the organization’s efforts to improve lives in low- and middle-income countries by supporting the generation and effective use of high-quality and relevant evidence to inform decision-making. Marie has over 20 years of experience managing operational and research projects with a development focus. In her previous role in 3ie, as director for evaluation and global director for innovation and country engagement, Marie provided strategic direction and guidance to 3ie’s work in evaluation and synthesis. Prior to joining 3ie, she was a manager in the World Bank’s Independent Evaluation Group, overseeing thematic, sector, corporate and project evaluations. She has also worked as the director of the evaluation department at the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation, where she was in charge of independent evaluation of programs and activities financed over the Norwegian aid budget. Prior positions include being the deputy executive director of 3ie during the institution’s start-up years, and a senior social development economist at the Inter-American Development Bank, specializing in social protection and health programs in Central America. Marie has published extensively, including on the evaluation of cash transfer programs, evaluation in fragile and conflict-affected states, and how to increase the accountability for evidence use and for outcomes among development agencies and governments.
Sudhanshu (Ashu) Handa is a 3ie senior research fellow and Kenan Eminent Professor of Public Policy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A trained economist, Ashu is one of the principal investigators of The Transfer Project, an initiative in partnership with UNICEF and FAO to document the wide-ranging impacts of government sponsored cash transfer programs in Sub-Saharan Africa. Through the Transfer Project and its collaborators, he has lead seven large-scale evaluations of national cash transfer programs in Sub-Saharan Africa. His current work involves long-term follow-ups of these evaluations to understand the intergenerational effects of cash transfers on the adult children of the original recipients. Handa previously worked at UNICEF’s Office of Research, the Inter-American Development Bank, the University of the West Indies-Mona, and the International Food Policy Research Institute. He holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Toronto.
Editors
Aniceto C. Orbeta, Jr. is the current President of the Philippine Institute for Development Studies, where he has served as a Senior Research Fellow since 1992. His research interests include education, labor market, social protection, demographic economics, and information and communication technologies. He has participated in the impact evaluation of programs and policies in education, social protection, judicial reforms, community-driven development, water services, agriculture, and agriculture finance with Philippine national government agencies, multilateral and bilateral institutions, and international non-government organizations. He served as a Professorial Lecturer at the University of the Philippines School of Economics (UPSE) and a Visiting Researcher at the Asian Development Bank Institute. He has a Ph.D. in Economics from the UPSE and did post-doctoral studies at Harvard University.
Peter Orazem has been on the faculty at Iowa State University since 1982 and currently serves as University Professor of Economics and Director of the Program for the Study of Midwest Markets and Entrepreneurship. He is a 1977 graduate in economics at the University of Kansas and received his Ph.D. in economics from Yale University in 1983. He is a past member of the Ames City Council, the Ames Convention and Visitors Bureau and the Ames Economic Development Commission. In 2018, he served as a Fulbright Fellow at the Univerza na Primorskem in Slovenia. His research deals with labor markets in the United States and in developing countries with a particular interest in human capital, regional economic development, and entrepreneurship. He is coauthor of chapters in the Handbook of Development Economics and the Handbook of Agricultural Economics. He served as a member of the core team for the World Bank’s 2007 World Development Report and wrote papers for the 2008, 2012 and post2015 editions of the Copenhagen Consensus. He is coeditor of a book, Child Labor and Education in Latin America published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2009. His research has appeared in the American Economic Review, the Journal of Political Economy, The Review of Economics and Statistics, the Journal of Finance, the International Economic Review, and numerous other outlets.
Hugh Sharma Waddington is Assistant Professor at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and London International Development Centre. He specializes in policy-relevant impact evaluation and evidence synthesis on topics like water, sanitation and hygiene, governance, cash transfers and smallholder agriculture, and has an interest in supporting capacity sharing in international development. He set up 3ie's Systematic Reviews Program and London Office and before that was employed at the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning of the Government of Rwanda, the World Bank, the UK National Audit Office, and the Poverty Research Unit at Sussex University. He holds advanced degrees in development economics and environmental health.
Monica Lambon-Quayefio is an applied economist whose research focuses on labor market and demographic economic issues as well as digital innovations in agriculture with a focus on women's and children’s welfare. In her recent work, she has focused on unpaid care work, inequality of opportunity, digital finance in agriculture, informal pensions and labor market inefficiencies. She is a research fellow of the Transfer Project, Centre for Effective Global Action (CEGA), Structural Transformation of African and Asian Agriculture and Rural Spaces (STAAARS) and the Africa Centre of Excellence in Poverty and Inequality Research (ACEIR). She is also a JPAL invited researcher. She is currently a senior lecturer at the Department of Economics, at the University of Ghana. She holds a doctorate degree in Economics from Clark University, Massachusetts in the USA where she received her master’s degree in economics. Her Bachelor of Arts degree was obtained in Economics with Mathematics from the University of Ghana.
If you have any questions please do reach out to the production manager, Audrey Portes, aportes(at)3ieimpact.org