Challenge
During 2016, Barcelona City Council developed the government measure Programa Barcelona Ciutat de Drets (Barcelona City of Rights Program). Actions to prevent and guarantee citizens’ rights and actions to include the human rights approach in public policies. The aim of this program is to promote a diverse, intercultural and multifaceted city model where all people have real, effective and equal access to all human rights recognized and guaranteed in the city.
Four years after its implementation, the City Council wants to evaluate the development of this measure. Therefore, the Spora Sinergies team is asked to carry out a triple evaluation of the program:
- Design evaluation: how was the intervention planned? Are the different levels (general and specific goals, thematic priorities and lines of action) related in a logical and coherent way? Are the governance structures adequate to ensure the proper monitoring and evaluation of the program?
- Implementation evaluation: how has the program been developed? What has been the participation experience of the agents involved? What are the strengths and weaknesses of the lines of action the program includes?
- Identification and evaluation of results: has the program been useful by including the human rights-based approach in public policies? Has it been useful to implement human rights policies according to the priorities set?
Answer
An evaluation of the design, the implementation and the results of the Barcelona City of Rights Program has been carried out. The purpose of this analytical exercise has been to generate information that will help improve both the design and effectiveness of the program, providing evidence and reflections that can facilitate and inform decision-making for future editions. Therefore, it evaluates:
- The design of the program, by performing a formal and critical analysis of the internal coherence of the program according to basic postulates of strategic planning and the theory of change.
- Its implementation, by setting out the strengths and weaknesses associated with the implementation process of each of the lines of action.
- The main results obtained, to know the effectiveness of the program through the evaluation of the achievement of the established specific goals. In addition, this evaluation has also included an analysis of the effectiveness of the program of the dimensions of the theory of change (information, training, advocacy and mobilization). Specifically, an analysis has been done to determine whether the program has been useful to: increase information and training on human rights among the technical body of the City Council and between citizens and organizations; to prevent human rights violations in the city of Barcelona; and to promote or strengthen local human rights networks or entities.
To carry out this evaluation, an exploratory session was carried out with the reference person of the program and a total of 12 interviews (7 group discussions and 5 individual interviews) with different key agents in the development of this measure.
The report includes different improvement proposals presented by the agents interviewed and a series of recommendations made by the Spora Sinergies team.
