Département de Géographie et Aménagement du Territoire, Université d’Abomey Calavi, Géographe, Attaché de recherche au Centre d’Expertise en Sciences Sociales Appliquées, Benin
The importance of public policy evaluation has made it a democratic, economic, social and environmental issue today. More than a simple process, the evaluative function of public action remains a real tool to support public decision-making that involves a significant correlation between the hypotheses and the results of policies without necessarily implying inverse causality. The objective of this study is to analyze the effectiveness of the public policy evaluation system in a triple context of results-based management, socio-economic and political reforms and the COVID-19 health crisis in Africa in general and in Benin in particular. Based on a documentary analysis, a survey and semi-structured interviews with political and administrative executives and authorities, this study addressed the issue of the effectiveness of the evaluative function from a dual empirical and operational perspective. From the results, it emerged that the analysis of the policy evaluation system in the Republic of Benin and in other African countries reveals quite significant progress in terms of content, availability of procedures, accessibility of policy documents or strategies developed and published. However, in practice, significant weaknesses remain and call for the implementation of corrective actions for a profound improvement of the system. Finally, this study made it possible to arrive at recommendations and suggestions with operational aspects oriented towards strategic axes for strengthening the contribution of different actors to greater effectiveness and efficiency in the implementation and evaluation of public policies in the Republic of Benin.