Speakers:

• Steven Haggblade, Professor of International Development, Michigan State University (Presentation | Video)
• Sheryl Hendriks, Professor and Director of Institute for Food, Nutrition, and Well-being, University of Pretoria (Presentation | Video)
• Danielle Resnick, Senior Research Fellow & Governance Theme Leader, IFPRI (Presentation | Video)

Discussants:

• Michael Morris, Lead Agricultural Economist, The World Bank (Video)
• David Pelletier, Professor of Nutrition Policy, Cornell University (Video)

Closing Remarks:

• Suresh Babu, Head of Capacity Strengthening, IFPRI (Video)
• Q&A Video

What explains the persistence of socially suboptimal policies over long periods of time? What factors and forces provoke episodes of reform that punctuate long periods of policy inertia? Given the growing need to achieve policy impact with scarce resources, these key questions increasingly preoccupy the international donor and research communities.

This seminar presents the Kaleidoscope Model, a practical analytical framework for understanding policy-reform processes. Drawing on insights from political economy, public administration, and policy-process scholarship, the Kaleidoscope Model encompasses a set of tractable, operational hypotheses that can be applied across disparate policy domains and country contexts.

The seminar will discuss the model’s robustness based on findings from fieldwork applications in Ghana, Malawi, South Africa, Tanzania, and Zambia with respect to two very different policy domains—namely, agricultural input subsidies and human micronutrient interventions.  

The Kaleidoscope Model was initially developed with financial support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) under the Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Food Security Policy, which consists of a consortium of partners that includes IFPRI, MSU, and University of Pretoria.  In addition to USAID, expanded applications of the Model will also be supported by the CGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM).