Realist evaluation for practice

This paper outlines the new, emerging realist paradigm in evaluation research, and applies it to social work practice. This paradigm has the potential for a ‘white box’ evaluation that not only systematically tracks outcomes, but also the mechanisms that produce the outcomes, the contexts in which these mechanisms are triggered, and the content of the interventions (or the generative mechanisms introduced by a programme). Two examples are provided, both studies with an extensive use of single-subject designs by practitioners within a realist paradigm. This article is based on the author's invited keynote address at the Ohio State University's Thirteenth National Symposium on Doctoral Research in Social Work, 6 April 2001