FOCUS ON KNOWLEDGE - special edition: "Bridging Research and Policy in International Development"

Bridging research and policy is a topic of growing practical and scholarly interest in both North and South. The main lessons from this volume are: the need for donors and research foundations to foster research capacity and to protect it from political interference; the need for researchers to use detailed case material in order to inform high-level policy debates within and across national boundaries, often by working in cross-country teams; the importance of presenting research results in such a way that they cannot be oversimplified; and the value of creating alliances between researchers and civil society advocacy groups.