8: Why evidence matters
It is tempting to think that homelessness is something to file under the ‘Too Difficult Box’ of social conundrums, an issue that cannot be addressed at the street level, only at the level of government policies on affordable housing, social security and poverty reduction.
Of course, social trends and national policies are at the heart of problems relating to homelessness and we need answers that look at whole systems, such as youth justice, mental health and child protection. And those on the frontline – public servants, charity workers and commissioners – need to make urgent decisions to help people experiencing homelessness. That means they need access to the best available evidence to use alongside their professional judgement and practitioner experience, and a culture of rigorous evaluation to ensure continual learning and improvement. Problems may be systemic and complicated, but that cannot distract us from trying to work out which programmes and interventions might do the most good.
In the field of homelessness, we are currently missing a strong evidence base on homelessness interventions. Until fairly recently, this was the case in education, too – it was not until the late 1990s that the concept of ‘evidence-informed practice’ really started to emerge in the UK (Hanley et al, 2016). Now, thanks to initiatives like researchED and the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF), the picture is vastly different, and more than half the schools in England have been involved in one of EEF’s randomised controlled trials (RCTs) (Nevill, 2019). Whole ecosystems of organisations, individuals and networks grow around these kinds of movements, which we have also seen in other policy areas – some of them planned and wide-ranging, like the Campbell Collaboration or the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence; others more sporadic, single-issue grassroot outfits, such as the Society for Evidence-Based Policing, researchED Evidence for the Frontline and Coalition for Evidence-Based Education.
| May 2022 onwards | Past Year | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Full Text Views | 232 | 198 | 69 |
| PDF Downloads | 74 | 26 | 1 |
We are a leading social science publisher
committed to making a difference.
Bristol University Press and
Policy Press
bristoluniversitypress.co.uk