The world of evidence-based policy just got some terrific news. Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo, of MIT, and Michael Kremer of Harvard, were recently awarded the Nobel Prize in economics.
This award honors extraordinary people doing extraordinary work to alleviate poverty in developing countries. I heard Esther Duflo speak at the Society for Research on Effective Education, and saw her amazing Ted Talk on the research that won the Nobel (delivered before they knew this was going to happen). I strongly suggest you view her speech, at https://www.ted.com/talks/esther_duflo_social_experiments_to_fight_poverty?language=en
But the importance of this award goes far beyond its recognition of the scholars who received it. It celebrates the same movement toward evidence-based policy represented by the Institute for Education Sciences, Education Innovation Research, the Arnold Foundation, and others in the U.S., the Education Endowment Foundation in the U.K., and this blog. It also celebrates the work of researchers in education, psychology, sociology, as well as economics, who are committed to using rigorous research to advance human progress. The Nobel awardees represent the international development wing of this movement, largely funded by the World Bank, the InterAmerica Development Bank, and other international aid organizations.
In her Ted Talk, Esther Duflo explains the grand strategy she and her colleagues pursue. They take major societal problems in developing countries, break them down into solvable parts, and then use randomized experiments to test solutions to those parts. Along with Dr. Banerjee (her husband) and Michael Kremer, she first did a study that found that ensuring that students in India had textbooks made no difference in learning. They then successfully tested a plan to provide inexpensive tutors and, later, computers, to help struggling readers in India (Banerjee, Cole, Duflo, & Linden, 2007). One fascinating series of studies tested the cost-effectiveness of various educational treatments in developing countries. The winner? Curing children of intestinal worms. Based on this and other research, the Carter Foundation embarked on a campaign that has virtually eradicated Guinea worm worldwide.
Dr. Duflo and her colleagues later tested variations in programs to provide malaria-inhibiting bed nets in developing countries in which malaria is the number one killer of children, especially those less than five years old. Were outcomes best if bed nets (retail cost= $3) were free, or only discounted to varying degrees? Many economists and policy makers worried that people who paid nothing for bed nets would not value them, or might use them for other purposes. But the randomized study found that without question, free bed nets were more often obtained and used than were discounted ones, potentially saving thousands of children’s lives.
For those of us who work in evidence-based education, the types of experiments being done by the Nobel laureates are entirely familiar, even though they have practical aspects quite different from the ones we encounter when we work in the U.S. or the U.K., for example. However, we are far from a majority among researchers in our own countries, and we face major struggles to continue to insist on randomized experiments as the criterion of effectiveness. I’m sure people working in international development face equal challenges. This is why this Nobel Prize in economics means a lot to all of us. People pay a lot of attention to Nobel Prizes, and there isn’t one in educational research, so having a Nobel shared by economists whose main contribution is in the use of randomized experiments to solve questions of great practical and policy importance, including studies in education itself, may be the closest we’ll ever get to Nobel recognition for the principle espoused by many in applied research in psychology, sociology, and education, as it is by many economists.
Nobel Prizes are often used to send a message, to support important new developments in research as well as to recognize deserving researchers who are leaders in this area. This was clearly the case with this award. The Nobel announcement makes it clear how the work of the Nobel laureates has transformed their field, to the point that “their experimental research methodologies entirely dominate developmental economics.” I hope this event will add further credibility and awareness to the idea that rigorous evidence is a key lever for change that matters in the lives of people
Reference
Banerjee, A., Cole, S., Duflo, E., & Linden, L. (2007). Remedying education: Evidence from two randomized experiments in India. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 122 (3), 1235-1264.
This blog was developed with support from the Laura and John Arnold Foundation. The views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of the Foundation.
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