Asia

New Resources for policy engagement and influence

July 6, 2015

Fostering sustainable policy change is a topic close to our hearts in the mental health sector.  This is why it is exciting to see the release of a new and online guide to understanding, engaging with and influencing policy.

With funding from the Canadian Grand Challenges, and hosted by the Mental Health Innovation Network, the Research and Policy in Development (RAPID) team at ODI developed this guide to illustrate insights from the development settings that may be applicable to quality assurance projects within many different settings, including the public health sector.

Outcome Mapping was first developed by the International Development Resource Centre (IDRC) in the late 1990s as a way to identify and present the qualitative impact of IDRC research in terms of changed behaviour and practice.  This free online guide includes tools to understand the complexities of political environments and social realities, and contribute to some of the more simple, linear engagement strategies usually expected in research and policy-making.

Targeting team leaders, researchers or policy-makers, the guide includes a range of ideas for varying amounts of time/resources and can be downloaded here: roma.odi.org