Evaluating collaborative natural resource management

In this article, we look at the evolving collaborative natural resource management movement in the United States and discuss current calls to evaluate it. We then explore approaches researchers have used to evaluate both specific efforts and the broader movement. Evaluative criteria developed thus far by several researchers show commonalities as well as differences. We argue that evaluation approaches will necessarily vary with the evaluation's intent, the type of collaborative effort being evaluated, and the values of the evaluator. Evaluators need to consider and make explicit their standards for comparison, criteria, and methods in order to clarify the nature of an evaluation and facilitate the synthesis of findings.