There’s a tension in the social sector between “evidence-based” and “innovative.” Policy-makers and funders have largely gotten behind the concept that basing decisions on evidence is a good idea. At the same time, they want to see proposals and work plans full of innovative thinking. (It’s hard to get support to keep doing what we’re doing —even if what we’re doing seems to be working just fine —without some innovation in the mix.)
This has bothered me for years on a purely semantic level. If something is truly innovative, then it hasn’t been done before. If it hasn’t been done before, it can’t possibly have been studied. If it hasn’t been studied, there can’t be evidence —at least, not rigorous, gold-standard evidence. So how can something be both “evidence-based” and “innovative”?
My answer? Adaptation.
Cultural and technological advancement —the stuff that builds humanity, that moves us forward as a species —has been driven much more by adaptation than by pure inspiration or creativity. Taking solutions proven in one context and applying them in another. Hearing or reading about pieces of diverse ideas, and fitting them together into something new. Adjusting to the cultural shock when an old way of thinking proves less than useful, or even untrue.
(More to come on this, some day. I just wanted to get the core of the thought articulated.)