Doctoral Researchers

When global principles of organization trickle down to national administrations they are not simply applied or rejected. Rather, they are translated: actors embedded in their local administrative context negotiate their meaning. Current international efforts in the field of development aid to foster and harmonize results-based management under the so-called “results agenda” stumble over local contexts constraining the appropriation of this model of organization. Experts argue that the lack of a “results culture” has hindered the sound implementation of results-based management systems in development aid administrations. I contend instead that the very translation of the results agenda builds up the culture of results of these organizations. In-depth content analysis and geometrical data analysis are employed to systematically explore the distribution of local frames as translations of the results agenda in the French administration of development aid, thereby reconstructing the broader issue culture of results and unveiling the distribution of power amongst frames and framers around results-based management in this sector.