Emilie Combaz - Research & consultancy in social sciences
 

Specialist support
through evidence, knowledge & learning

Enhancing planning, policy, programming, advocacy, and training

 

I support partners' planning, policy, programming, advocacy, and training, through customised advice on and contributions to their evidence, knowledge, and learning.


This can take many forms, such as:

  • facilitation;
  • training;
  • the creation of training manuals and materials;
  • guidelines;
  • policy- and practice-oriented literature reviews;
  • action-oriented analysis and advice tailored to a particular context;
  • peer review of policy and programming documents;
  • mapping of stakeholders, and of useful resources and contacts.


Below are examples of specialist support I have provided to various organisations.


Support research funder's efforts to advance knowledge translation in the Global South

In 2022, I have been part of a research project on how best to advance knowledge translation for development in the Global South, i.e. how to ensure that research findings about development issues actually get used by policy-makers and practitioners. This project is commissioned by Canada's International Development Research Centre (IDRC) and implemented by a partnership led by the UK-based Institute of Development Studies (IDS). I have provided multi-disciplinary, cross-sectoral, cross-regional literature reviews in three languages (English, French and Spanish), ensuring that the reviews offer findings about all world regions, disciplines, sectors, structures of inequalities, and stakeholder types. I have designed and implemented the search strategy in academic and grey literature, run the selection and prioritisation of references, extracted and critically analysed contents, and written up findings in clear, concise, engaging summaries and presentations. Throughout, I have productively collaborated with the project partners, with IDRC, and with the Southern-led steering group, to ensure that my work takes into account Southern perspectives and is relevant to Southern stakeholders.

Support the UN refugee agency's work on age, gender and diversity

In 2021 and 2022, I provided expert work on age, gender and diversity (AGD) to the Community-Based Protection Unit at UNHCR's Division of International Protection. Working with teams at headquarters, in regional bureaus and in country offices, I was the lead author and researcher to produce UNHCR's annual accountability report on AGD, which focused on intersectionality, and the associated microsite. I was also led the lead author and researcher for five promising practices on AGD, from five different world regions. Four of the practices have already been published, with a final one pending publication. The published practices cover: context-specific toolboxes online for community mobilisation; tailoring community-based protection to indigenous people's needs and preferences through empowerment; using online chat groups led by refugee women to prevent and respond to gender-based violence during movement restrictions related to Covid-19; and empowering refugee-led organisations to participate in and influence the civic life of their host country.

Providing in-depth support to UN Women's work on gender-responsive procurement

In 2019 and 2020, I supported UN Women's headquarters and its country and regional offices in East and Southern Africa in their internal and external work for gender-responsive procurement in the public and private sectors. Among others, I helped the organisation review its policies and build up knowledge out of its programming in multiple countries, wrote guidelines and a training manual on gender-responsive procurement, and contributed to its internal training and planning work on this issue, with attention to gender-transformative approaches. I also acted as a peer reviewer on internal programmatic guidance that helps country offices with their annual work planning on gender-responsive procurement.


Supporting programming and advocacy in the Middle East through facilitation, evidence, and mapping of resources

I have long provided such services with a focus on Middle Eastern countries. For example, I facilitated the internal learning and exchanges among an Oxfam team in a Middle Eastern country about how to find, assess, and use rigorous evidence on aid effectiveness and on local support systems, in their programmes and advocacy. In another case, I systematically identified helpful sources, resources, and contacts in Lebanon and Jordan for British academics who were participating in DFID-led programming there.


Supporting programming and advocacy for the political participation of persons with disabilities in Cameroon and Senegal

In 2018, I wrote intersectional, gender- and age-sensitive analyses on the political participation of persons with disabilities in Cameroon and Senegal for Sightsavers, an NGO specialised in disability issues. The organisation had over 10 draft quantitative and qualitative studies that it had commissioned and needed to know what the findings pointed to overall. I assessed and summaries these studies into clear, rigorous 10-page syntheses and 2-page summaries per country, providing both French and English versions. Additionally, I offered original analysis and recommendations for the NGO's policy and programming, and I annotated the source studies with comments.


Supporting local advocacy towards international aid actors through action-oriented analysis and advice

I have provided this type of services to international aid organisations, but also to local ones. For example, I worked with a local NGO in the Middle East that is critical of the foreign aid system. I provided it with research on what rights the local population has in relation to aid actors, under human rights and humanitarian law. This directly fed into their planning on how to advocate for changes and how to demand accountability.
 

Find out more about my experience covering various issues through this type of consultancy as well as through my knowledge helpdesk services: