摘要：Does external cooperation really help? The answer to this question varies according to the type of evaluation applied: effect, effectivity or impact evaluation. Effect evaluation verifies if the objectives and goals of a project or program where achieved by the end of its implementation. Effectivity evaluation assesses the social environment of the project, the policies and good government that had an influence on its implementation. Impact evaluation looks into the achievement of long-term goals, or changes in society catalyzed without having been planned by the project or program. About the first kind of evaluation there are tons of studies, about the second there are less, and about the third there is almost nothing. The conclusions of effect and effectivity evaluations are reduced to the technical and economical, and are limited by the assumption that all changes can be attributed to the project. They suggest that cooperation reduces poverty and generates development. If these conclusions were true, Latin America would be by now a poverty-free territory. In this article, impact is conceptualized from a social sciences and political economy perspective. Methodologically, it proposes that in analyzing the causes of change, context always precedes the project. Hence, it offers a conceptual framework from which to answer whether external cooperation really helps.
