Hosted by the Government Outcomes Lab at the Blavatnik School of Government at the University of Oxford, in partnership with the Policy Innovation and Evaluation Research Unit at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and Newcastle University Business School.

Governments and international donor agencies around the world have become increasingly focused on outcomes – the positive results that programmes produce in the lives of service users and citizens – rather than the volume or quality of activity. This ‘outcomes-based’ model encompasses a range of approaches. The conference will focus on models that encourage collaboration across sectors, such as outcomes-based commissioning, social impact bonds, outcomes funds, and place-based approaches. 

We are interested in exploring how well these approaches work in practice. We want to strengthen the understanding of when and how this focus on outcomes can be effective for delivering public services, and whether it can be more effective than other options. We aim to ensure that this emerging knowledge is used to equip government policy-makers with more and better tools to tackle complex social issues. 

In keeping with the 2018 conference, we will once again bring together the most distinguished academic and practitioner voices from different countries and disciplines for an in-depth exploration of the practice and evidence base around the implementation of outcomes-based models of public service provision from across the world.  

The conference will be of interest to academics, researchers, practitioners and policy-makers and will include keynote speeches from international experts and interactive group sessions alongside more traditional academic paper presentations.

Full details are available on the Government Outcomes Lab website.

Many of the sessions will be livestreamed and recorded on the Blavatnik School of Government's YouTube channel.