The purpose of this page is to provide some provisional ideas on the use of ParEvo to reconstruct alternative histories, as distinct from exploring alternative futures. Design choices will be different because the opportunities and constraints will be different.
Contents
- The chosen scope of alternative histories
- The number and duration of iterations
- Three possible reconstruction purposes
- Identify alternative stakeholder perspectives
- Detail specific causal pathways
- Explore counterfactuals
- The Facilitators guidance to participants
- Evaluation criteria
- Other options
The chosen scope of alternative histories
This interpretation was prompted by a recent viewing of a video by Andy Sterling, available here. Three dimensions are proposed:
- Scale of historical events being reconstructed. E.g.
- The whole programme from beginning to end, versus
- Specific sequence of events within the programme
- Diversity of stakeholders involved in the reconstruction. E.g.
- Only those involved in programme implementation, versus
- A wider group of stakeholders also involved
- Realism of the events being reconstructed. E.g.
- Description of events known to have occurred, though perhaps seen from different perspectives, versus
- Description of alternative events that could have happened, given what is currently known
The number and duration of iterations
In order to get an even coverage of the passage of time between the beginning of the programme and its end, it would probably be best to make each iteration equivalent to a particular span of time. For example, six months. Then for the total number of iterations x the duration of each iteration = the total span of time that the exercise needs to cover.
Three possible reconstruction purposes
These are a subset of the possibilities suggested above.
1. Identify alternative stakeholder perspectives
The first possible purpose would be to develop a broad-brush description of what happened to a program, from the beginning to the end. Here the intention would be to identify the key moments, and their consequences, as seen from the perspectives of different stakeholders. Choices could then be made by an evaluation team as to where, within this broad picture, they should invest the limited resources
Location in the design space = Scale 1 + Diversity 2 + Realism 1
2. Detail specific causal pathways
The second possible purpose would be to develop a detailed articulation of the sequence of events connecting a particular activity and its consequences. Here the intention would be to identify different views of the possible causal mechanisms that were at work. Then methods like process tracing could be used to identify the relative plausibility of each explanation.
Location in the design space = Scale 2 + Diversity 1 or 2 + Realism 1
3. Explore counterfactuals
A third possibility is that a ParEvo exercise could be used to construct a kind of “counterfactual history”. Two types could be considered, of the kind described by the Wikipedia entry on counterfactual history :
- “Counterfactual history [which] distinguishes itself through its interest in the very incident that is being negated by the counterfactual, thus seeking to evaluate the event’s relative historical importance. Such historians reason arguments for each change, outlining changes in broad terms only, as befits a mere byproduct of the exercise.
- An alternate history writer, on the other hand, is interested precisely in the hypothetical scenarios that flow from the negated incident or event. A fiction writer is thus free to invent very specific events and characters in the imagined history”
The first approach would limit participants to identifying alternative events to a given event in a storyline. Whereas the second would allow them to develop those alternative events into a whole new fictional storyline.
With either of these options, the facilitator would need to decide which events in a realistic reconstruction of history should be the “seed” for the development of counterfactual events that could then have happened.
An important point has been made in this blog posting by James Hardy (2016). Any counterfactual has an ‘antecedent ‘ and a ‘consequent ‘. The antecedent is the event that is different from what really happened, the consequent is the consequence(s) of that difference. He argues that often too much atention is give to evaluating the likelihood of the consequent events, whereas any evaluation of a counterfactual should start by evaluating the possiblity and likelihood of the antecedent.
Location in the design space = Scale 1 or 2. + Diversity 1 or 2 + Realism 2
Postscript: The same Wikipedia entry goes on to say: “Most historians regard counterfactual history as perhaps entertaining, but not meeting the standards of mainstream historical research due to its speculative nature. Advocates of counterfactual history often respond that all statements about causality in history contain implicit counterfactual claims—for example, the claim that a certain military decision helped a country win a war presumes that if that decision had not been made, the war would have been less likely to be won, or would have been longer“.
References of possible interest
‘What if’ is a waste of time. Counterfactual history is misguided and outdated, as the first world war debate shows. Richard Evans. 2014 The Guardian
FORAYS INTO “WHAT IF” HISTORY: AN AFTER ACTION REPORT. Mark Grimsley | May 1, 2015
Counter-Factual History: Valid Exploration or Inappropriate Time Waster?
James Hardy | Creative Arts, Society | September 14, 2016
The Facilitators guidance to participants
If histories are being reconstructed in order to inform an evaluation process it is likely that there will need to be more constraints on the contributions being made than in an exercise aimed at a more open-ended and imaginative exploration of possible futures.
Ideally, the events described would need to be more than just possible. Preferably participants would believe that the events did happen, or were likely to have happened, as described.
The following guidance could also be considered:
- Omissions: Facilitators could draw attention to the kinds of events and issues that do not seem to have been attended to the current point
- Quality: Facilitators could highlight quality issues relating to the contents of contributions that have been made at any point. For example, the extent to which events were clearly and unambiguously described, enough to make them potentially verifiable
At least three different mechanisms would be available for channelling this guidance:
- In the Facilitators guidance found at the top of the exercise, at ParEvo.org This is typically updated at the beginning of each iteration.
- In the email sent to participants by the Facilitator at the beginning of each iteration
- In the Comments made on individual contributions, during the Comment phase of each iteration, if that has been enabled and then used by the Facilitator
Evaluation criteria
These are likely to be different from those used to assess alternative futures
- Probability no longer seems relevant, except when counterfactual events are being explored (see below).
- Desirability is still relevant but would probably best be differentiated. For example, into
- Equity
- Sustainability
- Verifiability will be more important. Along with other related criteria such as ” Evidenced”
Other options
Histories as sequences of “Most Significant Changes (MSC)
When participants area asked to add a new contribution, describing what happened next, in the period covered by the current iteration, they could be asked to be selective. Rather than recounting all the events in that period they could be asked to describe what they thought was the most significant event during that period, along with an explanation of why they thought so. A personalised interpreted view of history.
When the next iteration began the Facilitator could ask the participants to select the storyline to extend, based on their view of which of all the most recently reported and interpreted changes they thought was most significant of all.
This kind of approach would have evaluation consequences. Individual contributions that were added to by many others, would be the more significant. Storylines with more side branches, and descendants, than others would be more significant.
Different storylines will have been created by different combinations of participants. The social structures these forms of cooperation may be of interest. Who shares many/few similarity of views of significant change with whom?
Imagined histories
In two evaluations carried out in 2021 the evaluation team used ParEvo to construct imagined histories of individual experiences. In one case it was the experience of a person becoming a UN Volunteer. In the other, it was a staff member’s experience of the implementation of a gender policy in a UN organisation.
In both cases, after the ParEvo exercise was completed, the Facilitator surveyed the views of large numbers of other volunteers/staff members of those organisations to ask them which storylines (or parts thereof) matched their own experience, and in what ways so.
ParEvo 