Registers of Practices as an Evidence-Based Social Policy Mechanism for Child Welfare: An Analysis of International Experience

The article analyses the international experience of establishing evidence-based practice registers. Such registers are considered not as a “container” of once and for all selected “best practices”, but as a permanent mechanism of evidence-based social policy. Using the material of registers developed in the USA and the UK, the analysis of the most important structural components of the registers is carried out, with the main focus on the methodology and procedure of practice selection. The authors question the hierarchy of research methodologies and show that experimental design (randomized controlled trials) can be recognized as the “gold standard” of research only under certain conditions — if a linear, simple theory of change is adopted, while the adoption of a complex theory of change requires other research strategies and methods. Based on the analysis, several priority tasks are formulated that need to be addressed in order for the national register of practices being created in Russia to comply with the principles of evidence-based social policy.