LOGICAL FRAMEWORKS, ARISTOTLE AND SOFT SYSTEMS:A NOTE ON THE ORIGINS, VALUES AND USES OF LOGICAL

FRAMEWORKS, IN REPLY TO GASPER

SIMON BELL*

Open University, UK

Over recent years I have worked on a range of projects in various parts of the world. The projects have allbeen quite di�erent in scope and content, but they have all had one solitary linking factor ± they have allbeen designed, managed and evaluated by use of the logical framework approach (LFA). Gasper (1999)notes the ubiquity of the LFA and also the stunning lack of accompanying theory concerning its evolutionand development. I have written several articles relating my experiences of making use of logical frameworks(see e.g. Bell, 1996, 1998) and am aware of a literature around them (see e.g. Coleman, 1987; Cordingley,1995; Team Technologies, 1995; Thompson, 1995), but I have more recently been puzzling over their originsand the theory which substand them.

So far as I can ®nd out from reviewing frameworks in consultants' reports and the LFA in discussions inthe literature, the approach as such has been around since the early 1970s, originating at USAID and thenspreading rapidly to UNDP ± the rest is history. But the principles of the LFA seem to go back a lot furtherthan this. I think the origin can be traced to classical Greece.

I was describing the LFA to a philosopher-friend and he spotted it immediately! He told me to readAristotle. Aristotle described a doctrine of `four causes' by which, it has been argued (Flew, 1979), he meantthat there were four fundamental types of question that could be asked of any speci®c issue or problem (or,for our purposes here, project). The four types of question form a hierarchy ± from bottom to top ± thematerial, the formal, the e�cient and the ®nal. Aristotle describes these in The Metaphysics as related to themaking of a statue (a project certainly). Material questions would relate to: `what is the statue made of?'(answers might include e.g. bronze and labour). Formal questions would ask: `what is the bronze statuesupposed to be?' (e.g. a statue of the Leader of the Gods, Zeus). E�cient questions might relate to: `what wasthe statue expected to be for?' (e.g. as an object of reverence). Final questions might relate to: `why was thestatue made at all?' (e.g. to assist in maintaining the moral and ethical structure of the state).

Making statues, making rural development policy, building up health infrastructure ± the thinking can beregarded as being similar at one level anyway. Considering the LFA in this light, the logic behind the LFAcan be argued to work as follows.

. Material questions can be interpreted as relating to the physical processes and activities involved in anyprocess.

. Formal questions relate to what the activities, when brought together, produce as output.

. E�cient questions are to do with what the produced thing will be.

. Final questions are interested in how this thing contributes to wider needs and purposes.

Intentionally or unintentionally, these questions arise in the development and evaluation of LogFrames asthey are often presented. Further, these four levels of questioning have provided me with what I consider tobe an holistic set of questions to ask of any project context.

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*Correspondence to: Simon Bell, Southern Cottage, Green Lane, Wicklewood, Norfolk NR18 9ET, UK.

Whilst accepting Gasper's criticism of the LFA, in particular

. the misuses of the approach in contexts which are not appropriate,

. with craft skills which are inadequate and

. in impositional and systematic control processes devised without the consent of those who have to livewith the consequences,

I have nevertheless found the LFA of value to me in my practice, but mainly as a means to develop questionsand assess the causes at work in projects at the evaluation level. The four questions work their way into myuse of the LFA as follows.

. What activities are taking place in this project (material causes) ± were they originally planned for or arethey unintended additions to those ®rst considered? What is going on?

. What are the outputs from these activities ± what were they supposed to achieve ( formal causes)? Whathave they achieved and who wanted them to be achieved? How are we doing what is going on?

. What purpose or purposes are these outputs designed to bring about (e�cient causes). Was the purposechosen from within the project or imposed upon the project from a small controlling group? (The answerto this type of question will indicate whether the project is purposeful or purposive ± and this in turn willindicate the level of autonomy and internal viability within the project.) Why are we doing what is goingon?

. What wider goal is it expected will be made more realizable if the purpose is achieved (®nal causes). Whodetermined why we are doing, how we are doing and what is going on?

Maybe Aristotle is the originator of the logic behind the LFA, but, as Gasper indicates, this cannot be theend of the case. Indiscriminate use of any approach ± no matter how apparently sensible and benign ±without due reference to context, multiple perspective and variable goals indicates a tyranny of method overthe needs of context ( for more on this see Bell, 1994) and surely must end in someone's tears. Gasper'sidenti®cation of two `styles' is valuable for the furtherance of the discussion around the LFA. His `style A',which conforms to a control model perspective, is compared with `style B', a more humanized, trust-basedapproach (not a new observation this ± for example see McGregor and theory X, theory Y ± McGregor,1960). Gasper indicates that style A `is of course the style of the LogFrame'. I would not disagree entirelywith this. The LFA with its measurement and accounting can be a control freak's tyranny (Bell, 1994). But,just as easily, in di�erent hands with a di�erent culture of use it can be a means to think dynamically andsystemically ± multiple perspectives and multiple levels ± about complex problems. For example, if the LFAis linked to other participative problem-solving approaches such as Soft Systems Methodology (Checkland,1981; Checkland and Scholes, 1990; Checkland and Holwell, 1999) and applied as described elsewhere (Bell,1999), I would argue that it can provide systemic as well as systematic capability to a stakeholder team. Forexample, on projects on which I have recently worked in Pakistan and China, the LogFrame has been`passed across' to stakeholder groups and used by them to develop their own views of projects which can thenbe compared with donor and project manager versions. The resulting multiple perspectives have allowed newinsights to arise. The process for participation has to be explicit though. It is not enough to give a stakeholderteam a copy of TeamUp or an LFA manual. The need is for workshops and facilitated brainstorming ±taking into account local ideas and concerns about how such team work can be developed. The team canthen develop the four levels of ideas about their project (or the project which is not theirs but which will bethrust upon them). Generally the responses have been favourable in my experience. Maybe it is a con-sequence of the universal nature of Aristotle's observation which has meant that a wide range of people froma wide range of cultures can make use of the LFA?Maybe this wider use is a function of the success or failureof facilitation? Maybe a combination of the two? The point is that the LFA can be a participatory device fordeveloping wider understandings about projects, and the inclusion of multiple views can help to buildLogFrames which are full of new emergent ideas and clear about boundaries and scope of in¯uence.

30 S. BELL

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The problem seems to have been that the LFA has been the unquestioned and ubiquitous approach,experienced by some as a tyranny, of many projects over 30 years. The beginnings of questioning and thedevelopment of participation may well bring out hidden strengths as well as indications of appalling weak-nesses in the LFA in theory and practice.

REFERENCES

Bell S. 1994. Methods and mindsets: towards an understanding of the tyranny of methodology. Public Administration and Development14: 323±338.

Bell S. 1996. Approaches to participatory monitoring and evaluation in Dir District, North West Frontier Province, Pakistan. SystemsPractice 9: 129±150.

Bell S. 1998. Managing and learning with logical frameworks: the case of an MIS project in China. Human Systems Management 17:15±28.

Bell S. 1999. Finding out rapidly: a soft systems approach to training needs analysis (TNA). Development in Practice 9: 18±32.Checkland P. 1981. Systems Thinking, Systems Practice. Wiley: Chichester.Checkland P, Holwell S. 1999. Information, Systems and Information Systems. Wiley: Chichester.Checkland P, Scholes J. 1990. Soft Systems Methodology in Action. Wiley: Chichester.Coleman G. 1987. Logical framework approach to the monitoring and evaluation of agricultural and rural development projects.

Project Appraisal 2: 251±259.Cordingley D. 1995. Integrating the logical framework into the management of technical co-operation projects. Project Appraisal 10:

103±112.Flew A. 1979. A Dictionary of Philosophy. Pan: London.Gasper D. 1999. Evaluating the `logical framework approach': towards learning-orientated development evaluation. Public

Administration and Development 20(1): 17±28.McGregor D. 1960. The Human Side of Enterprise. McGraw-Hill: Boston, MA.Team Technologies. 1995. TeamUp 2.0. Team Technologies: Chantilly.Thompson J. 1995.User Involvement in Mental Health Services: the Limits of Consumerism, the Risks of Marginalisation and the Need for

a Critical Approach. Centre for Systems Studies: University of Hull, Hull.

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