Department of Justice Component of Canada’s Action Plan Against Racism
3. METHODOLOGY
The methodology used to evaluate the Justice component of CAPAR included a document review, a file review and key informant interviews with departmental officials and other stakeholders. Case studies were conducted for the formative evaluation to collect more detailed information on a set of sub-studies funded through CAPAR; however it was not used in this evaluation. The following section provides further details on each research method.
3.1. Document Review
A series of relevant documents were identified and reviewed. These documents can be grouped under the following categories:
- Performance information documentation such as: Annual Reports to Citizenship and Immigration Canada; the Evaluation Assessment of CAPAR; the Evaluation Framework for the Justice Component of CAPAR; the horizontal Results-based Management and Accountability Framework for CAPAR; and the Formative Evaluation of the Department of Justice component of CAPAR.
- Deliverables from projects funded through the Justice component of CAPAR, such as: the National Anti-Racism Council of Canada’s report on the Overrepresentation of Aboriginal Peoples and People of African Descent and Asian Descent in Custody; Dr. Andrea Slane’s report on Combating Hate on the Internet: Current Canadian Efforts and the Recommendations of Non-Governmental Organizations to Improve Upon Them; Hate Crime for Victim Services Workers booklet; and the African Canadian Legal Clinic’s Anti-black Hate Crimes Manual.
3.2. File Review
All JPIP files that have been funded under the Action Plan[4] (n=10) as well as those that were not approved for funding (n=11) were reviewed as part of the evaluation.
3.3. Key Informant Interviews
Interviews were conducted with key informants, both within and outside the Department, who have been involved with the activities of the Justice component of CAPAR. A total of 12 interviews were conducted. Interviews with departmental personnel (staff from Youth Justice Policy, Research and Statistics Division, Public Law Policy, Criminal Law Policy, and Programs Branch) (n=7) were conducted in person, while interviews with key informants outside the Department, including funding recipients (n=5), were conducted over the telephone.
3.4. Surveys
Surveys were used to obtain feedback from participants who attended three of four departmental forums on Aboriginal justice issues. A telephone survey was conducted for the second forum (n=29), and surveys were distributed in-person at the third forum (n=6) and last forum (n=24).
3.5. Methodological Limitations
There were several methodological limitations with the evaluation. First, there was very little quantitative data and information available for the evaluation. Most of the activities were oriented towards policy and research development, networking, and information sharing, which are better suited to qualitative data collection. Secondly, the low response rate to some of the surveys posed a challenge to having a representative sample and the accuracy of the survey findings.
[4] Beginning 2007-2008 to end of 2009-2010 fiscal year
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