When conducting culturally competent evaluations it is important to “understand the program’s social, cultural, and historical contexts as well as the culture of the program itself” (CDC, 2014). Evaluators should familiarize themselves with culturally determined mores, values, and ways of knowing in the population being evaluated (AEA, 2011). This may require “deliberately setting aside time and resources in the evaluation timeline and budget to learn about differences and similarities” among stakeholders, as well as between the evaluator and stakeholders, and designing processes that take these similarities and differences into account (Lee, 2007).

Culturally responsive evaluation (CRE) requires particular attention to the historical, sociopolitical, community,and organizational contexts in which an evaluation will be conducted (McBride, 2018). This includes the history of the location, the program, and the people (Hood et al., 2015). “As much as possible, evaluators should understand the realities and challenges to the daily lives of the priority population based on political positioning, leadership, power dynamics, peer agency coordination, etc. These conditions and more could influence the success of an investment and the outcomes continuing, discontinuing, or expanding support based on evaluation results and findings” (Public Policy Associates, 2015).

Cultural and historical context are acknowledged and addressed in culturally responsive and equitable evaluations. “Evaluators should also recognize the continuing reality of white privilege and structural oppression that perpetuate racial inequity in America today and develop evaluation protocols that account for these factors. Finally, evaluators using this lens must recognize that each community has its own history and context, which must be acknowledged and considered when assessing the impact of social investments and developing findings and recommendations” (Public Policy Associates, 2015).

Understanding historical context in this field is essential; researchers must acknowledge and address the dynamics of power (Gitlin, 1994 as cited in Bowman et al., 2015) and disempowerment when creating research or evaluation studies conducted with Indigenous people. Prior to European contact, Indigenous people inhabiting North America used their own systems of self-governance to sustain high levels of health, education, and social and community welfare of tribal people. Each tribe was unique in its culture, customs, worldview, and traditions, and other teachings were grounded in a way of life that was distinct to each tribe. In a culturally responsive Indigenous evaluation (CRIE)  framework, it is important to understand and consider the unique worldview(s) of the tribe(s) impacted by the evaluation (University of Toronto Press, 2020).

Although culture and context are not specifically mentioned, empowerment evaluation’s grounding has been in ethnography and ethnographic research. Additionally, the overarching and guiding principles of being community-owned and based upon community knowledge are closely aligned with grounding in culture and context. To that end, the history and background of communities must be part of the evaluation, if honoring community knowledge and capacity. In an empowerment evaluation framework, centering community knowledge and community ownership is foundational to self-determination (Fetterman et al., 2018).

In the international development sector, consideration of cultural and historical contexts and different worldviews is critically important. Bamberger & Segone (2011) note that “when designing an equity-focused evaluation it is important to understand the context within which the intervention has been implemented, and the factors that affected implementation and accessibility to the different worst-off groups (including economic, political, socio-cultural, environmental, legal, institutional and other factors)”. Even when practiced in the US Domestic context, “equitable evaluation explicitly accounts for the context of structural barriers to social change and recognizes that culture is bound to this context. We are evolving toward evaluation that more fully recognizes context and cultural validity and that explores questions that deepen understanding of historic and present-day structural and systematic barriers to desired outcomes “(Dean-Coffey, 2018). The Equitable Evaluation Framework™ (EEF) notes that consideration of historical and structural decisions has contributed to the condition to be addressed and understanding that the cultural context is tangled up in both the structural conditions and the change initiative itself.”

“The use of a social justice lens highlights the need for careful contextual analysis as the starting point for evaluations that are focused on social transformation designed to improve human rights” (Mertens, 2016). Contextual analyses are an essential stage of the evaluation. Evaluators are charged with acknowledging “the historical and social location of knowledge, combined with an understanding of the effect of a legacy of discrimination and oppression. The evaluator’s role is to bring to visibility historical knowledge of this nature, link it to the social positioning of those who create the knowledge, and critically examine the consequences of accepting one version of reality over another” (Mertens, 2016). The transformative ontological assumption holds that “there are multiple realities that are socially constructed” (Mertens, 2007); that is, different realities can emerge and be experienced based on one’s lived experience. Evaluation should explore different versions of reality for people from different social positionalities in “determining the reality that holds potential for social transformation and increased social justice” (Mertens, 2007).