Person:
Rawlings, Laura B.
Author Name Variants
Fields of Specialization
Social protection,
Impact evaluation,
Development economics
Degrees
Departments
Global Practice on Social Protection and Labor
Externally Hosted Work
Contact Information
Last updated
January 31, 2023
Biography
Laura B. Rawlings is an economist with over 20 years of experience in the design, implementation and evaluation of human development programs. She currently works on developing innovative approaches for scalable social protection systems in low resource settings, with a research focus on using cash transfers together with behavioral interventions to foster improved early childhood development. She was the team leader responsible for developing the World Bank’s Social Protection and Labor Strategy 2012-2022 and was previously the manager of the Strategic Impact Evaluation Fund (SIEF). She also worked as the Sector Leader for Human Development in Central America where she was responsible for managing the World Bank’s health, education and social protection portfolios. She began her career at the World Bank in the Development Research Group where she worked on the impact evaluation of social programs. She has worked in Africa and Latin American leading numerous project and research initiatives in the areas of conditional cash transfers, public works, social funds, early childhood development and social protection systems. Prior to joining the World Bank she worked for the Overseas Development Council where she ran an education program on development issues for staff in the US Congress. She has published numerous books and articles in the fields of evaluation and human development and is a professor in Georgetown University’s Global Human Development program.
Publication Search Results
1 - 10 of 20
-
Publication
Building Social Protection and Labor Systems : Concepts and Operational Implications
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-03)This paper presents a framework for designing and implementing social protection and labor (SP&L) systems in middle and low income countries. Although the term 'system' is used to describe a country's set of social protection programs, these tend to operate independently with little or no coordination even when they have the same policy objective and target similar population groups. The paper argues that enhancing coordination across SP&L policies, programs, and administrative tools has the potential to enhance both individual program performance as well as the overall provision of social protection across programs. The first part of the paper discusses the characteristics of well?designed social protection systems. It also points to the gains and some of the risks - of moving toward systems, including: (i) more effective risk management in crisis and non?crisis periods; (ii) improved financial sustainability; (iii) more equitable redistribution; (iv) economies of scale in administration; and (v) better incentives. The second part discusses issues related to design and implementation based on country studies for Brazil, Chile, India, Niger, Romania, and Vietnam. It suggests three levels of engagement to support the design of SP&L systems: (a) at the policy level, defining how different instruments (e.g., savings, risk pooling, redistribution) interact, and coordinating financing mechanisms and institutional arrangements; (b) at the program level, improving the design of individual programs and creating synergies with other programs within and across social protection functions; and (c) at the administrative level, setting up basic 'nuts and bolts' tools that can work across programs, such as beneficiary identification and registry, payment mechanisms, and management information systems. The last part of the paper outlines some of the implications of a systems vision for the World Bank's social protection and labor practice. -
Publication
Evaluating the Impact of Conditional Cash Transfer Programs
(Oxford University Press on behalf of the World Bank, 2005-03-01)Several developing economies have recently introduced conditional cash transfer programs, which provide money to poor families contingent on certain behavior, usually investments in human capital, such as sending children to school or bringing them to health centers. The approach is both an alternative to more traditional social assistance programs and a demand-side complement to the supply of health and education services. Unlike most development initiatives, conditional cash transfer programs have been subject to rigorous evaluations of their effectiveness using experimental or quasi-experimental methods. Evaluation results for programs launched in Colombia, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, and Turkey reveal successes in addressing many of the failures in delivering social assistance, such as weak poverty targeting, disincentive effects, and limited welfare impacts. There is clear evidence of success from the first generation of programs in Colombia, Mexico, and Nicaragua in increasing enrollment rates, improving preventive health care, and raising household consumption. Many questions remain unanswered, however, including the potential of conditional cash transfer programs to function well under different conditions, to address a broader range of challenges among poor and vulnerable populations, and to prevent the intergenerational transmission of poverty. -
Publication
Impact Evaluation of Social Funds : An Introduction
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2002-05)Despite the importance of knowing whether development programs achieve their objectives, impact evaluations remain rare in developing economies. This is unfortunate. With the growing use of results-based management by governments, determining whether goals have been attained and convincingly linking changes to specific programs has become increasingly critical. Tracking such outcomes as gains in school enrollment or reductions in infant mortality is indispensable. But simply gathering good data on outcomes sheds little light on why objectives have or have not been met. For this reason, impact evaluations should be a key instrument in policymakers' monitoring and evaluation toolbox. -
Publication
Evaluating Social Funds : A Cross-Country Analysis of Community Investments
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2004)The study seeks to answer four questions that summarize the fundamental issues in the international debate about the capacity of social funds to improve beneficiaries' living conditions: o Do social funds reach poor areas and poor households? Do social funds deliver high-quality, sustainable investments? Do social funds affect living standards? How cost-efficient are social funds and the investments they finance, compared with other delivery mechanisms? The findings and lessons from this research reflect a specific moment in the evolution of six social funds and therefore may not fully predict the future impact of current investments. The evaluation assesses subprojects identified and implemented between 1993 and 1999, a period when longer-term objectives-such as increasing access to and utilization of basic services-began to supplant the funds' original emergency mandates. The time period selected allowed enough elapsed time following the implementation of the social fund subprojects to make measurement of impact and sustainability possible. The evaluation does not consider the effects of social fund projects on employment or on income generation-the original objectives of the first generation of social funds, which were introduced in Latin America. It also does not discuss the effect of social fund investments on capacity building-a more recent emphasis of social funds seeking to assist decentralization and community development. -
Publication
Evaluating the Impact of Conditional Cash Transfer Programs : Lessons from Latin America
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2003-08)Unlike most development initiatives, conditional cash transfer programs recently introduced in the Latin America and the Caribbean region have been subject to rigorous evaluations of their effectiveness. These programs provide money to poor families, conditional on certain behavior, usually investments in human capital-such as sending children to school or bringing them to health centers on a regular basis. Rawlings and Rubio review the experience in evaluating the impact of these programs, exploring the application of experimental and quasi-experimental evaluation methods and summarizing results from programs launched in Brazil, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, and Nicaragua. Evaluation results from the first generation of programs in Brazil, Mexico, and Nicaragua show that conditional cash transfer programs are effective in promoting human capital accumulation among poor households. There is clear evidence of success in increasing enrollment rates, improving preventive health care, and raising household consumption. Despite this promising evidence, many questions remain unanswered about the impact of conditional cash transfer programs, including those concerning their effectiveness under different country conditions and the sustainability of the welfare impacts. -
Publication
A New Approach to Social Assistance: Latin America’s Experience with Conditional Cash Transfer Programs
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2004-01)Conditional cash transfers (CCTs) are an innovative and increasingly popular approach to social assistance. They provide money to poor families contingent upon certain behavior, usually investments in human capital such as keeping children in school or taking them to health centers on a regular basis. These programs are perhaps the clearest policy manifestation of a new line of thinking on the long-term role of social assistance programs. Not only are they instruments for short-term poverty alleviation, but they also encompass longer-term economic growth and human capital development objectives. They have been adopted internationally and in several countries they have been scaled up to become integral components of poverty alleviation strategies. -
Publication
Colombia : Reforming the Social Safety Net
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2003-02)Historically, Colombia's "safety nets" were economic growth and a now unsustainable expansion of social services, notably in health, education, and pensions. Social assistance (SA) was not included in the dramatic social sector reforms of the 1990s, implying that the social safety net did not benefit from increased spending, decentralization and the strategic prioritization afforded to other social sector areas. SA remains under-financed compared to national demands and international norms (Box 1). Furthermore, the SA programs that could have provided a safety net during the crisis were hampered by structural constraints, including poor poverty targeting in certain programs, institutional inflexibility, and unfocused mandates. The Government of Colombia asked the World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) to help craft Colombia's social safety net was reviewed and a number of steps taken, including: (i) rapid crafting of a short-term emergency safety net investment program called the Social Support Network (Red de Apoyo Social, RAS); (ii) a poverty assessment and a social safety net assessment; and (iii) implementation of two social sector adjustment operations focused on medium term reforms of the social safety net, health and education systems. The Colombia Social Safety Net Assessment included: (i) a risk and vulnerability assessment based on the analysis of new and existing household survey data as well as a rapid qualitative study and (ii) an institutional analysis of Colombia's new and existing federal social assistance programs. With the Colombia Poverty Assessment, this analytical work provided an empirical basis and a participatory process for outlining priorities for reforming the social protection system. -
Publication
Protecting the Poor Through Programmatic Adjustment Lending in Peru, Brazil and Colombia
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2003-12)Social reforms typically require long-term, incremental policy changes. Traditional World Bank (WB) funding for discrete investments or technical assistance often had little broad policy impact. Even sector adjustment loans tended to be too inflexible and short-term to support ongoing social reforms. Some countries needed new kinds of financial and technical assistance to sustain reforms during crisis and beyond. Recognizing the need for steady, incremental reforms combined with institution building, the WB introduced Programmatic Structural Adjustment Loans/Credits (PSAL/PSAC) in 1998. In the social arena, this instrument has provided fast-disbursing, flexible, multi-year support to help countries preserve their social safety nets during crises and strengthen them in the long run through capacity building and institutional reforms. In the Latin America and the Caribbean region, loans to Peru, Brazil, and Colombia illustrate how the new multi-sector social reform efforts have worked in practice. -
Publication
Examining Conditional Cash Transfer Programs : A Role for Increased Social Inclusion?
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2006-06)Conditional Cash Transfer programs (CCTs) provide money to poor families contingent upon certain verifiable actions, generally minimum investments in children s human capital such as regular school attendance or basic preventative health care. They therefore hold promise for addressing the inter-generational transmission of poverty and fostering social inclusion by explicitly targeting the poor, focusing on children, delivering transfers to women, and changing social accountability relationships between beneficiaries, service providers and governments. CCT programs are at the forefront of applying new social policy theories and program administration practices. They address demand-side barriers, have a synergistic focus on investments in health, education and nutrition, and combine short-term transfers for income support with incentives for long-run investments in human capital. They also are public sector leaders in program administration, using modern targeting, registering, and monitoring systems along with strategic evaluations. Their impact depends on the supply of quality, accessible health and education services and may increase with strengthened links to the labor market, and a greater focus on early childhood and transient support to households facing shocks. CCT programs are facing a number of challenges as they evolve, from reaching vulnerable groups to fostering transparency and accountability, especially at the community level. Centralized programs have been criticized for limiting the engagement of local governments and civil society and it is clear that in limited capacity environments, a greater reliance on communities is warranted. In sum, though promising, these programs are not a panacea against social exclusion and should form part of comprehensive social and economic policy strategies and be applied carefully in different policy contexts. -
Publication
Stepping Up Early Childhood Development : Investing in Young Children for High Returns
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2014-10)Investing in young children is one of the best investments that countries can make. A child s earliest years present a unique window of opportunity to address inequality, break the cycle of poverty, and improve a wide range of outcomes later in life. Recent brain research suggests the need for holistic approaches to learning, growth, and development, recognizing that young children s physical and intellectual well-being, as well as their socio-emotional and cognitive development, are interrelated. To fully benefit from future opportunities in life and become productive members of society, by the end of early childhood, young children must be: healthy and well-nourished; securely attached to caregivers; able to interact positively with families, teachers, and peers; able to communicate in their native language; and ready to learn throughout primary school. This document draws on these existing frameworks and broad evidence on the impacts of ECD interventions. It summarizes some of the existing literature on this topic with the aim to identify key interventions needed for children. The document is intended to provide an easily accessible introduction to interventions and integrated services that could help policymakers and practitioners think about how to effectively invest in ECD. In addition to identifying key interventions, the document outlines four principles that can help countries design and implement strong ECD policies and programs. Countries should: (i) prepare an ECD diagnostic and strategy; (ii) implement widely through coordination; (iii) create synergies and cost savings through integrated interventions; and (iv) monitor, evaluate, and scale up successful interventions. In terms of interventions, within the ECD period, 25 key interventions are identified as essential for a child s growth and development. For each intervention, illustrative costs and impacts are provided. These are based on existing evidence and are only intended to be indicative. The document suggests that these interventions can be delivered through five integrated packages at different stages in a child s life. The five packages of interventions include: (a) the family support package, which should be provided throughout the ECD period, (b) the pregnancy package, (c) the birth package (from birth to six months), (d) the child health and development package, and (e) the preschool package.