The Yale Research Initiative on Innovation and Scale (Y-RISE) is pleased to invite paper submissions for its annual meetings in December 2023.
Conference Dates: December 16 – 20th, 2023
Location: Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands
Submission Deadline: September 10th, 2023, 11:59pm US ET.
We welcome paper submissions related to the complexities of scaling up effective policies or to a few priority research initiatives in specific sectors, described below.
Submission process
Submit your paper here: https://forms.gle/
- You can make multiple submissions, but submit one of the submission forms for each submission.
- The cover page of each submission must include the paper title, abstract, authors, affiliations, and contact information for the applicant.
- The submission form must be completed in full by the deadline to be considered for the conference.
- We will notify applicants by October 10th.
About Y-RISE
Social scientists have developed a rigorous toolkit for evaluating the effects of interventions, but changes in context or scale can limit the ability of such evaluations to serve as a forward-looking guide to policy. Y-RISE has assembled thematic research networks, is setting up research sites in partnership with implementers who operate at scale and supports new research to develop insights around different challenges or implications of scale. For more information, please visit http://yrise.yale.edu. We welcome paper submission on any of the themes listed below.
Spillovers, Network and Equilibrium Effects of Policy Interventions
Spillovers across individuals, groups, or areas induced by scale can amplify or undermine the intended effects of a program. This may include general-equilibrium effects via markets, health externalities such as contagion, risk-sharing, or the transmission of information and/or the transfer of financial resources across members of a network.
Evidence Aggregation and External Validity
The question of external validity or how a program works outside the context of existing evaluations, complicates decisions to scale up or even continue programs that appear promising. To make inferences about large-scale policy change also requires us to develop methods to aggregate evidence across different studies.
Macro, Growth, and Welfare Effects of Policy Interventions
Changes in individual behavior induced by a program can, at scale, have impacts on the macroeconomy – creating feedback loops whose effects may manifest over time. Such changes can alter the behavior of firms, lenders, and governments, leading to structural shifts and welfare impacts that may emerge only in the medium- or long-term.
Political Economy Effects of Policy Interventions
Successfully scaling a program requires understanding how the program interacts with the political landscape – especially if governments become key partners in the scale-up process.
Specific Research Initiatives
- Health Behaviors
Taking advantage of a partnership with the WHO Behavioral Insights unit, we are conducting a project with the Jamaican government on improving nutritious dietary choices at schools. Our research focuses on whether scaling should follow centralized guidelines or whether individual schools should have autonomy in implementation. Taking advantage of a partnership with BRAC and the Bangladesh Ministry of Health, we are conducting projects on (a) scaling para-counselor based mental health support services and (b) reducing smartphone and social media usage among children to protect their mental health. In partnership with the Sierra Leone Ministry of Health, we are working on cost-effective last-mile-delivery of health services, engaging community health workers, community mobilization and demand generation to improve maternal and child health.
We welcome submissions related to school diets and nutrition, mental health, last-mile health service delivery, community health workers, and on scaling complexities related to any of these topics.
- Adaptation to Climate Change
Climate change induced sea level rise and salinity intrusion in coastal Bangladesh is causing changes to cropping patterns, shifts toward aquaculture, changes in the organization of agriculture, and drinking water scarcity We have partnered with a group of hydrologists, geophysicists, meteorologists at MIT along with an institutional partnership with BRAC to collect panel data on large samples, and implement interventions to (a) accelerate diffusion of adaptive farming techniques, and (b) create water entrepreneurs to address drinking water scarcity. We welcome submissions on related climate-change research globally, especially papers that use micro data.
- Innovations to Improve Entrepreneurial Productivity
The Y-RISE IPA Workforce Development Initiative focuses on the complexities of scaling up entrepreneurship interventions in low- and middle-income countries. We encourage submissions on the scaling complexities of entrepreneurship interventions, including market-level GE effects, spillovers, treatment effect heterogeneity, innovative at-scale delivery, or shortages of skilled trainers. We are especially interested in research on business-skills training and mindset-based entrepreneurship training.
Accommodations and expenses
Y-RISE is pleased to offer accommodation and reimbursement for reasonable economy-class travel expenses for one author per paper. We have reserved rooms at a hotel at the Holiday Inn Resort at a discounted group rate. Please direct any questions regarding this call for papers to yrise@yale.edu
