Logical Frameworks: Problems and Potentials (Teaching material for ISS participants)

Abstract

Compared to its huge and still growing use, insufficient in-depth assessment has appeared of the Logical Framework Approach. From a review of three ‘generations’ of ups, downs and evolution, the paper probes and links LFA’s technical intricacies and socio-political assumptions, to give a non-essentialist analysis of problems and potentials. It diagnoses critical issues and dangers in specifying the ‘vertical logic’ and ‘horizontal logic’ in logical framework matrices. The matrix’s simplistic conceptual structure requires skilled handling to avoid pitfalls and produce acceptable approximations or to know when not to employ it. Top-down contexts of use have often worked against this, amplifying rather than countering dangers from the approach’s background technocratic assumptions.