was open to qualified students of all political persuasions – there was going to be no “punishment” of nationalists or former Milošević supporters. – The evaluation team met a number of former scholarship recipients in high office today. The fact that the funds came quickly, and at that difficult time in their history, and also that the scholarships were available to all – all this has seemingly made a considerable impression among many members of Serbia’s upcoming élite, and the scholarships probably cemented the image of Norway as a sincere partner. Otherwise it is clear that individual grants were a mixed lot in terms of relevance to operational foreign-policy goals. In general, these Embassy Projects, representing a large number of disparate activities, are impossible to aggregate in any meaningful way. At the level of effectiveness of individual grants it is therefore difficult to see what can be claimed. What has been somewhat striking, however, is that those informants that have benefited from Embassy Project grants – and the many others who are aware of them - all speak highly of them. Since the projects have largely been quite specific and targeted, the likelihood of the outputs being produced is probably reasonably good. But it would be very helpful to have a more careful synthesis study on what has actually been achieved through these numerous activities. Given some of the comments and observations provided, the results may in fact be more profound than expected. What is clear is that having this flexible small-scale funding available locally has given the Embassy an important tool for remaining relevant, visible and supportive in a fast-changing context.
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Evaluation of Norwegian Development Cooperation with the Western Balkans