Programme evaluation is another widely used tool to help EMBs improve their accountability. The boundaries between performance auditing and programme evaluation are blurred. Both provide independent, objective analyses of how the EMB may better uses its resources. A performance audit will generally concentrate on the economy, efficiency, and effectiveness of the EMB’s performance in relation to the objectives of its activities as stated in its strategic plan or other legal and operational framework documents. A programme evaluation will generally start from the basis of questioning whether the electoral framework, and consequent strategic objectives that the EMB has determined, meet the needs of the EMB’s stakeholders.

Key questions for a programme evaluation of an EMB’s activities include:

1. Does the framework for the EMBs activities, and the EMBs objectives, meet the needs and objectives of the EMB’s stakeholders?
2. Are the services the EMB provides necessary?
3. Could the EMB’s services be provided more effectively?
4. What are the long- and short-term impacts of the services being provided?

Programme evaluations are wholly outcome-focused, feeding back into the EMB’s strategic planning cycle. They concentrate on how the EMB serves its stakeholders, including whether the needs assessments on which an EMB’s strategies and activities are based are still valid. As they are stakeholder-focused, they concentrate on obtaining the expectations of stakeholders of the EMB and their views on the appropriateness and performance of its current activities. In an environment of changing societal attitudes and political and legal frameworks, and technological advances, these evaluations assist the EMB to identify areas of activity that no longer effectively meet its stakeholders’ needs. A programme evaluation may review whether specific EMB services are still needed, or whether other institutions are better placed to use all or some of the public funds available for specific electoral services, for example voter education, than the EMB.