Using Household Surveys to Build Analytic Capacity

This article reviews the results of efforts in five countriesto build a national capacity to analyze social policy; theseefforts were undertaken in oconjunction with Living StandardsMeasurement Survey (LSMS) projects. Case studies for Bolivia,Jamaica, the Kyrgyz Republic, South Africa, and Vietnam showthat building such capacity requires explicit planning, significanttime and money, open access to data, and strong support frompolicymakers. Lessons are drawn about four aspects of buildingcapacity—training, technical assistance, research, andrecruitment. The lessons learned from these LSMS projects applyin a more general sense to other kinds of capacity-buildingprojects.