The DEval Opinion Monitor for Development Policy

The adoption of the 2030 Agenda has made the active involvement of citizens in development cooperation (DC) and the German Sustainable Development Strategy more relevant than ever. The Agenda’s ambitious goals, which address such topics as global food security, health, environmental protection, gender equality, education and sustainable production and consumption, will not be achieved without broad public support.

From a normative perspective, too, the support of the general public for any political goals and measures is important. For example, government decision-makers should take the population's views into account when designing policies in order to ensure their acceptance or legitimacy. The same applies to DC as an instrument for implementing the 2030 Agenda.

Equally, civil society organisations rely heavily on citizens’ interest and support in the form of donations and civic engagement. While financial contributions and civic engagement ensure their capacity to operate, public familiarity with and appreciation of these organisations’ work is essential in order to anchor an awareness of global interdependencies in wider society and establish behaviours that are in keeping with the 2030 Agenda.

At present, however, insufficient data and studies are available on the general public's perspective on development policy, DC and global sustainable development, particularly in the wake of current world political developments (e.g. international terrorism, the global refugee movement and the coronavirus pandemic) which have made DC a greater focus of public attention once more. As a result, there is an urgent need to know more about people's knowledge, attitudes and behaviours in relation to these issues. The DEval Opinion Monitor seeks to meet this need for insights, and to provide DC actors with both feedback on public opinion on the topic of DC and sustainable development, and orienting knowledge to guide their strategic approaches and their communication and educational work.

Insights into the population's attitudes towards development policy and global sustainable development make it possible to understand and classify public opinion and the commitment of citizens. This Knowledge allows for them to be taken into account in the design of development policy communication and education work, the promotion of development policy commitment and the strategic progress of development cooperation.

Against this background, the study series "Opinion Monitor Development Policy" examines the following overarching questions:

1. What are the attitudes of the population towards development policy and sustainable development, what do they know about this topic, how are they involved, and how do these factors change over time?

2. What are the characteristics of attitudes, knowledge and commitment?