Do evidence networks make a difference?

As part of the Global Evidence Summit in Cape Town in September 2017, Prof Ruth Stewart gave the keynote addressing the question of ‘Do evidence networks make a difference?’. The following text is based closely on that opening address. She outlines how evidence networks make a difference by building our shared understanding across the evidence ecosystem, enable growth in our shared capacities, and enable a potential and readiness for change. In this article she provides additional information supporting each of these three ways in which evidence networks make a difference, as well as elaborating on how her work, and that of her Centre at the University of Johannesburg, is closely aligned with the production and use of evidence synthesis. She makes a strong case for her central argument: ‘If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together’.