I keep coming back to the phrase "Dance with the system" - not just march onwards no matter what happens.

Lots of people in the open system are very determined to try and strengthen evidence-based policy.

When we do work in places like China and Vietnam, research tends to be really effective as a way of getting change, whereas in more open places, mobilization and the creation of public pressure through the media often seem to be the things we try.

Economists who studied in the '80s tend to have a pretty crude neoclassical view that's just about freeing up prices and markets, and then you'll get the growth and everybody benefits. And they'll just repeat that, because if you're a minister or a senior civil servant, you don't have time to read anything anymore. You get very fixed in your views.

I see [activists] getting really angry that people won't just do what the evidence tells them, and that's not very helpful. You need to actually think why that is.

Floundering around, learning by doing but also by failing, is not only good but inevitable.

The death of deference seems to be general at the moment, so everybody has to earn their reputation and trust all over again. You don't just get it by virtue of being a professor or a politician or anybody else.