For an evaluation design or "political strategy" to succeed in instituting a process of valuing and be appropriate for a particular setting, patterns of social relations and beliefs about the evaluation must be in agreement with those of the chosen evaluation design. This agreement must be in place either at the onset or occur during the evaluation process. Alignment of political power and definitions of credible knowledge is inherent in six evaluation approaches or designed which include: positivism, interpretivism, critical theory, aesthetics, collaborative research and action research. The sociology of knowledge approach is used to examine the social meaning of each of these designs. This analysis exposes much of the taken for granted assumptions in each of these. Specifying types of evaluation designs that are appropriate is to define a specific potential role benefiting specific parties in the evaluation and in the educational system itself. Educators and evaluators should consider the need for, the design of and political outcomes likely in any evaluation situation and to eschew general policies about the necessity and form of evaluations. Designs should be examined from a larger perspective to understand the full social meaning of educational evaluation. (RR)