Community-Based Participatory Research

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    Mobilizing community and academic knowledge for transformative change: The story of the UNESCO Chair in community based research and social responsibility in higher education
    (The Canadian Commission for UNESCO’s IdeaLab, 2017) Hall, Budd L; Tandon, Rajesh
    What role can higher education play in advancing knowledge democracy and fulfilling its social responsibility? This paper co-authored by Dr. Budd L. Hall and Dr. Rajesh Tandon reflects the establishment, evolution, and contributions of the UNESCO chair in community-based research and social responsibility in higher education. Established in July 2012 as a unique co-chair partnership bridging the University of Victoria (Canada) and Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA, India). This paper outlines the effectiveness of a distinctive global North-South co-chair method in connecting academic institutions with grassroots practitioners to promote knowledge and democracy. The paper explores how universities should collaborate with communities in the co-creation of knowledge to promote social responsibility, inclusion, and sustainable development. Through its three core domains, knowledge mobilization, policy advocacy, and capacity building, the chair has generated substantial, systemic impact. Through global reports, policy dialogues, and training programs, the Chair has influenced higher education policy, fostered international networks, and contributed to embedding engagement and participatory research into the everyday functions of universities. This paper demonstrates how universities can contribute to social change by working closely with communities, promoting sustainable development, and strengthening their social responsibility.
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    Notes on monitoring-fifth training workshop on participatory development. September 15-19, 1997
    (Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), 1997-09-19) Satyamurti, V.
    Monitoring is essential to any planning activity, as it provides a systematic and continuous assessment of the progress of work over time. In these writings, compiled by V. Satyamurthi, monitoring is presented not merely as a technical exercise but as a practical tool for accountability, learning, and improved programme management. These writings explain in detail what should be reviewed during monitoring, what information is useful, and how aims and indicators may be defined clearly. Particular attention is given to process monitoring, including the use of resources, progress of activities, and the manner in which work is carried out. The notes further discuss methods of data collection and analysis, including surveys, case studies, regular records, and participatory approaches that involve communities directly. Equal emphasis is placed on interpreting findings, sharing feedback, and using results to improve planning procedures and institutional learning. Satyamurthi also underlines the importance of making monitoring participatory so that people affected by programmes can have a say in the process. These notes provide a grounded and practical guide to participatory monitoring processes.
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    Monitoring and evaluation
    (0000) Satyamurti, V.
    In this article, V. Satyamurthi discusses the need for monitoring and evaluation in sustaining the efficiency and long-term relevance of social programmes designed to strengthen citizens’ capacities to participate fully in social, economic, and political life. He traces the growing emphasis on monitoring and evaluation from the early 1950s, and more sharply in the 1970s, when international development assistance expanded and demands for accountability increased. At the same time, the article notes important critiques of conventional approaches that relied excessively on measurement, targets, and narrow indicators, arguing instead for a stronger learning process orientation. The article clearly explains the distinction between monitoring and evaluation, their core components, indicators, and the principles of participatory monitoring and evaluation. Particular attention is given to assessing the progress of community groups toward self reliance over time. In doing so, it demonstrates that participatory evaluation assesses the appropriateness of present goals and of the institutions that define those goals, making it a fundamental part of meaningful social programmes.
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    NZ VASS impact assessment: Pilot programme-Facilitator’s report
    (Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), 2001-07) Dwivedi, Anju
    How can impact assessment become a process of learning rather than only an exercise in measurement? This facilitator’s report by Anju Dwivedi documents the NZ VASS Participatory Impact Assessment Pilot Programme and reflects on how evaluation can be transformed through sustained participation, capacity building, and institutional commitment. The programme was designed not simply to assess outcomes, but to immerse partner organisations in the philosophical and methodological foundations of participatory impact assessment while learning from experiences of the past. Drawing on pilot initiatives in India, Bangladesh, Fiji, and New Zealand linked organisations, the report shows how facilitators worked with staff, communities, and local groups to identify indicators, plan assessments, collect evidence, and analyse change together. A wide range of participatory tools were used, including mapping, role play, Venn diagrams, interviews, ranking, focus groups, and seasonal analysis. These methods enabled communities to articulate impacts in their own terms and strengthened confidence, ownership, and dialogue. A central lesson of the report is that participatory impact assessment succeeds only when organisations demonstrate a genuine commitment to the process. It requires time, openness, and willingness to learn by doing.
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    Involving communities in planning and assessing the impacts of development programmes: Report on a pacific NGO workshop on participatory approaches to development, Nadi, Fiji, 23–25 June
    (2023-06-23) Quinn, Marion; Clark, Kevin
    This report documents a Pacific NGO workshop on participatory approaches to development held in Fiji in 2003, aimed at strengthening the capacities of civil society organisations to use participatory impact assessment, stakeholder analysis, indicator setting, and community based monitoring in their own contexts. Its central concern is how development can move beyond expert driven models toward processes where primary stakeholders influence decisions, resources, and outcomes. The report covers practical sessions on identifying stakeholders, understanding gender relations, designing meaningful indicators, collecting and analysing data, and using participatory tools such as mapping, ranking, focus groups, seasonal calendars, and time use studies. Through examples from Pacific countries, it shows how communities can define priorities, generate knowledge, and evaluate change on their own terms. This report offers an important lesson that monitoring and evaluation are not merely technical exercises but democratic processes linked to power, voice, and accountability. It demonstrates that when communities participate from the beginning of a project cycle, development interventions become more relevant, more sustainable, and more responsive to local realities.
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    Participatory impact assessment. August 20- 25, 2001
    (Particiaptory Research in Asia (PRIA), 2001-08-25) Dwivedi, Anju
    How can development interventions be made more accountable to the people they are meant to serve? In this paper, Anju Dwivedi examines how participatory impact assessment can reframe conventional approaches to evaluation by placing communities at the center of the process. She begins by tracing shifts in development thinking from a focus on economic growth in the 1950s to an increasing emphasis on participation and human development by the 1990s, where people’s involvement became central. Dwivedi argues that social development is not a linear process that can be captured through simple output and outcome measures. Impact must instead be understood as change from a given starting point, including intended and unintended effects on people’s lives. Participatory impact assessment therefore becomes a continuous process across the project cycle, engaging communities and other stakeholders in defining indicators, collecting data, and interpreting findings. The paper also foregrounds the importance of integrating a gender lens to understand differentiated impacts. For practitioners and researchers, this paper offers a grounded way to rethink impact assessment as a political and learning process rather than a technical exercise.
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    Bridging the gap between the researcher and the community: PRIA’s engagements in promoting community based research and social responsibility in higher educational institutions
    (Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), 2014) Tandon, Rajesh; Singh, Wafa; Srinivasan, Sumitra
    PRIA has engaged with academia in a multitude of interventions, bringing community and practitioner knowledge into the portals of traditional research institutions and processes. By doing this, PRIA has helped Higher Educational Institutions (HEls) realize their social responsibility towards a community's needs and aspirations. This document traces PRIA's work in promoting community engagement within HEls in India and beyond. The experience, garnered over three decades, have been classified into six categories to highlight the different forms PRIA's interventions as a facilitator have taken to build bridges between the world of formal research, the practitioner knowledge of civil society actors and the experiential knowledge of local communities. The experiences discussed in this paper are not intended to be comprehensive; a few specific interventions are described under each category to illustrate the nature of the engagements fostered and the practices promoted.
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    Analytical note on data collected from North Bengal university
    (2015) Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA)
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    The knowledge for change global consortium
    (Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), 2021-11-04) Kaul, Niharika