Participatory Research

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A case study of participatory research among farmer-settlers in Southern Phillipines
(1980) Belamide, Eileen
This case study examines the use of participatory research as a tool for rural organizing among farmer-settlers in Southern Philippines. The study describes a community of migrant farmers facing persistent poverty, land conflict, displacement, and violence following a corporation’s claim to their cultivated land. Participatory research was integrated into a rural organizers’ training program and subsequently applied within the village through continuous dialogue, community immersion, data gathering, collective analysis, and organizing. Local farmer-settlers were involved as research partners in identifying problems, gathering and interpreting information, analyzing the economic, political, and cultural structures affecting their situation, and developing plans for collective action. The research process emphasized that data gathering should serve community action and strengthen self-reliance rather than function solely as an academic exercise. Through the transfer of research and analytical skills to community members, the villagers developed a broader understanding of their land struggle and its connections with wider social, economic, political, and cultural structures. The process also contributed to stronger community organization, collective decision-making, self-reliance, and initiatives in areas such as economic activities and community health. The study identifies the principal outcomes as changes in the community’s perception of its social conditions and gradual changes in aspects of the village’s social organization.
A note on the participatory research project in the asian region
(1981) Tandon, Rajesh
This paper traces the rise of participatory research as a response to the limits of conventional social science, linking it to wider struggles for democracy and development. It reflects on both its potential and contradictions, framing it as an ongoing project rather than a finished method.
A review: The participatory research project
(Learning, 1978) MacNeil, Teresa
MacNeil (1978) critically reviewed the Participatory Research Project of the International Council for Adult Education’s through an examination of three working papers by Budd Hall, Rex Jackson, and Bonnie Cain. The review focused on participatory research as a type of inquiry where communities participated in the research process. MacNeil acknowledged the contribution of the communities as active agents of change through their empowerment, learning, and exchange, as well as the research itself, and its role and relationship with social change. However, she noted several shortcomings, such as an absence of a clear methodological direction, a definition of participatory research as opposed to other types of research, and questions related to the communities’ ability to undertake action based on research. Throughout the review, MacNeil used examples, such as the Dene’s participation in the Mackenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry, to illustrate her points. In the final section, she concluded that participatory research could contribute to expanding knowledge production and community participation while also recognizing the need for conceptual clarity and methodological precision to achieve these goals.
Action and knowledge: Breaking the monopoly with participatory action research
(The Apex Press, 1991) Fals Borda, Orlando; Rahman, Mohammed Anisur
This book is the result of field work and reflection inspired in Participatory Action-Research (PAR) techniques and philosophy during the last twenty years, when this form of study-and-action was first proposed and tried. The book does not attempt the impossible task of covering the entire field. It does try, however, to underline PAR's main features as we have experienced them, illustrating them in Part II through a handful of process studies, or vivencias, from different countries. Such vivencias are expected to show why PAR is a viable ap-proach to face some of the very old problems still experienced in many parts of the world where "development" policies have been tried and found wanting. However, although the crisis of "development" and its discourse is every day more widely felt and discussed, because PAR began much before, the alternative rise of PAR should not be interpreted as a response to it. From the beginning, those who adopted PAR have tried to practice with a radical commitment that has gone beyond usual institutional boundaries, reminiscent of the challenging tradition of Chartists, utopians and other social movements of the nineteenth century. Therefore, while recognizing that ours is an ancient, permanent task, it is our hope to reach social action groups, grassroots animators, intellectuals and government officials with a constructive message adapted to present needs for social and economic change, and conducive to other options for enlightenment and awakening of common peoples-especially those forgotten, despised or left voiceless by the dominant Establishments. We are concerned with such sociopolitical problems as people's power and struggles, and with cognitive issues, such as those implied in the accumulation of different types of knowledge. The pertinent theoretical discussion is found in Parts I and III, written also with a view to undertake a dialogue with academic scholars and in particular those who consider themselves "post-modern." We want to express our appreciation to the collaborators of this book and to the many groups that participated in the experiences. Thanks are due also to the director of the Institute of Political and International Studies of the National University of Colombia, Bogotá, and to the chief of the Rural Employment Policies Branch of the International Labour Office, Geneva, for their institutional support of the present work.
Building capacity through action learning
(Institute for Development Research (IDR) Reports, 1993) Leach, Mark
The ability to learn from experience is critical for individuals and organizations seeking to be effective in rapidly changing and complex situations. Educators, corporate managers, public administrators, and grass roots activists have all been challenged by the dilemmas of learning from action and experience. While using many different terms (including action research, action science, experiential learning, participatory research, organizational learning, learning systems, etc.) these people have developed a rich and varied set of insights into facilitating what might be generally called "action learning." The purpose of this paper is to review several streams of work related to action learning (AL), and to consolidate some of the key principles in an effort to help organizations expand their capacity to develop action learning strategies. Particular attention will be paid to the relevance of action learning principles for non-governmental and community based organizations (NGOs and CBOs).
Community engagement: A critical guide for practitioners
(2017-05) Shaw, Mae; Crowther, Jim
The motivation for this critical guide to community engagement comes primarily from our experience over many years as teachers on undergraduate and postgraduate programmes of community education. These programmes have historically been validated both by the university and the appropriate professional body, so they are firmly located at the interface between academic and vocational standards; between theory and practice. We have found that these different, sometimes contradictory, demands create a productive dynamic which has been at the core of our teaching, our writing and our relationships with the broader field of practice. We consider that an engagement with significant theoretical frameworks, an awareness of important historical traditions and an empathetic identification with the social reality of marginalized groups are all necessary in order to practise critical community engagement.
Creating knowledge: A monopoly? Participatory research in development
(Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), 1982-06) Hall, Budd L; Gillete, Arthur; Tandon, Rajesh
This book is about participatory research as a political process bound up with questions of power and knowledge production, rather than merely a set of methods. It opens with the Jamaican Drama for Progress literacy project, where a shift from delivering pre-written messages to villagers toward enabling them to write and perform their own material captures the move from research done on people to research done with them. Drawing on the Latin American tradition of investigación acción and Paulo Freire's thematic investigation, the collection questions who is authorised to produce knowledge about poverty and underdevelopment. Five theoretical essays address participation, power and alternative methods, followed by seven case studies from Indonesia, Senegal, Tanzania, England, Chile, Canada and India, and a concluding section of critical reactions. Rather than success stories, what emerges are unresolved questions about initiating participatory work, sustaining ties with political organisations, and balancing theory with praxis in research committed to social transformation.
De fracaso y frustración en el trabajo de campo: cómo asumir la ética de la representación en la investigación participativa [Of failure and frustration in field work —how to assume the ethics of representation in participatory research]
(Universidad Colegio Mayor de Cundinamarca, 2013) Oslender, Ulrich
La investigación participativa ha vuelto a la agenda por estos días. Sin duda en la academia convencional ha cobrado mayor aceptación que por allá en la década de 1970, cuando Orlando Fals Borda y otros desarrollaron lo que se dio a conocer como Investigación-Acción Participativa (IAP). Los consejos de investigación muestran cada vez mayor interés en financiar propuestas de investigación en colaboración, al parecer deseosos de escuchar y aprender de las experiencias de grupos subalternos. Lo sorprendente quizás es que muchas de estas investigaciones se reinventan hoy sin referencia siquiera al trabajo pionero de Fals Borda y otros. Otra carencia en los debates metodológicos se refiere a la falta de enfrentar abiertamente problemas de fracaso, decepción o frustración que el académico-activista pueda haber experimentado en el trabajo de campo. En este artículo, quisiera reflexionar sobre una experiencia de investigación en colaboración en la que participé y considerar de manera crítica aquellas situaciones que generaron alguna decepción personal, mostrando así las limitaciones en el campo de la investigación participativa. Hasta ahora me he abstenido de escribir sobre esto, pues plantea problemas éticos significativos en la posible identificación de sujetos de investigación, que hacen parte de esta historia. Sin embargo, creo que es solo mediante el examen crítico y abordando los fracasos y las frustraciones de las agendas de investigación en colaboración que pueden evitarse tales disgustos en el futuro. Cómo escribir sobre estos fracasos es una cuestión que no se responde fácilmente.
Education for women's empowerment
(ASPBAE, 1996) Batliwala, Srilatha
Education for Women’s Empowerment reflects on education as a means to challenge gender inequality and advance women’s empowerment. The paper states that women’s empowerment requires overcoming social, economic, political, and cultural relations and structures that undermine women. Education for literacy, basic and women’s rights, self-reliance, citizenship, reproductive health, critical thinking, and self-determination are presented as pivotal forces for social change. The paper is a call for decentralizing and democratizing education, engaging women and their communities, integrating traditional knowledge, gender-responsive curricula, and training materials, and enhancing the role of NGOs and civil society in education. It also calls for advocacy, networking, monitoring, and evaluation, and participatory approaches to research, as well as strategies for policy implementation at various levels. To advance women’s empowerment, the paper suggests that education can contribute to enhancing women’s participation, voice, resources, and control and promote gender justice and social change.
Enabling Public Grievance Redressal Systems in Municipalities: An Operational Manual
(Society for Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), 2013)
This report is about enabling urban municipalities with Public Grievance Redressal (PGR) systems, developed by PRIA India along with PRIP Trust in Bangladesh and SILAKA in Cambodia and supported by the United Nations Democracy Fund. The manual is based on a project carried out across cities in India, Bangladesh, and Cambodia between 2011 and 2013. Municipal accountability depends on citizens having a reliable way to raise complaints, and the manual lays out what PGR systems are and why they matter for governance that answers to the people it serves. Civil society organizations and municipal officials are shown working together at each stage, from assessing what already exists to mobilising citizens, building the capacity of staff and elected representatives, and eventually institutionalising complaint mechanisms within municipal structures. Challenges that surfaced during implementation find space here too: limited awareness among citizens, resource constraints within municipalities, and resistance from within bureaucracies that complaint systems often disturb. It provides examples and case studies from India, Bangladesh, Cambodia, and Malaysia to guide practitioners working to strengthen municipal governance.
Fifteen years of Participatory-Research-in-Asia
(Participation & Governance, 1997) Tandon, Rajesh
We have just completed fifteen years of our experience as PRIA. The seeds of this organisation were sown by the early work on participatory research during the late 70s. That experience provided the philosophical basis for our work: Knowledge is Power. This perspective inspired the early activities we undertook by promoting a number of initiatives which emphasised recognition and articulation of indigenous popular knowledge in the fields of education, health-care, natural resource management etc. Over the years, different ways of expressing that philosophy gained ascendancy in PRIA's work. Today, our work in strengthening Panchayati Raj Institutions as mechanisms of local self-governance is its most explicit expression. We are using methods of organising and promoting the learning of leadership in local bodies to play their rightful role as self-governing institutions. Special emphasis is being placed on learning and empowerment of new leadership in these institutions: women and socioeconomically weaker sections of society.
From clients to citizens: Asset-based community development as a strategy for community-driven development
(The Coady International Institute, St. Francis Xavier University, 2002-01) Mathie, Alison; Cunningham, Gord
Asset-based community development (ABCD) is presented as an alternative to needs-based approaches to development. Following an overview of the principles and practice of ABCD, five major elements of ABCD are examined in the light of current literature on relevant research and practice. This involves exploring: the theory and practice of appreciative inquiry; the concept of social capital as an asset for community development; the theory of community economic development, such as the sustainable livelihoods approach; lessons learned from two decades of international development in the participatory paradigm; and the theory and practice of building active citizenship engagement and stronger civil society. How ABCD both reflects recent trends in these areas and stands to benefit from the insights generated from this work is outlined.
Knowledge and social change: An inquiry into participatory research in India
(Society for Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), 1985-10) Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA)
This report is about an inquiry into participatory research, evaluation, and training efforts across India, carried out by the Society for Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA) with seven collaborating organizations from different parts of the country. It grew out of a shared unease among researchers and trainers about the distance conventional social science placed between the expert and the people that research was meant to serve. The study set out to document ongoing experiments in the field and to draw out what these scattered efforts had in common. The cases move from training sessions with rural and urban women to inquiries carried out jointly by professionals, activists, and forest dwellers, each showing people affected by a problem taking part in investigating it themselves. The report works through how such processes build confidence and collective awareness among participants and how the person facilitating a group must stay close enough to its concerns to be useful while keeping enough distance to see clearly. The seven cases differ widely in setting and scale, yet common threads run through them around mobilization, skill-building, and the sharing of authority over knowledge, questions that the study returns to through each case.
Lambatlaya
(Institute of Social Work & Community Development (ISWCD), 1984) Abad, Henedina; Hall, Budd L; Gawasnon, Banika; Sadulla, Jaime; Veneracion, Ma. Corazon J; Tolentino, Carmina; Freire, Paulo; Lanot, Marra P.L; Lacaba, Jose F; Tan, Rene; Torres, Amaryllis T; Magno, Neng
This bulletin is about participatory research as an alternative to traditional social science research practice in the Philippines, particularly research “with” and “for” the people. The contributions review research practices in which professional social scientists assume total or partial responsibility for defining problems, collecting, analyzing, interpreting data, and presenting findings to poor and vulnerable communities as if they are only research subjects. This bulletin draws lessons from the authors’ varied experiences in community development, adult education, health, rural and urban organizing, and social action. Participatory research is discussed as a praxis, that is, a process of inquiry, reflection, learning, and action. Participatory Action Research, participatory conscientizing research, community participation in research, alternative approaches to research, and building community research capacity are some of the issues taken up. Emphasis is placed on people’s participation in problem definition, data collection, analysis and interpretation, decision-making, and action. The contributions also take up issues of professional researchers’ monopoly over knowledge production, people’s concepts and analysis, community organization and empowerment, connecting research with action, and people’s participation in development planning. The bulletin further raises questions concerning methodology, research evaluation, community participation indicators, scientific validity, cost effectiveness, and research linkages with development planning. The contributions are by Henedina Abad, Rene Tan, Budd L. Hall, Amaryllis Torres, Neng Magno, and Ma. Corazon J. Veneracion. This bulletin also contains bibliographic essays by Jaime M. Sedullo, Ma. Corazon J. Veneracion, and Carmina Tolentino.
Local knowledge, social movements and participatory research: Indian perspectives
(Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA), 2021-11-30) Participatory Research in Asia (PRIA)
Looking back, looking forward: Reflections on the origins of the international participatory research network and the participatory research group in Toronto, Canada
(1997) Hall, Budd L
In this article, Dr. Budd Hall looks back on the early history of the International Participatory Research Network, founded in 1976 in association with the International Council for Adult Education. He traces his own path into the work through years spent in Tanzania, where Julius Nyerere's ideas on self-reliance, Marja Liisa Swantz's participant research, and a 1971 visit from Paulo Freire shaped his understanding of research as an act of solidarity rather than a neutral exercise. He describes the 1975 special issue of Convergence that first drew together scattered efforts around the world, the 1977 Cartagena conference with Orlando Fals Borda and other Latin American scholar-activists, and the network's founding commitment to autonomous, horizontally organised nodes across Toronto, New Delhi, Dar es Salaam, the Netherlands, and Caracas. He then considers what role universities should play in a field built on breaking the academy's monopoly over knowledge production and reflects on the structural pressures that work against genuine collaboration between academics and communities. The article closes by asking whether participatory research might extend further, toward co-creating knowledge with the rest of nature.
Participatory impact assessment: Final report on a two-year pilot programme in South Asia and the Pacific
(Voluntary Agency Support Scheme (VASS), 2003-06) Clark, Kevin; Quinn, Marion
How can development interventions become more accountable to the communities they engage with? This report presents the findings and lessons from a two-year Participatory Impact Assessment pilot programme carried out across South Asia and the Pacific with New Zealand NGOs, their regional partners, and local communities. Its central argument is that impact assessment must move beyond measuring short term outputs to understanding long term social change through the active participation of primary stakeholders at every stage of the project cycle. Across multiple case studies involving women’s empowerment, livelihoods, peacebuilding, and community facilitation, the report illustrates how communities can identify indicators, analyse change, and shape future directions of programmes themselves. It highlights key themes such as partnership, stakeholder involvement, gender justice, institutional learning, and the use of participatory tools including mapping, ranking, theatre, focus groups, seasonal analysis, and interviews. The report consistently emphasises that evaluation is not merely a technical review but a democratic and empowering process through which ownership is strengthened, unintended impacts are surfaced, and organisational accountability is deepened
Participatory research
(0000) Tandon, Rajesh
This article by Dr. Rajesh Tandon examines the relationship between development with knowledge and research in the context of developing countries, arguing that mainstream development strategies have largely remained Western-centric, adopting a top-down, technology-driven approach and being detached from the lived realities of marginalized communities. He critiques post-WWII development strategies as primarily dependent on knowledge that is controlled by the monopoly of elite researchers to serve the interests of those in power- under the guise of objectivity and neutrality. The article further criticises the irrelevance of sophisticated research methodologies and ethical issues that arise due to seeing humans as mere subjects, and presents participatory research as an emerging alternative. It emphasises the role of ordinary people in generating and utilising their own knowledge to bring socio-economic changes.
Participatory research - An integral part of the development process
(Women and Development Unit (WAND) Extra Mural Department, UWI, 1983) Ellis, Pat
Ellis develops the concept of participating research as an alternative concept to the dominant approaches to social research. Ellis is critical of the tendency of research to be an end in itself as opposed to being a means to an end, and proposes a new paradigm in which research is integrated into development and change processes. He also highlights the problem with the dominant approach, which is overly concerned with imposing control, objectivity, quantification, and academic discourses, while remaining detached to the issues affecting the subject of investigation. Particripatory research recognizes the subjectivity of research and seeks to involve the researched group actively in the research process to obtain information and knowledge that can then lead to transformative action and change. The paper makes a distinction between the researcher as a facilitator and expert, and highlights how the former can be more effective in sharing expertise and knowledge with the researched community. The article further highlights the political nature of participating research, as a means to achieve equity and democratization of knowledge and influence. Ellis provides examples from Trinidad, St. Vincent, and Saint Lucia, which illustrate the potential of participating research in community development, women’s development, and education respectively. The paper concludes that participating research has the potential to contribute to community empowerment and self-reliance, which are critical aspects of development in the region.
Participatory research and participatory social action
(1980-04-13) Tandon, Rajesh