Table 4-1: Common chapter abbreviations PRA Participatory Rural Appraisal
AR Action Research PR Participatory Research PA Participatory Approach PM Participatory Methodology PAR Participatory Action Research
par generic participatory action research
presented as challenges or problems, arise from the interpretation and implementation of PMs, and not in the failure of the bulk of PMs to recognise and engage with these issues.
Although discussion on research methodology is often presented together with a description of the research process, I have located this chapter within the literature review because the participatory approach used by CLIQ was simultaneously a research
methodology and part of the intervention (alongside ICT access, training and use).38 Furthermore, the concept of participation
shares theoretical and practical links with QoL, empowerment, ICTs and development, which will be elaborated on at the end of this chapter. Table 4-1 expands on the acronyms used in this chapter which can be confusing given the similarity of letters used.
demand participation (Chambers, 2008:91); misuse and abuse has become common. In 1993, Rahman predicted the corruption of Participation Action Research (PAR) alongside its growth: “PAR, after all, is threatening to become a respectable intellectual movement....
PAR is getting institutionalised, and this will corrupt some in this movement at the same time as promoting its growth” (Rahman, 1993:87).
Arnstein’s (1969) ladder of citizen participation (see Figure 1-1, p2) and Roodt’s comment that use of the term participation “...ranges from that of a legitimating exercise to a transformative one...” (2001:479), indicate the variety of meanings attached to
participation in theory and practice. Claims of following PM, when an activity actually
amounts to co-option or manipulation is social fraud, where the time, energy, hope and trust of poorer people is abused under the pretext that through their participation their views will influence policy or they will be in control of resource allocation dedicated to locally-defined projects. The proliferation of a range of unprincipled activities that are passed off under the name of one or another PM has a range of negative effects including undue criticism being levelled against PMs. It has nevertheless, also lead to useful reflection and analyses of PM processes by practitioners and academics (see Cook and Kothari, 2001; Gaventa and Cornwall, 2008; Hickey and Mohan, 2004).
Abraham and Purkayastha (2012:124) note 19 references to literary works that each recognise the variety of labels used to name participatory and action research approaches.
For example, 20 years ago, the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) and the Overseas Development Agency (ODA) named 44 different PMs, prefaced with the remark that “[t]he interactive involvement of many people in differing institutional contexts has promoted innovation, and there are many variations in the way that systems of inquiry have been put together” (IIED and ODA, 1994:98-99). Attempting to define or distinguish between the unnamed and differently named or branded PMs, has remained a mostly a futile exercise. PMs are not static and there are few universally acknowledged definitions, let alone any that have widely agreed upon implementation standards and mechanisms to monitor, evaluate and regulate use. Chambers (2008:170) notes how a number of practitioners have abandoned labels. Recognising the continuing evolution of PMs based on a variety of catalysts including “...poaching and fusion (from other ‘branded’
PMs) as sources of creativity” (Jupp, 2007:115), Jupp suggests the use of “...generic language
to describe the different contexts in which participation is used... rather than brand names and acronyms” (ibid:122).
PAR (see Burkey, 1993 and Rahman, 1993) and Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA - see Chambers 1997, 2005, 2008) are the two brands of PMs which together are the closest to the methodology employed for CLIQ. Hickey and Mohan (2005:6) refer to PAR,
conscientisation and popular education (influenced by the writing of Freire, Fals Borda, and Rahman) as “emancipatory participation”. The focus is on education, popular
conscientisation, and socio-political action. As an action-orientated methodology, PAR falls within the critical theory set of paradigms (Guba and Lincoln, 1994:109), with Prozesky and Mouton (2001:537) describing it as “...a dramatic change from what is conventionally seen as ‘proper’ research in positivist terms, that is objective, impartial, scientific and quantified”.
Burkey (1993:63) defines PAR as “...a means for [poor people] to gain knowledge and to use it to improve their lives”.
The three principle components of PRA are methods, attitudes and behaviour and sharing, with the visual and tangible PRA methods regarded by Chambers and many others as “...the most visible and obviously distinctive feature of PRA” (Chambers, 2008:86-87).
Hickey and Mohan name this approach as “populist/ participation in development” (2005:6).
In the early 1990s, PRA was practiced and adapted by practitioners around the globe.39 As a PM, it was debated by practitioners and academics striving to share and learn from each other, facilitated through networks and workshops co-ordinated by the participation group championed by Robert Chambers at the Institute of Development Studies (University of Sussex).
The application of PMs to research on QoL and its use in development interventions is well articulated by McTaggart, as quoted in Reason and Bradbury’s (2001:1) introduction to a handbook on action research (AR): “The aim of participatory action research is to change practices, social structures, and social media which maintain irrationality, injustice, and
39 PRA evolved from Rapid Rural Appraisal in the early 1990s. In 1995 amidst much debate regarding the name PRA, the core publication of PRA experiences was renamed from RRA Notes to Participatory Learning and Action (PLA) Notes. Some continued practicing under the PRA brand, while others adopted the PLA brand.
Chambers (2008:87-89) details the variety of approaches that contributed to the evolution from RRA to PRA/
PLA and beyond.
unsatisfying forms of existence”. The congruence of AR (see Altrighter et al., 2002; Dick, 2005; Wadsworth, 1998) and Participatory Research [PR] (see Cornwall and Jewkes, 1995;
White and Pettit, 2004) with aspects of PRA and PAR led to my inclusion of AR and PR literature in my post-field discussion of research methodology. PAR, PRA, AR and PR all discuss guiding principles, behaviour and attitudes of external researchers or activists,
without which mere participation in visual methods for gathering information and facilitating local analysis would essentially be reduced to another extractive research tool. Following Jupp, I refer to CLIQ’s research methodology as participatory action research (par), being a generic name that describes the context within which the participatory approach was undertaken. It is from this post-field perspective, that chapter 4 discusses PMs and par drawing on literature inclusive of that which specifically discusses PRA, PR, PAR and AR.