Conflicting demands and the power of defensive routines in participatory action research

Abstract

Participation has been of ongoing interest in the field of action research and the New Health Promotion movement, but it is not without tensions and problems. This article presents the challenge of containing the conflicting demands of personal empowerment, practical advancement and theory building in a community-based participatory action research project 'Aspiring to Healthy Living in The Netherlands'. A Participatory Action Research (PAR) methodology was chosen because of its contribution to empowerment of the community of older people, which was one of the project goals. Besides that, the project aimed at the development of an intervention program for encouraging healthy living amongst older people in The Netherlands and contributing to the knowledge base on healthy living, by analyzing narratives from the participants. However, when time pressure rose, the empowerment goal started to collide with academic and practical aims, and the dialogue within the project team became obstructed leading to a return to the traditional routine of applied research and the accompanying power relationships, with implications for the learning in and about the project. This article starts with a short review of the literature on community participation in health research and the challenges of learning participatory action research, followed by a description of the PAR project and the process of participation, using the ladder of Pretty as a tool to highlight different levels of participation in different project stages. By using the theory of organizational learning developed by Argyris and Schö n (Argyris, 1993; Argyris & Schö n, 1978), insights will be provided into the attempts of a relatively inexperienced team to create a participatory and dialogic research project, and the problems in keeping reflection and learning going within a context of external pressure.

‘Community control’ in CBPR: Challenges experienced and questions raised from the Trans PULSE project

“…Ray (2007) distinguishes between 'traditional' (community members provide information), 'consumerist' (community members are there for researchers to achieve their end goals) and 'democratic' (a model of community involvement in research partnerships, where the latter attempts to redistribute power. Common to all CBPR models are the democratic and empowering characteristics of community engagement, and a genuine desire to challenge dominant power arrangements (Jacobs, 2010). However, at one end of the CBPR spectrum are more 'traditional' forms of research processes that value community input while academic researchers retain control, ownership and management.…”

“…While we were able to ask some of those who contacted us to complete a survey and start a new chain of recruits, there is no way of knowing who else was missed as a result of the structure of this methodology. Jacobs (2010) makes mention of such conundrums where anxieties about 'academic quality' in research studies can risk potentially usurping moral and ethical concerns. Our discussions as a team, however, focused on upholding the integrity and rigor of the RDS method, while at the same time trying to figure out how to include isolated individuals as participants.…”

“…In some instances, they will complement one another, whereas in others, they may actively compete. Jacobs (2010) maintains that at times like this 'academic quality' may supersede the need or desire to pay strict attention to moral or ethical concerns in research and in CBPR. One very interesting dilemma that illustrates these two potentially contrasting lenses focused on the needs of 'isolated' trans people.…”

“…For example, while CBPR appears to address ethical considerations and questions, such as whether communities are consenting to, benefiting from, or being harmed by research (Guta et al, 2010), questions remain about who is really in control of the agenda in CBPR. For example, Jacobs (2010) speaks to the need to 'truly empower' community members by being open to them as 'co-thinkers' and 'co-organizers' at all stages of a research project, in order to be really successful.…”

Conflicting views on professional development. Critical dialogue as a research and intervention method for a Master’s course in professional education for teachers

“…Dialogue has become a buzzword that is easier to advocate than to put into practice (Smaling, 2008). Also, dialogue can easily become blocked, and turn into either a disagreement or an apparent but shallow consensus, if no meta-reflection takes place on the process of dialogue itself (Jacobs, 2010b).…”