Organizational Identity and Positionality in Randomized Control Trials: Considerations and Advice for Collaborative Research Teams

Navigating “Insider” and “Outsider” Status as Researchers Conducting Field Experiments

“…A scholar's membership in a particular group based on visible, ascriptive characteristics is important in the degree to which a researcher can gain access to the institutional actors and enumerators who are crucial to field experiments (Haas et al 2021). The actors involved in implementing a field experiment make judgments and inferences based on how a researcher presents (Tajfel et al 1971).…”

What, Where, Who, and Why? An Empirical Investigation of Positionality in Political Science Field Experiments

“…For experimentation on political topics, the three key actors with stakes in the experimental design and implementation are the subjects/citizens, the researchers, and the implementers (i.e., research firms, donors, political parties, nongovernmental organizations, government agencies, and others) (Haas et al 2022). Of the total articles with field experiments published between 2000 and 2017 in three top political science journals, 62 % entailed a partnership (Levine 2021).…”

“…Partner selection is paramount for both normative questions-ethical parameters and project legitimacy in the field (Haas et al 2022;Ouma 2020), as well as for scientific outcomes. From a normative standpoint, if the government is the main partner in a field experiment that relies on cluster randomization, its "right to rule" in certain policy areas (e.g., public schools and public health clinics) alleviates some ethical concerns regarding the lack of informed consent (Evans 2021).…”

Field Experiments in the Global South: Assessing Risks, Localizing Benefits, and Addressing Positionality

“…Consequently, RCTs carry significant benefits but also costs and risks for participants, research staff, and researchers themselves (Kaplan, Kuhnt, and Steinert 2020). Although all political science studies require ethical and cost-benefit evaluations, RCTs invoke special considerations of identity, positionality, and power dynamics (Haas et al 2022;Kim et al 2022), especially for studies conducted in the Global South. The resource-intensive nature of RCTs means that they often are conceived of and led by scholars from the Global North (Corduneanu-Huci, Dorsch, and Maarek 2022;Panin 2020).…”

“…Field experiments, also known as randomized controlled trials (RCTs), have emerged as a leading methodological tool to strengthen causal inference in the social sciences (Banerjee and Duflo 2009). Designed to make causal claims on research questions of interest to scientists, policy makers, and the public, RCTs often require significant resources, substantive interventions in participants’ lives, and partnership with nonacademic implementers (Davis and Michelitch 2022; Haas et al 2022; Teele 2014). Consequently, RCTs carry significant benefits but also costs and risks for participants, research staff, and researchers themselves (Kaplan, Kuhnt, and Steinert 2020).…”