(Re)Imagining Utopias

Research with institutionalized populations: Methodological and ethical dilemmas

“…I did not ask any of my participants to sign informed consent documents. Instead, I proceeded with oral consent to protect vulnerable participants' privacy and ensure they did not feel pressured or at risk by signing a form that might result in identifying and divulging their identity, particularly in the contexts of post-authoritarian legacies fraught with the memories of informant's facing interrogation, persecution, and retribution in exchange for information (Silova et al, 2017). In addition to the authoritarian legacies in Ukraine, vulnerable populations like orphans and imprisoned women have been ostracized in society and largely ignored by the public and the state, and as such were not used to participating in social science research.…”

“…The qualitative research methodology has been largely misunderstood and misconstrued in Ukraine due to the epistemological dominance of the quantitative research paradigm and its primary method of survey, seen as more "reliable" and "valid" (Silova et al, 2017). Both of my studies in orphanages and prison employed in-depth, semi-structured interviewing with youth and adults.…”

“…This suspicion derived from the historical legacies of socialism, where interviews resembled government strategies of interrogation and possible persecution. As Sobe et al (2017) put it, "The researcher's interview may bear uncanny semblance to the state security interrogation in promising to reveal information and motives not visible from mere observation" (p. 306). Additionally, as discussed in a previous publication on my research, Ukraine is not an "interview society" (Fontana and Frey, 2005: 646) like the United States, where the majority of the public is accustomed to participating in surveys, interviews, and focus groups.…”

“…While there exists a strong body of scholarship documenting the many challenges qualitative researchers face with vulnerable populations in the Global North, there is limited research on the ethical dilemmas arising with institutionalized populations, such as orphaned children and incarcerated women, in post-authoritarian and post-socialist contexts in the Global South (Silova et al, 2017), or what some scholars refer to as the Global East (Kuzhabekova, 2020). For example, qualitative researchers in the Global North have highlighted ethical dilemmas in gaining access to and recruiting participants, informed consent, rapport building, confidentiality, researcher and participant relationship, and vulnerability (Blagden and Pemberton, 2010;Pittaway et al, 2010).…”

The conceptualisation of democratic citizenship education by non-Western societies

“…There also needs to be a prioritisation and inclusion of the local dialect and local traditions into research studies done in non-Western countries. This will enable researchers to better understand local realities, rather than viewing them as anachronistic and archaic (Sobe, Iveta, Alla & Kovalchuk, 2017). Prioritising indigenous knowledge will foster 'culturally relevant theoretical frameworks and avoid the marginalisation of local knowledge and traditions' (p. 3).…”