Research ethics committees, ethnographers and imaginations of risk

Abstract

Ethnographers’ concerns about institutional ethics review are by now well-known and several hypotheses have been advanced to explain their complaints. Many have highlighted the lack of epistemological fit between ethnographic methods and ethics review paradigms. Others point to the existence of a “victim narrative” and suggest that circulating horror stories are unrepresentative of ethnographers’ experiences, or argue that ethnographers’ complaints disguise a self-interested and un-reflexive desire to avoid oversight. A final explanation suggests that resistance is restricted to an ageing cohort of scholars raised in an era before ethics review became the norm. Drawing on two surveys of ethnographers conducted a decade apart, we conclude that the most convincing explanation for the longstanding “chorus of complaint” is the fundamental epistemological conflict between ethnographic methods and the way ethics review is currently constituted. We conclude that the time has come to radically reframe and restructure ethics review regimes.

Carceral ethnography in a time of pandemic: Examining migrant detention and deportation during COVID-19

“…Furthermore, prison ethnographers have long identified specific methodological, epistemological, and ethical issues around working ethnographically in spaces of confinement which might apply productively to reimagining ethnographic praxis during the pandemic. These include the question of research access to sites of detention and incarceration to document everyday life and routines in these institutions ( Bosworth and Kellezi 2016 ; Hasselberg 2016 ; Maillet et al, 2017 ; Wacquant 2002 ); questions of research ethics and reflexivity in studying carceral settings ( Bell and Wynn 2020 ; Bosworth and Kellezi 2017 ; Esposito 2017 ; Hammersley 2015 ; Turnbull 2018 ); the prison–society relation and the articulation between intramural and extramural worlds ( Boe 2020 ; Brown and Schept 2017 ; Cunha 2014 ; Fassin 2017 ; Gill et al, 2018 ; Weegels et al, 2020 ), and the importance of contextualization of ethnographic observations from within the prison walls with other related institutions including courts, police, and the multiple state and non-state actors in the infrastructure of deportation ( Barak et al, 2020 ; Berg 2021 ; Conlon and Hiemstra 2017 ; Coutin 2003 ; Könönen 2019 ; Mountz et al, 2013 ; Provine et al, 2016 ). Many of these concerns highlighted by prison ethnographers can be applied to the pandemic context more broadly and were helpful to us in conceiving our research strategy for this project.…”

The ethics review and the humanities and social sciences: disciplinary distinctions in ethics review processes

“…Echoing Tolich and Fitzgerald (2006), Bell and Wynn (2020) observe that a ‘fundamental epistemological conflict’ (p. 206) emerges between qualitative researchers and ERBs in terms of the ways that framings of risk, benefit, and consent are configured in social science research. They apply the notion of ‘imaginations of risk’ to identify three key elements of risk inherent within prevailing ethical review process: the risk posed by research itself, the risk posed to the institution, and the risk posed to the researcher (2020: 10).…”

“…They apply the notion of 'imaginations of risk' to identify three key elements of risk inherent within prevailing ethical review process: the risk posed by research itself, the risk posed to the institution, and the risk posed to the researcher (2020: 10). For Bell and Wynn (2020) qualitative-interpretivist researchers hold antithetical views on risk to those applied by ERBs, with this posing a point of epistemic conflict. Various scholars have highlighted how these imaginations of risk can prevent important research from advancing, particularly in the humanities, social sciences, and fields using community-based participatory research methods, such as the creative arts (e.g.…”

Dilemas, disonancias y conflictos éticos del trabajo de campo en antropología médica en contextos institucionales de atención a la salud

“…En estas últimas, se pueden identificar estudios sobre los códigos de ética antropológica (6) para guiar el comportamiento de los investigadores. Algunos de estos análisis consideran favorable establecer un marco general sobre las responsabilidades del investigador, mientras que otros argumentan que los códigos no son la única forma de institucionalizar los estándares morales de la disciplina (7). Con respecto a esto, se han hecho críticas referidas a su utilidad, retórica y función legal (8) en las que se argumenta que la realidad del trabajo de campo supera aquellos lineamientos éticos, ya que poco tienen que ver con las controversias vividas en la realidad (9).…”