Participatory Action Research

Abstract

Participatory action research (PAR) represents an epistemological framework, pedagogical approach, research methodology, and process for collaborative social action. PAR processes connect research, education, and action with the aim of addressing inequities to achieve social justice and societal transformation. By disrupting dominant notions of who holds expertise, PAR centers the situated knowledge of marginalized groups who are directly impacted by sociopolitical inequities. Central to PAR are the epistemological questions of whose knowledge counts, what counts as knowledge, who benefits from knowledge, and the purpose and audience for which knowledge is used and disseminated. One of PAR’s central tenets is that the people directly impacted by a societal issue, who must navigate systems of oppression, hold the most knowledge and wisdom regarding the complexities of the issue—and the structures, contexts, processes, and systems that (re)produce it—and how to solve it. PAR acknowledges that those directly impacted by systemic injustices have the most to lose and the most to gain in transforming the root causes of these issues and, therefore, are best positioned to motivate and lead others in partnership to address the root causes of social injustices. While PAR does not represent a collection of discrete practices, various PAR forms and approaches represent contested meanings linked to competing ideological underpinnings, societal interests, purposes, and interpretations depending on the contexts in which it emerges. For example, in some forms of PAR the purpose is to support participants in achieving greater control over their social and economic lives through intergenerational action aiming toward structural change, transforming systemic power relations, social justice that intersects with educational, socioeconomic, gender, queer and trans, disability, and racial justice. PAR recognizes that societal institutions, including schools, typically do not support historically marginalized groups in deepening their analysis of the root causes of injustices they face. The PAR process allows coresearchers to uncover the discourses and ideologies that normalize structural violence. Informed by popular education methods and social movements, PAR employs participatory pedagogical approaches that engage marginalized people in analyzing their lived experiences and contexts to disrupt grand narratives that bolster systems of domination and structural disinvestments in marginalized people’s institutions and communities. As a research methodology, PAR can include qualitative, quantitative, or mixed methods and can include creative methods such as PhotoVoice. PAR products draw on research findings and recommendations to call for new initiatives, practices, and policies and can take many forms such as a presentation to powerholders, an art exhibition, a film, an organizing campaign, or a theatrical performance. PAR allows space, opportunities, tools, and structured processes to enable marginalized groups to examine inequities and injustices and to critique the dynamics of power and neoliberal logic that may manifest in their worlds and within the research team.