Participatory Research in Mesoamerica and Data Protection in Europe (and Elsewhere)

Alanna Cant

doi:10.1111/napa.12144

Abstract

AbstractThis essay examines the tensions between participatory ethnographic research methods and newly emerging legal regimes of data protection and privacy. Drawing on the example of recent grant‐funded research in Mexico, the essay charts how the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation impedes the practices and ethos of participatory research in significant ways. In particular, new legal requirements about data collection, access and storage, and “the right to be forgotten,” effectively preclude integrating community members into research planning or data collection. As countries around the world move toward more robust and comprehensive data protection and privacy laws, the issues raised in this essay are likely to become more pressing in many different research contexts in the future. [Mexico, data protection, participatory research, privacy laws].

Highlights

S ince at least the 1990s, developing participatory research methods have offered anthropologists an avenue through which the power hierarchies inherent in traditional ethnographic research may be destabilized
This essay examines the tensions between participatory ethnographic research methods and newly emerging legal regimes of data protection and privacy
What are the consequences of such regulatory regimes for participatory and ethnographic research more broadly? some of my colleagues advise taking a pragmatic perspective on the new laws by giving lip service on paper to the requirements while going about our business as usual in the field, others have worried whether anthropology is even legal under General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) (Humphris 2018)

Summary

Introduction

S ince at least the 1990s, developing participatory research methods have offered anthropologists an avenue through which the power hierarchies inherent in traditional ethnographic research may be destabilized. As the point above states, “only university personnel strictly necessary for implementing the grant” are allowed to access personal data This means that other participatory research practices, such as collaborating with participants in writing and publication, and returning data to research communities, are rendered near impossible under GDPR, at least without prior anonymization that changes participants’ names and ensures that no one can be identified within the data at all (see Chibnik this issue).

Conclusions

This is where the EC’s focus on individuals’