Using Participatory Action Research as a Liberatory Tool in Nonprofit Organizations

Abstract

Various forms of participatory action research (PAR) have in the past decades gained prominence in practice-oriented scholarship in pursuit of human liberatory causes. But this strand of research remains much less visible in the mainstream publications of nonprofit research. This article discusses PAR in relation to its concept, philosophy, methods, processes, validity and ethics. Then, it assesses its application in nonprofit settings, using examples from the authors’ experiences and the literature. The article then considers the prospects of using PAR in nonprofit research and makes a few suggestions for nonprofit practitioners and researchers interested in this approach.