22.10.2024 Iida Kauhanen, Liselott Sundbäck and Sari Vanhanen
During the past years, participatory methods and collaborative research have gained increased recognition in migration and integration research. But what does this entail regarding ethics, merits and pitfalls in research? During the Nordic Migration Research Conference in Bergen in August 2024, we invited scholars to discuss these questions in our workshop. We looked at participatory methods as an umbrella theme including action research, participatory research, and co-researching.
In our workshop, we asked presenters and other participants to engage in an open and critical discussion based on their own experiences. To enhance this discussion, we invited presenters to address their “burning questions”, including sensitive, problematic, or even difficult-to-answer questions. These questions could also be radical and propose new innovations. During the two workshop sessions, several interesting questions were raised. We have chosen to present some of them to increase discussion related to participatory research and co-creation of knowledge.
Ethical considerations
One aspect related to participatory research and its “messiness” are the challenges with ethical approvals. Ethical approvals are usually considered by boards for research ethics at the researcher´s university and can be necessary if the research involves eg. vulnerable groups such as asylum seekers. In processes related to ethical approvals, the assumption is that the researcher knows how the research will evolve. However, the particularity of participatory research is that it cannot be determined fully in advance, as research participants are able to impact the research direction during the process. Therefore, the unpredictability and “messiness” of participatory approaches, entail challenges when it comes to ethical approvals.
Ethical approvals might limit questions and topics to be discussed in participatory research, as in the case of one of our workshop participants researching unaccompanied minors. Here, the ethical approval narrowed down the topics related to home that could be discussed, while the research participants were willing to steer the research in another direction by highlighting what was important to them.
Furthermore, what if some participants want to arrange a photo exhibition with their names, while others prefer to participate anonymously? It raises concerns related to the protection of anonymity of participants. Some researchers raised the importance of having an open discussion on the possibility to protect anonymity. However, they had recognized that participatory research might involve parts where anonymity will be challenging to secure.
On the other hand, anonymity might not be ideal if we aim to shift research power positions. Instead, research subjects should be credited for producing research data, such as pictures, paintings, texts, or other contributions.
Arts-based methods
Many presenters of the workshop utilized arts-based methods in their participatory research. They acknowledged art as a key to more nuanced discussions and as a vital element that helped shape trust between the researchers and the participants. While the use of art to facilitate discussions was acknowledged as useful, we also discussed how to better honor the art produced during research in the creation of novel knowledge, as well as in the analysis process and reporting of research results
Traditionally, academic analysis and reporting favors the written form. When analyzing data, we often transcribe video and audio recordings to text and utilize written diaries. The analysis is then commonly presented in academic written format. This, traditionally, more acknowledged written format diminishes the role of art in research. However, this type of analysis and reporting is still very limited. Hence, we ask what would happen if we focused more on the art itself? Is there a way to move beyond utilizing art simply as something to make the process more fun and participatory, to elucidate further interviews or to act as illustrations in academic papers? In some research designs, such as participatory photography for example, visual images are included in the reports as well as analysis. However, even then, to publish in academic journals, the analysis and the reporting are transferred to text, keeping images as illustrations. What could an academic article look like, where text is no longer the primary mode of reporting or where data and the analysis would not be transferred to written words?
Academic structures
As the research process in participatory approaches can be messy, the principal investigator often reflects on how to lead, support, and manage participatory research and collaborative processes? On the one hand we want participants to impact the direction of the research, on the other hand we need to follow our research plans as well as ethical, structural and funding guidelines.
So how open or precise should the instructions then be when motivating the participants to engage in the research process? For example, one concrete case that came up during the workshop was about photographs, and how the research guidelines and researcher’s instructions impact the results. For example, General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) sets guidelines for what and who can be seen in the photos. This becomes problematic, when participants are asked to take photos of meaningful places, like their homes. Families and other close people may be central to the construction of feeling like home, yet these people are not allowed to be seen in the photos due to privacy protocols. This may limit the way home (for example) becomes conceptualized through these photos.
Another question was how to keep co-researchers and/or participants engaged over extended time frames in academic research. Who will have the time, energy, and resources to be involved when the research process might extend over a long period? This raises further questions about the freedom of research participants and the extent to which the research should guide the joint (analytical) process.
Ways further?
For this workshop, we approached participatory research not only as a set of methods but also as an ideological perspective on democratizing knowledge, where participants are thoroughly involved in the research process. We wanted to address questions concerning the meaning of co-creation of knowledge, ethics and possible dilemmas in doing participatory research, questions regarding epistemic positions and knowledge generation.
The discussions on participatory methods left us with fewer answers but many more burning questions, which may need to be explored in future workshops. For example, it would be fruitful to further explore what happens when participatory methods “fail” and share experiences on the “messiness” related to participatory approaches – and how to resolve these in practice. It is also necessary to discuss the limitations of these methods and understand when they are not applicable. We would also like to see academia expand, to allow knowledge production and reporting that is not only focused on written format.In the future, ethical committees could have more flexibility so that they would embrace the character of participatory research when making decisions over ethical approvals. This could be solved by continuous assessments of ethical aspects, instead of a formal approval in the beginning of the research. The co-researchers’ network in Finland has produced a book for researchers engaging in participatory research and one section of this book brilliantly engages with ethical aspects. This network has also been actively discussing new practices and forms in ethical approvals e.g., with the Finnish National Board on Research Integrity (TENK).
Photograph: Sari Vanhanen
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