Operationalising participatory research and gender analysis: new research and assessment approaches

Participatory research approaches are increasingly popular with scientists working for poverty alleviation, sustainable rural development, and social change. This introduction offers an overview of the special issue of Development in Practice on the theme of ‘operationalising participatory research and gender analysis’. The purpose of this special issue is to add value to the discussion of methodological, practical, philosophical, political, and institutional issues involved in using gender-sensitive participatory methods. Drawing on 16 articles, we place some of the main issues, empirical experiences, and debates in participatory research and participatory technology development in the context of implementation, evaluation, and institutionalisation of participatory research and evaluation approaches.     

Donors and exogenous versus endogenous development

Economic and social development has occurred through the millennia. The post-World War II and post-colonial periods have ushered in a new era of donor-led development assistance policies and of professional development practice. Since the 1950s, development has been conceived of as rich and technologically advanced countries helping poor countries develop – a delivery system of development. The dominant development priority has been economic growth as opposed to livelihoods and social/human development. With some interesting exceptions, development, seen as development assistance, has been largely top down, or exogenously driven. In recent decades, scholars, practitioners, and even donors have called for participatory approaches, building on local institutions, culture, capacity, and local ownership. There remains a gap between the rhetoric and the practice of development. If we want to move from top-down, exogenous development to development that encompasses endogenous approaches, we must understand the barriers posed by practices in both donor and recipient country development organisations. This paper explores the barriers and possible remedies open to practitioners, policymakers, and academics at different levels.     

Officialising strategies: participatory processes and gender in Thailand's water resources sector

This paper examines participatory processes in an Asian Development Bank (ADB) technical assistance package in Thailand's water resource sector. The authors analyse various levels of social interaction in the local community, in meso‐level stakeholder consultations, and in opposition to ADB's environment programmes expressed by civil society organisations. While participatory approaches are employed to promote more bottom‐up management regimes in water resources, the authors find that local power and gender differences have been overlooked. Evolving institutions of resource governance are constituted by gender, reproducing gender inequalities such as regarding water intended for agricultural use as a ‘male’ resource. Finally, it is argued that understandings and practices of participation legitimise particular agendas in a politically polarised arena.     

Environmental cooperation of Northeast Asia: transboundary air pollution

The puzzle of why Northeast Asian countries do not have anyenvironmental cooperation comparable to Europe's successfulregulatory regime even though both regions have borne similarconditions of the atmospheric problem has been explored. Inorder to answer this question, the author shed light on someof the conditions in Northeast Asia that would be necessaryfor regional cooperation to take place, by examining the factorsthat shape the environmental foreign policy of sovereign states.The success of Europe's regional cooperation in dealing withacid rain has been investigated, through the lens of interest-basedand epistemic community approaches. The interest-based approachprovides two factors – ecological vulnerability and economiccost – to show why some countries have taken more activepositions than others. In addition, the author argues that onemore factor is necessary, the existence of an epistemic community,out of the knowledge-based community perspective, because evenself-interested states have difficulties in defining their interestsdue to high uncertainty and complexity about developing goalsand preferences. After applying the two perspectives to thecooperation of Northeast Asian countries, it is found that lackof domestic and regional consensus on ecological vulnerabilityto transboundary acid deposition and the high economic costsof reducing emission have contributed to slow development ofthe cooperation of Northeast Asia. In addition, the lack ofsolid expert communities in Japan, as a leading country, couldhinder Northeast Asian countries from speeding up the transitiontoward regulatory regime formation from the current informationsharing cooperation. Received for publication August 12, 2005. Accepted for publication December 22, 2006.     

Using the personal influence model to guide theory building for participatory communication in Africa

Abstract

This article argues that the personal influence model (PIM) be used strategically to resolve conflicts and social crises in Africa. It presents PIM as a complementary, analytic discourse to participatory communication, a development paradigm commonly used globally in a variety of social programs. That discourse, as a framework for theory building, is grounded in Africa's emerging and enduring realities: (a) the growing interest of the international community to assist Africa to meet the U.N. Millennium Development Goals, whose focus is to reduce extreme poverty by 2015; (b) the ephemeral nature of Africa's political and social stability that necessitates reducing fear, improving community security, nurturing public trust, and building inter-group relationships, all as preconditions for attaining social development, and for using a community-agency- contracts-partnerships approach to deliver development services; and (c) the palpable congruence of PIM with Africa's extensive social networks, which are typically used as communication tools for social development. Those realities guide four propositions that serve as a heuristic template for testing and refining the participatory approach, thereby guiding theory building in participatory communication in African communities. That template identifies an expansive three-concept research agenda – culture, community governance and rule of law, and economic freedom – that raises questions, defines concepts, measures key variables, and assesses outcomes.     

For Whom the Bell Tolls: Democracy and Development in South Asia

This paper suggests that there are many contrary pulls, some old, and others new, operating on socioeconomic development in the South Asian region. It argues that September 11th, 2001 has been a defining and defiling moment for the region, since the consequences of the terrorist attacks on the US will weaken democracy in the subcontinent. Consequently, the region will lose its historical advantage of not being militarised by outside poles, or interests, and this will undermine democratic mechanisms that facilitate alleviation of poverty and inequality. This paper investigates the disjunction between mainstream and grassroots perceptions of India's poverty, arguing that localised democratic government, attention to the institutional architecture of countries, and enabling participation of the poor and the discriminated offer the only way to deal with economic and social inequality.     

Roles and contributions of community seed banks in climate adaptation in Nepal

Community seed banks are an effective local institution to conserve quality seeds, to strengthen farmers’ accessibility to social seed networks, and improve agrobiodiversity and food security. This article analyses the prospects and challenges of community seed banks in climate change contexts. It finds that community seed banks serve as sources of climate-resilient seeds to withstand in local climates and improve community resilience. Community seed banks provide landraces for participatory crop improvement to develop resistant varieties to improve quality and productivity. They also strengthen participatory seed exchange to cope with climate adversity. However, there are challenges with defining specific and common goals, functions, approaches, and governance.     

Security governance and the private military industry in Europe and North America

Even before Iraq, the grow ing use of private military contractors has been widely discussed in the academic and public literature. However, the reasons for the proliferation of private military companies and its implications are frequently generalized due to a lack of suitable theoretical approaches for the analysis of private means of violence in contemporary security. Consequently, this article contends, the analysis of the growth of the private military industry typically conflates two separate developments: the failure of some developing states to provide for their national security and the privatization of military services in industrialized nations in Europe and North America. This article focuses on the latter and argues that the concept of security governance can be used as a theoretical framework for understanding the distinct development, problems and solutions for the governance of the private military industry in developed countries.     

Local participatory innovations and experts as political entrepreneurs: The case of China's democracy consultants

This study is concerned with understanding the dynamic behind participatory innovations in China. The case of China provides a contrast to the literature on participatory innovations in democracies. While participatory innovations in democratic countries are seen as a way to deepen and improve democracy, in China these innovations are to some extent developed in order to provide an alternative to electoral democracy. In this article I introduce the concept democracy consultant to describe expert political entrepreneurs involved in the development of participatory innovations. Research on local participatory innovation in China is abundant but the role that experts play in this process has previously not been analysed. Based on in-depth interviews with democracy consultants and local officials, the study finds that democracy consultants frequently act as bridges between central and local levels of government by providing expertise, information, legitimacy, and connections. This is especially true in localities where local leaders want to gain the attention of the central level but lack the required expertise and connections.     

Sustainable development at the sharp end

This paper takes an actor-oriented approach to understanding the significance for policy and practice of field-worker experience at the interface between project and people. It is set in the context of an Indian project which aims to reduce poverty through sustainable, participatory agricultural change, based on low-cost inputs, catalysed by village-based project staff. Diaries kept by such staff are analysed to reveal how the social position of field-workers enables and constrains their interactions within and without the project, and the ways in which ‘street level bureaucrats’ shape projects through their discretionary actions. They show the Village Motivators struggling to communicate project objectives, to establish their roles and distinguish themselves fromother village-level bureaucrats, to negotiate participation, to overcome hostility to Participatory Rural Appraisal, to arbitrate access to consultants and seniors, to interpret project objectives and lobby for changes in these without admission of failure, and finally to develop a shared vocabulary of participation and belief in success. Some of the implications for participatory approaches are that there may be significant contradictions between sustainability and participatory development.     

The lost 1990s? Personal reflections on a history of participatory technology development

This article traces a history of agricultural participatory research, largely from the author's personal experience. Participatory research in the 1970s was mostly led by disciplinary scientists, and characterised by innovative activities and open academic debate, with some recognition that policy and development practice was a political process. The 1980s saw a shift to learning from past experience, and a participatory mainstream developed, seeking methods for scaling up. Meanwhile, others sought to understand and influence policy and institutional change in their political and cultural contexts, and to keep open the academic debates. The author considers the 1990s as ‘lost years’, during which mainstream participatory practitioners became inward-looking development generalists, not so interested in learning from others outside their paradigm. The late 2000s provide a chance to re-recognise the political and cultural embeddedness of science and technology; re-introduce strong, widely based disciplines; and learn from past activities that resulted in positive development outcomes (planned or unplanned).     

Fragile states

Since the 1990s, states that lack the capacity to discharge their normal functions and drive forward development have been referred to as ‘fragile states’. This article focuses on Africa, which not only has the largest concentration of prototypical fragile states, but has been the focus of attention for scholars, international development agencies, and practitioners. The author reviews competing analyses of the post-colonial African state and concludes that its characteristics of weak institutions, poverty, social inequalities, corruption, civil strife, armed conflicts, and civil war are not original conditions, but are rooted in specific historical contexts. It is essential to understand both the external and internal factors of fragility if such states are to get the assistance and empowerment that they need – not only for the benefit of their impoverished citizens, but also for the sake of global peace, prosperity, and security. Ultimately, it is the citizens of the countries concerned who are responsible for determining when states are no longer fragile – not ‘benevolent’ donors and the international community, whose prime motivation for interventions supposedly to strengthen the state is to ensure that fragile states find their ‘rightful’ places in the hegemonic global order.     

Solidarity economy and recycling co-ops in São Paulo: micro-credit to alleviate poverty

Lack of working capital hinders collective commercialisation of recyclables. Social exclusion and bureaucratic constraints prevent recyclers from obtaining official bank loans. As they continue to depend on intermediaries, the cycle of poverty, dependency, and exclusion is perpetuated. The article discusses collective commercialisation and the micro-credit fund created among 30 recycling groups in the Brazilian city of São Paulo. A committee of eight women recyclers manages this fund. The article contextualises reflections on empowerment and community-based development, applying the theoretical framework of social and solidarity economy. The author finally suggests that inclusive governance structures have the potential to generate greater justice and sustainability.     

Methodological debate in poverty studies: towards ‘participatory qual–quant’?

Compared with the divisive views of the past, integrative thinking has recently come to characterise the methodological debate on poverty. ‘Qualitative vs quantitative’ has given way to ‘qual–quant’; ‘cross-disciplinarity’ has replaced ‘economics vs anthropology’. This article attempts to review this change. It begins with a historical overview of the pure economic approach to poverty and its critique. The critique, both from within economics and from the participatory and anthropological disciplines, is examined, and recent trends are considered. The current ‘qual–quant’ approach is illustrated with examples, and the author concludes that the future may well see the emergence of a ‘participatory qual–quant’ approach.     

Garden of Eden? The impact of resettlement on squatters' ‘agri-hoods’ in Fiji

Since the mid 1990s, squatter settlements in Fiji have been expanding at a phenomenal rate, largely due to the non-renewal of agricultural land leases and inadequate urban governance. In response to squatter growth, the government of Fiji has implemented a squatter-resettlement scheme. This scheme threatens the livelihoods of squatters engaged in urban agriculture, or ‘farming squatters’. In this article, interviews with key informants and squatter residents will reveal contrasting attitudes and approaches to the issue of ‘farming squatters’. The article suggests a more participatory process to address the needs of ‘farming squatters’.     

The emergence of post-crisis regional financial institutions in Asia—with a little help from Europe

Faced with the negative impact of regional and global financial crises, Asian countries have established joint-solution mechanisms over the last two decades in order to better protect themselves from short-term outflows of capital and from currency speculation. Despite some progress being made in regional financial cooperation, especially by the countries of the ASEAN+3 grouping, the overall degree of financial integration within the region remains surprisingly low, however. This contrasts sharply with the keen interest of many Asian countries in gaining a stronger voice within the multinational finance institutions (MFIs), and especially within the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Unable to initiate major governance reforms of the MFIs, Asian countries have not only set up regional support liquidity arrangements but also their own multilateral development banks (MDBs). While the USA and to some extent Japan have tried to prevent a rebalancing of power within the global financial architecture, major European countries have actively supported these changes by becoming founding members of the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). Taking a New Institutional Economics (NIE) perspective, the paper aims to explain why some regional financial institutions are more attractive for Asian countries than others and why European countries are supporting Asia’s attempt to gain more weight in global financial governance (GFG)—and, thus, contribute to the acceleration of the power shift away from the USA toward emerging Asian economies in general and China in particular.     

Reforming governance under authoritarianism: motivations and pathways of local participatory reform in the People’s Republic of China

Many authoritarian regimes use participatory political reform to maintain control over the societies under their rule and survive global waves of democratization. Recent studies of transitional governance have underscored the importance and intricacy of institutional reform; however, no consensus has been reached on an explanation of the dynamism that shapes institutional reforms under non-democratic systems. Why do authoritarian apparatchiks reform their institutions of governance? How can the varied pathways of these reforms be explained? Post-Deng China provides an ideal laboratory in which to study these issues. Since the 1990s, growing tensions between the Leninist polity and a gradually opened society have compelled local governments in China to test a vast set of participatory reforms. In an examination of three major local participatory budgeting reforms in China, this article maps the main pathways – representation, consultation, and transparency – of these recent sub-national participatory reforms implemented by the incumbent regime, and explores the driving forces that sculpt a reformist model over the alternatives. By introducing an “incentive-contingent framework”, this article sketches out the “repertoire” of participatory reforms in the authoritarian governance of China and suggests an explanatory framework for the variation in the strategies and forms of such institutional innovations.     

The Emperor's New Clothes: A moral tale for development experts?

While global problems of poverty, inequality, and social upheaval are on the increase, the language used by development agencies and development experts sounds increasingly radical and idealistic. New socio-political conditions have been borrowed from real contexts in the South, only to be re-imposed on Southern 'partners'. Notions like empowerment, participation, and governance are paradoxically enforced through top-down, external intervention. Hans Christian Andersen's parable of the Emperor's new clothes highlights the illusory nature of this re-packaging of development policies in the 1990s. One major difficulty is that micro- and meso-level socio-political conditionalities remain subordinated to macro-level economic liberalisation. They look participatory from a distance, but at close quarters these measures have effectively become new forms of management and control, which are just as costly [as the old methods] but do not result in great benefits to project participants. (Craig and Porter 1997:50, commenting on the current vogue for mainstreaming of participation in development projects) Beautiful images of the high goals of the official development discourse and deep internal turbulence were clearly interdependent [but] contradictions between the discourse of goals and means and what is actually being achieved may not be visible any more. (Quarles van Ufford 1995:4, 12-13, 14)     

Citizen-driven reform of local-level basic services: Community-Based Performance Monitoring

Amid growing interest in forms of participatory and decentralised governance, increasing efforts are being made to increase the accountability, responsiveness, and relevance of the state through active citizenship. Drawing on the theoretical basis for social accountability, this article explores bottom–up views of active citizenship which highlight the importance of the intrinsic as well as the instrumental value of participatory social accountability, and thus of active citizenship. One approach to social accountability, Community-Based Performance Monitoring (CBPM), is used to demonstrate these instrumental and intrinsic values in practice, in relation to local public-service delivery.