THE CHALLENGE OF PARTICIPATORY RESEARCH AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR FUNDING AGENCIES

In an age of growing skepticism about the development industry and about the appropriateness of the predominant paradigms of modernisation and immutable technology transfer, many scholars and practitioners are now attempting to re‐define approaches to development (e.g. Taylor, 1979; Galtung et al., 1980; Chambers, 1986; World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987). Out of this general effort to re‐consider the ways in which social and economic development should be conducted has emerged the notion of participation. In conceptual terms it is now widely agreed that development plans and policies must not only account for the perceptions and opinions of local populations, but that community groups should participate in the underlying processes of consultation and decision‐making. What is much less understood, however, are the mechanisms by which participation is operationalised and institutionalised, and the stresses as well as the advantages which accrue from participatory practices. This is particularly the case in the realm of scientific inquiry where participatory research (PR),(1) has emerged as part of the search to render science more germane to the needs and opinions of local people.