ABSTRACT
Participatory Action Research (PAR) has been defined as a collaborative process of research, education and action (Hall 1981) explicitly oriented towards social transformation (McTaggart 1997). It represents a major epistemological challenge to mainstream research traditions in the social and environmental sciences. The latter assume knowledge to reside in the formal institutions of academia and policy, and often presuppose an objective reality that can be measured, analysed and predicted by suitably qualified individuals. In contrast, Participatory Action Researchers recognise the existence of a plurality of knowledges in a variety of institutions and locations. In particular, they assume that ‘those who have been most systematically excluded, oppressed or denied carry specifically revealing wisdom about the history, structure, consequences and the fracture points in unjust social arrangements’ (Fine forthcoming). PAR therefore represents a counterhegemonic approach to knowledge production.
