By Deepa Nagari
In this blog post, I will reflect on conducting community-based participatory research (CBPR) with forced migrants as an emerging researcher in the early stages of her PhD career. I will combine some of the insights gleaned from the topic with the overall ethical considerations of community-based research.
My research will examine alternative pathways to forced migration policies and laws, particularly looking at the Canadian context and the current narratives and discourses of governance, belonging, exclusion, and societal responsibility. Specifically, it will examine the importance of grassroots movements, efforts by civil society organizations, mobilization and advocacy efforts, and lessons from diverse experiences and scholars who are on the ground working towards providing effective solutions for asylum seekers, forced migrants, and displaced people. I argue that these groups and movements are not separate from our political and legal institutions; we should examine their practices and seriously consider their implications in shaping current policies and laws. These groups can provide an avenue to decenter forced migration from the hegemony of the current refugee protection regime and the authority of the nation-states while applying alternative frameworks to refugee protection.
Furthermore, engaging with community and civil society organizations also recognizes that forced migrants and asylum seekers have the agency to determine policy and legal structures that affect them. This recognition also broadens the understanding of what constitutes “political space” beyond the formally recognized decision-making spheres. Thus, my doctoral research project seeks to unpack the current state of bordering and migration policies and laws in the Canadian context, adding to the existing literature. Importantly, it also aims to offer a new analysis and approach to responsibility, engagement, and governance within forced migration and bordering practices and protection that involves the society, the general population, and migrants.
To achieve this, I proposed a multi-methodological approach that includes Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR). CDA would provide a proper understanding of the scholarly discourses, as well as the power relations that are present in the sociolegal context of migration and bordering. CBPR, I believe, would work well with CDA in that it has the potential to make substantial contributions to the community where the research is taking place (striving towards social change) and it allows the participants of the research to engage and participate with the knowledge production and dissemination (Filler et. al. 2021; Lenette 2022).
CBPR is a collaborative form of research that integrates social science research with participant action and agency (Yanay & Battle 2020; Lenette 2022). CBPR is participant-centred, is made by the participants of the research, and exists because of the position of the subjects in the community (Starodub 2018). Additionally, as per Dr. Christina Clark-Kazak, Participatory Action Research and other community-based research projects involve being invited into a space to conduct research based on what the community wants or needs to research. CBPR has its benefits; it would allow for a deeper understanding of the issues within the community and enhance capacity-building opportunities for the participants (Filler et. al., 2021; Lenette, 2022). Additionally, CBPR addresses the power relations between the researcher and the participants, putting me (the researcher) within the community and pushing forward my research subjects. As a large part of my research focuses on alternative pathways to protection and how to dismantle the hegemony of nation-state intervention, I believe CBPR would allow my research participants to reimagine themselves and their futures, and it would also recognize their agency to provide strategies for themselves.
However, this kind of research has its difficulties. First, CBPR does not follow the typical academic trajectory because it is a developing methodological strategy (Starodub 2018). The point of CBPR is to tease out the personal experiences, issues, and problems of the community and participants who drive the research (Starodub 2018). Thus, pre-determining a set strategy is difficult before beginning the actual research. This is an issue, particularly with conducting a CBPR within doctoral studies, where it is almost impossible to do a pure CBPR in the PhD program due to its program and academic requirements.
Second, I think my biggest concern lies in the fact that I am early in my career as a researcher, so I have not had much experience working with the community with whom I am researching, or many experiences with interviews or action research. The additional resources by Jacquez et al. (2021), Ellis et al. (2007), and MacDonnell et al. (2017) all provide valuable insights into how to ethically conduct CBPR. However, once again, these are established scholars in their field who have been conducting research with the community for a while. My biggest hurdle will be balancing trying to finish the PhD as per the requirements of the degree, while still cultivating relationships; being reflexive in terms of positionality, power dynamics, and hierarchies; and trying to produce work that will help the community without reinforcing harmful structures.
There seems to be more of a trend towards CBPR in the last couple of years, particularly because it allows researchers to engage with the community and produce research that would directly benefit them. However, at various times throughout the course, we discussed the ethics of researching vulnerable populations. Specifically, as per Atern et al. (2021), several ethical concerns arise from CBPR, including assuming or reinforcing Western and euro-centric ideologies, differentiating hierarchies, and disparities in outcomes. The insights from Dr. Clark-Kazak and Dr. Nimo Bokore were extremely valuable and helped me deconstruct the idea of CBPR I had before taking this course. As per their suggestions, I will attempt to adjust my methodology so that I can still do CBPR, as I believe it is still an important strategy that strives to ethically conduct research with forced migrants. However, I have realized that I have a lot of work that I need to do before I embark on my research journey.
The LERRN course was just the beginning of my journey. I now plan on reading about my research methodology to explore the various ways CBPR has been used in forced migration research and in other fields, what lessons were learned by other researchers, and what insights they can provide on conducting CBPR as an early career researcher during their PhD. In this way, I think it is valuable to reflexively think about the methodology researchers use as part of their study. We need to consider whether the chosen methodology is chosen because we think and believe it will benefit the participants and community versus its actual impact. These are questions and concerns that I think I will grapple with throughout my PhD career, but they are good and tough questions that I think all researchers need to face. Eventually, via my exploration, I may find that doing CBPR could be doing more harm than good to my participants due to my positionality and the power dynamics. That is something with which I need to contend and accept, while still striving to find ways to better the policies and laws for the community.
Author bio:
Deepa Nagari is a 2nd-year PhD student at York University’s Socio-Legal studies focusing on alternative pathways to protection for forced migrants and refugees in the Canadian context; she also works as a Research Assistant for CERC Migration at TMU.
Reference List
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Lenette, C., Milne, E. J., Nunn, C., & Gardner, J. (2021). Ethics and community-based participatory research (CBPR) with people from refugee backgrounds: Key ethical concerns and principles for CBPR practice. UNSW Sydney, STARTTS NSW. Coventry University, Manchester Metropolitan University.
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Filler, T., Benipal, K. P., Torabi, N., Minhas, S. R. (2021). A chair at the table: a scoping review of the participation of refugees in community- based participatory research in healthcare. Globalization and Health, 17(1), 103-113. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12992-021-00756-7.
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