All stakeholders are equal…But some stakeholders are more equal than others (with apologies to George Orwell): posted by Mary Brydon-Miller

For our session on covenantal ethics at the upcoming World Congress we’ve drafted up some case studies related to ethics in community-based research. These examples are intended to guide our reflection and discussion related to the application of the covenantal ethics approach to specific situations. The following case study is very loosely based on Catherine Campbell’s excellent book, “Letting them Die”: Why HIV/AIDS prevention programmes fail”, along with Susan Boser’s important contribution to the literature on research ethics and AR, “Ethics and power in community-campus partnerships for research”. What are your thoughts on power and AR? What strategies have you used to bring all the stakeholders to the table in ways that give everyone an opportunity for genuine dialogue and decision making?

In an effort to address the problem of AID/HIV transmission you have established a research project designed to bring all the stakeholders to the table. This includes local physicians and other health care providers, community leaders, sex workers and union officials representing local miners who have high rates of AIDS/HIV infection and who often transmit the virus to their wives and other sex partners. In order to make clear the importance of this effort and to show respect to the participants in the process, you arrange to hold the meetings at a regional conference center with state-of-the art facilities. Unfortunately, when you have your first meeting, few of the union members and none of the sex workers you have contacted attend, despite your work to provide stipends to cover travel costs and other expenses. In the interests of moving forward, you decide to go ahead with the meeting, in hopes of increasing participation next time.

Aristotle, Phronesis, Research Ethics and AR posted by Mary Brydon-Miller

“Ethical reasoning requires a different form of intellectual engagement than that of scientific analysis.” (McKee & Porter, 2008. 724)  Ethical reasoning, these authors suggest, requires instead “what Aristotle calls phronesis, or the art of practical judgment.”  My own introduction to this concept and its relationship to the theory and practice of action research comes from the work of my friend and colleague Olav Eikeland.  Olav has written extensively on the ways in which Aristotelian concepts can provide a lens through which to better understand the practice of action research and, in particular, assist us in deepening our examination of the ethical implications of our work (Eikeland, 2006, 2008a; 2008b).  Porter and McKee go on to observe that “the methods that many science researchers use to conduct their studies are not well suited to addressing the ethical questions related to and raised by those studies” (p. 725), and yet it is the biomedical model on which our basic models for evaluating research ethics are based and it is the certainty and the clear-cut answers that human subjects review processes seek to impose.  Action research, in contrast, embraces uncertainty and accepts the notion that there may not be clear cut answers to our questions, and that it is by testing our understandings of the world through dialogue with others and through experience in action that we reach greater clarity of understanding.  Action research at its best encourages us in the development of practical wisdom and provides opportunities to share this wisdom with others, and in doing so has the potential to make an important contribution to our understanding of research ethics in general. 

Eikeland, O. (2006) Phronesis, Aristotle, and action research.  International Journal of Action Research, 2(1) 5-53.

Eikeland, O. (2008a).  Aristotle, validity, and action research.  In B. Boog, J. Preece, M. Slagter, and J. Zeelen 9Eds.), Towards quality improvement of action research:  Developing ethics and standards (pp. 29-44).  Rotterdam:  Sense Publishers.

Eikeland, O. (2008b).  The ways of Aristotle: Aristotelian Phronesis, Aristotelian Philosophy of Dialogue, and Action Research

McKee, H. & Porter, J. L (2008).  The ethics of digital writing research:  A rhetorical approach.  College Composition and Communication. 59 (4), 711-749).

Getting the Word Out, posted by Mary Brydon-Miller

Writing in the conclusion to the Special Issue on Ethics and Action Research, Davydd Greenwood, Olav Eikeland and I suggested that we “develop strategies for making the results of research of direct benefit to community” and “develop innovative strategies for disseminating the results of our work”.  But the hiring committees and reappointment, promotion, and tenure policies of many universities fail to recognize such work as a legitimate form of scholarship, and may even actively discourage faculty from including such contributions on their c.v.s .   Those of us who have achieved senior faculty status should work to implement another one of the recommendations Davydd, Olav, and I made to “realign reappointment, tenure, and promotion policies to reflect both the unique demands of action research and the importance of community engagement.”  We need to make it clear to our institutions that such work is a legitimate—and much needed—form of scholarship. 

Call for Papers for JERHRE sent in by Sarena Seifer-- Posted by Mary Brydon-Miller

We thought some of you might be interested in contributing to this special issue of the Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics.  Our thanks to Sarena Seifer for sending along the CFP!

Call for Papers on Community-Based Participatory Research

The September and December 2010 issues of Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics (JERHRE) will be devoted to CBPR

The theme of these two issues will be:

New Models for Reducing Barriers between Researchers and Communities
(although not exclusively)

These special issues of JERHRE will explore new models for achieving success in community-based participatory research using new media, new kinds of collaborations, new social dynamics, new combinations of social research methods, new goals, or new ways of assessing risks to the community per se and its members. They may also examine ways to sustain programs when funding is interrupted. While researchers are primarily interested in research, communities are primarily interested in programs and services; accordingly, these special issues of JERHRE may also examine ways of creating and sustaining program services along with research.

Deadlines for submission of manuscripts: June 1 for possible September publication.

August 1 for possible December publication.

Papers accepted for publication, but not in time for inclusion in these special issues, will be published in the next issue of JERHRE.

Submit papers in Word format as email attachments to Editor-in-Chief Joan E. Sieber (joan.sieber@sbcglobal.net) and to special guest editor Nancy Shore, Assistant Professor of Social Work at the University of New England and Senior Consultant, Community-Campus Partnerships for Health (nshore@une.edu). Please see www.csueastbay.edu/JERHRE for manuscript preparation instructions and other details about JERHRE. Authors are invited to nominate one of their three peer reviewers. Send the name, email address and a sentence or two about the individual. It is suggested that you send 2 or more nominees in case your first choice is unable to accept the invitation to review. Authors wishing to see prior articles published in JERHRE are invited to view the March 2006 issue which is available at no cost in full text. Please go to: http://caliber.ucpress.net/loi/jer. CBPR was also the theme of the June 2008 issue of JERHRE. To read the intro/editorial from that issue, please go to: http://bit.ly/cANsVy

Authors wishing to submit abstracts or concept papers to Editor Joan Sieber are welcome to email (joan.sieber@sbcglobal.net) queries or phone (510-538-5424).

The following factors will be considered in accepting manuscripts for publication:

· Scientific validity of the research design, if an empirical work; comprehensiveness if it is a review of the empirical literature.

• Thoroughness and depth of analysis.

• Discussion of conclusions and their implications for future research.

• Exploration of best practices derived from research findings.

• Conciseness; quality will be valued over quantity.

In it for the Long Haul - Mary Brydon-Miller

This past week my son, Rhys, spent the evening at a Kentuckians for the Commonwealth (KFTC) meeting discussing efforts to stop the development of a new coal ash dump in my hometown of Louisville, Kentucky. When I first learned of the Appalachian Land Ownership Study in the 1980’s I had no idea that I would one day move to Kentucky myself and that my son and I would become KFTC members. At the time, living in New England, the issues facing Appalachian communities seemed remote, but Billy Horton’s description of the project published in Voices of Change: Participatory Research in the United States and Canada brought home to me the struggles of activists across the region to uncover the inequities in tax policies that continued to impoverish the people and destroy the local environment. So I was excited to read Shaunna Scott’s recent ARJ article, “Discovering What the People Knew: The 1979 Appalachian Land Ownership Study” in which she examines the legacy of the Land Ownership Study, both for practitioners of participatory action research as well as for the people of the region. Scott’s article reminds me of the importance of taking the long-view when considering action research and of remaining mindful of the ethical implications our work can continue to have years later. Scott describes KFTC as “an organization which continues to develop grassroots leadership in Kentucky and provide a voice for citizens in the state legislature,” and describes other organizations in Virginia, West Virginia, and Alabama that also continue to support the work originated by the Land Ownership Study. Scott also notes the personal impact the project had on those involved, people like John Gaventa, and Susan Williams who continues her work as Education Director of the Highlander Education and Research Center . This potential for our work to continue to influence practice should inspire and energize us, but at the same time it should caution us to take the time, as Scott suggests, to consider how to support not just the research component of the project, but the action steps we will take as a result. And to critically examine the ethical implications of our work, now and in the future.

Reciprocity, Relationship, and Covenantal Ethics - Mary Brydon-Miller

In their article, “Reciprocity:  An Ethic for Community-based Participatory Action Research”, authors Sarah Maiter, Laura Simich, Nora Jacobson, and Julie Wise define reciprocity as “an ongoing process of exchange with the aim of establishing and maintaining equality between parties” and explore how this notion might inform our understanding of the ethical implications of community-based participatory action research.

This concept of reciprocity relates closely to the idea of community covenantal ethics that I’ve been exploring in some of my own recent work.  I first came across the concept of covenantal ethics in the work of my friend Anne Inga Hilsen (include link to Arj, 4(1), 23-36) in which she cites the work of William May, a physician whose book, The Physician’s Covenant lays out some basic principles of covenantal ethics.  Anne Inga describes how this informs her work as an action researcher, “I suggest that AR can also be seen as a covenant between the researchers and the local participants.  Instead of doing good to serve my own needs or act as rational contractual action, I will argue that AR, from my position, can be seen as entering into a covenant with the local participants” (2006, 27-28). 

This covenant is founded in the notions of reciprocity and relationship.  In their article, Maiter and her colleagues provide a very clear and complete discussion of how they designed and carried out a community-based participatory action research project designed to examine the issue of mental health care among diverse communities in Ontario, Canada. At the same time, they also help to deepen our thinking of the ethical implications of our work as action researchers

Brydon-Miller, M. (2009).  Covenantal ethics and action research:  Exploring a common foundation for social research.  In D. Mertens & P. Ginsberg (Eds.), The Handbook of Social Research Ethics (pp. 243-258).  Los Angeles: SAGE Publications.

May, W. F. (2000).  The physician’s covenant:  Images of the healer in medical ethics (2^nd ed.).  Louisville, KY:  Westminster John Knox Press.