Disrupting the Flow and Disentangling the Discomfort An examination of the deconstruction and re-negotiation in positionality and collective meaning in driving processes of change in participatory-action research Dr Irena L. C. Connon KTP and Post-Doctoral Research Associate University of Dundee CECHR Symposium 2016
Issues emerging within current research project
Current research project is a Knowledge Transfer Partnership project that focuses on transforming responses to energy disruption during power outages in extreme weather events and mitigating human vulnerability
Original project scope was as an inter-organisational and actionorientated applied research project
But, findings to date include:
Community, organisation and policy responses are underpinned by presence of ‘hidden’ power trajectories that produce disparities that present challenges in producing transboundary approaches
These power trajectories involve inter and intra institutional and community ontologically-based classificatory-boundaries, differences in socio-cultural norms and practices, and temporal and spatial conceptualisations
Limits abilities in breaking through existing organisational cultural boundaries to a mere bridging of communication between organisations
The project is now looking at ways to address these structural and ontological barriers through a range of potential, new trans-organisational and trans-boundary strategies
New issues and ideas emerging from current research project
New areas of research interest have emerged from conducting the current project
Current project has involved using a wide variety of ethnographic and participatory research methods within and across multiple contexts
Emerging Question: How are deeply embedded ontological meanings raised, expressed, negotiated and re-negotiated through participation in the research project?
Following Emerging Question: What are the implications of this in terms of conceptualisations and actualisations of empowerment processes and in thinking about research ethics?
These have implications for the researcher, the research process, research outcomes and for the participants
These implications can lead to rethinking discourses of empowerment in participatory research methods and a rethinking of ethical considerations that add further complexities within this re-negotiation process.
Reaching beyond boundaries: What’s next……
Self-perceptions and positionings transcend institutional and ontological boundaries
Academic conceptualisations have succeeded in breaking down the ontological classifications that underpin orthodox thinking on human-environmental interaction
But the majority of the strategic, policy and practice developments in mitigating the human impacts of climate change continue to underpinned by epistemologies and ontologies that over-simplified the human-environmental security problem
Traditional conceptualisations of scale, structure and ontology in policy require rethinking…………….and……………
Should resilience policy, practice and research be focusing beyond borders as well as boundaries?