Action and Knowledge: Breaking the monopoly with Participatory Action Research - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1853390984 ISBN 13: 9781853390982

Publisher: Practical Action Publishing, 1991

Synopsis

The book draws on twenty years of experience with the techniques and philosophy of PAR using case studies from Asia, Africa, Latin America and North America to show how widespread this approach to development has become since it emerged as a new way to empower the oppressed two decades ago.

About this title

Synopsis:

Participatory Action-Research, or PAR, is an innovative and radical approach to economic and social change that recognizes how important it is for people who are involved to have the critical voice in determining the direction and goals of change. This demands a commitment from social scientists and policy makers to deprofessionalize and share their expertise, and to listen to the feelings and needs of the common people, particularly those forgotten and left voiceless by the dominant institutions of society. "Action and Knowledge" draws on 20 years of experience with the techniques and philosophy of PAR using case studies from Asia, Africa, Latin America and North America to show how widespread this approach to development has become since it emerged as a new way to empower the oppressed two decades ago. As shown in this book, PAR can successfully bring about change because it actively involves people in generating knowledge about their own condition and how it can best be transformed.

The book gives a constructive message to social action groups, grass-roots organizers and government officials in both industrialized countries and the Third World on ways to stimulate social and economic change, and will also lead to further dialogue with scholars, teachers and students (especially those who consider themselves "post-modern" about the crisis of "development".

About the Author:

Orlando Fals-Borda died in 2008. His perspective built a singular bond between science and politics that changed dramatically the relations between society and knowledge. An essential part of his effort was centered on the construction of a perspective from the border and the periphery, focused on the subordination conditions of the Latin American societies

About this edition

• Publisher: Practical Action Publishing
• Publication date: 1991
• ISBN 10: 1853390984
• ISBN 13: 9781853390982
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 192
• Editor: Fals-Borda Orlando