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There has been a growing recognition of the role of Non-Governmental Development Organizations (NGDOs) in strengthening civil society as an effective strategy for poverty eradication. This approach includes broad-based development ownership and empowerment of the poor. The paper argues that in the context of globalization NGDOs need to focus on expanding space for poor people to engage with emerging forms of states and markets for their livelihood advantage. This implies creating space where the poor can effectively negotiate the global discourses and frameworks of development from their particular experiences and images of reality. In this position, the poor will find room for manoeuvre within which to influence the local, national and global processes and structures for their benefit. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

This paper argues that in generating perceptual meanings of social actors as data, researchers need to deal with multiple representations, identities and categorisations of their own and those of their informants. The need to also consider power dynamics that develop in the communication process between the "researcher" and the "researched" in the process of generating data is also emphasised. The paper suggests that an analysis of image-conflicts can be used to reveal the "hidden meanings" during these research encounters and improve the quality of research findings.

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