Introduction to Special Issue: Qualitative Method/ologies in Development Studies

Abstract

The articles in this special issue address a selection of questions in qualitative methods and methodologies in development studies, which is a topic that often seems to be overlooked or under-communicated in international journals. Searching through previous editions of Forum for Development Studies, we find only a few articles with methods as the primary topic, although method/ology is arguably addressed in articles' methods sections. For method/ological themes one has to turn to thematically focused journals such as Ethnography, or to recent resource materials such as Sage Research Methods Cases (Hansen, 2018). Whereas the wealth of textbooks within social sciences provides comprehensive methodological elaborations or overviews of methods, they may not be ideally suited for the needs within development studies. Undoubtedly, publications dedicated to methodologies and methods for fieldwork in the global South are scarce, with Doing Development Research (Desai and Potter, 2006) as one notable exception. Furthermore, the changing nature of the digital and global world opens up for new methods at the researchers' disposal. Far from the studies of the founding fathers and mothers of development studies and anthropology, globalisation and digitalisation processes impact on how one is able to perform research, i.e. on the methodsunderstood as the concrete techniques and practical choices involved in collecting and analysing data. Underlying such discussions there should also be room for methodological elaborationsunderstood as a systematically, theoretically, philosophical and disciplinary grounded reflection about the justifications for the chosen methods. This special issue was initiated in order to contribute to such discussions. It draws on an initiative by Professor emerita Turid Hagene that spurred the collaborative efforts of the Research Group on Development, Power and Inequality in the Section for Development Studies, Department of International Studies and Interpreting, Oslo Metropolitan University in Norway, and it comes out of two distinct experiences. First, it addresses concerns we have had in our own mainly qualitatively oriented research within the interdisciplinary field of development studies, where different disciplinary methodological traditions meet. Second, it draws on our experiences as lecturers in

Peran Media Sosial Instagram @Greenpeaceid Sebagai Media Kampanye Dalam Menjaga Lingkungan

“…Metode penelitian kualitatif merupakan salah satu penelitian yang pelaksanaannya tidak terkait dengan data berupa angka (Sukma Alam, 2020). Dalam penelitian secara kualitatif merupakan langkah untuk melakukan penelitian yang sering dipakai di Indonesia namun kurang dipakai penelitian di jurnal Internasional (Arntsen & Waldrop, 2018). Penelitian kualitatif memiliki landasan penelitian pada suatu pengamatan yang dilakukan secara langsung terhadap objek yang menjadi bahan penelitian.…”

Analisis Perilaku Politik Generasi Milenial Dan Z Indonesia Dalam Virtual Sphere

“…Kontribusi pengguna paling tinggi berada di Pulau Jawa 56,4%, Sumatra 22,1%, Sulawesi 7,0%, Kalimantan 6,3%, Bali dan Nusa Tenggara 5,2%, Maluku dan Papua 3,0% (APJII, 2020b). Dari total pengguna tersebut, terdapat 51,5% pengguna internet Indonesia yang aktif mengakses media sosial, dan 32,9% yang mengakses internet untuk kebutuhan komunikasi (APJII, 2022).…”

Accessibility to and utilization of maternal, neonatal and child health (MNCH) services by rural women: A case study of health centres in Mutare district based on the 3 delays model

“…Focus Group Discussions (FDG) provided access to a larger body of knowledge and were undertaken under minimum guidance of a facilitator with pregnant women or women that had delivered within a year of the time of study (to minimise recall bias). The focus group discussions were done with each group having not more than 12 women to enable good group control and allow all women to participate fully in the discussion (Arntsen and Waldrop, 2018). Focus groups were likely to create severe issues of external validity, especially where the reactive effects of the testing arrangement probed the perceptions, opinions, beliefs, and attitudes towards the service.…”