Researching with ‘Local’ Associates: Power, Trust and Data in an Interpretive Project on Communities’ Conflict Knowledge in Myanmar

Abstract

This article discusses benefits and challenges of qualitative-interpretive research conducted in teams of outside (Northern) researchers and national (Southern) associates, in which the latter have considerable autonomy over research design and data generation. Reflecting on our collaboration with Burmese associates on arts-based workshops with violence-affected communities in Myanmar, we discuss how structures and dynamics of power and trustbuilding shaped the research process and data interpretation. Our reflective analysis suggests that interpretivist research 'by proxy' is possible and can be highly enriching but depends upon sufficient time (and funding) for meaningful, long-term engagement with 'local' research collaborators, which our project lacked.

Drawing Out Experiential Conflict Knowledge in Myanmar: Arts-Based Methods in Qualitative Research With Conflict-Affected Communities

“…While ABR methods help generate trusting working relationships between participants and researchers, recruiting participants in the first place remains a challenge in research on sensitive topics. In the Myanmar project, recruitment was only possible through reliance on already existing relationships of trust (Bliesemann de Guevara et al, 2020; cf. Gameiro et al, 2018).…”

“…To implement this method in Myanmar, the researchers collaborated closely with three Myanmar research associates: two artists facilitating the workshops and a businesswoman organising logistics (Bliesemann de Guevara et al, 2020;Kušić, 2020). These associates ran two drawing workshops with members of conflict-affected communities in Kachin and Rakhine states, areas at the time partly access-restricted to foreigners.…”

“…Based on a literature review of ABR, the article first argues that ABR methods’ threefold potential to enhance participants’ agency in the research process, allow for multiple meanings to surface, and contribute to positive transformations suggests that these methods are particularly useful as means to explore situated, experiential insights into how a violent conflict impacts on individuals and communities in specific sociocultural contexts and affects their understandings of peace and development. The article then discusses the implementation and results of the “Raising Silent Voices” project, which employed a drawing method to access communities’ experiential conflict knowledge in Myanmar (Bliesemann de Guevara et al, 2020; Julian et al, 2019). The project collaborated with the international NGO Nonviolent Peaceforce (NP), which provides unarmed civilian-to-civilian protection in areas of violent conflict.…”

Peace Teams in the Protest-Repression Nexus: A Sociomaterial Perspective of De-escalatory Tactics

“…This backdrops Peace Team work, emphasizing the development of community connections, and in particular the essential role of trust in these connections [11]. It also lends depth to understanding the ideological backing of peace work in influencing perspectives of violence that inform practices [32,33].…”

Peace geographies and the spatial turn in peace and conflict studies: Integrating parallel conversations through spatial practices

“…In response, scholars increasingly recognize the value of ethnographic methods in peace and conflict research, (Millar, 2014, 2018a; 2018b). This has also brought greater attention to previously peripheralized peace research agendas including indigenous knowledge and peacebuilding (Brett, 2013; Chaves, et al., 2018, 2020; Macaspac, 2018), alternative peace and security initiatives such as peace zones/communities (Hancock, 2017; Hancock & Mitchell, 2007; Kaplan, 2017; Macaspac, 2018), and the differential politics of peace research between local and foreign scholars and between foreign scholars and local communities in the Global South (Bliesemann de Guevara et al., 2020; Macaspac, 2017).…”