Covert Research

The Art, Politics and Ethics of Undercover Fieldwork

David Calvey

• Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781849203845, 9781849203838
• eBook ISBN: 9781473954922
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Science Research & Methodology
• Index: Social Sciences

Undercover research is an emotive and controversial field often equated with deception and transgression.  Using classic examples and contemporary case studies this book challenges covert research's dispersed place within the social sciences and rehabilitates its reputation as a powerful research method.

Drawing in part on his own undercover research into the night-time economy of bouncers, the author explores the roots and evolution of covert research; his deft treatment of the fear and fascination within furtive fieldwork is grounded in the practicality of the methods and tools needed to conduct quality research in the field.

Packed with learning-by-example tips, this book shows that with critical imagination and proper ethical foundations, covert research could be a great addition to your methodological toolkit.

1 What is Covert Research?

• 1.1 Popular definitions of covert research 5
• 1.2 Media scandals, whistleblowing, exposé documentaries and citizen journalism 6
• 1.3 Mock interviews and comedic pranks 11
• 1.4 Television hoaxing 12
• 1.5 Social media 12
• 1.6 Practitioner undercover investigations 14
• 1.7 Deception in police culture 15
• 1.8 Conclusions 17
• 1.9 Learning exercise 17

1.1 Popular definitions of covert research

Turning to the initial task, it is important here to briefly survey some populist definitions of covert research from introductory textbooks because students will typically gain a basic understanding of the field from such sources, which then becomes a type of conventional wisdom on the field.

Holloway broadly defines covert research as ‘research processes in which researchers do not disclose their presence and identity as researcher and participants have no knowledge of their research identity’ (1997: 39). Macionis and Plummer claim: ‘In sociology, the dilemma appears where the researcher conceals his or her identity and “cons” his way into a new group’ (2005: 64). Giddens adds: ‘Indeed, some of the most valuable data that have been collected by sociologists could never have been gathered if the researcher had first explained the project to each person encountered in the research process’ (2009: 37).

Turning to the more methodological introductory texts, covert research is understandably given more detailed treatment. Bryman (2008), in Social Research Methods, focuses on Humphreys and Milgram as key ‘infamous cases’. He then discusses a range of cases and related issues about access, legality, going native and key informants as well as the rise of visual ethnography.

Throughout various keyword books, dictionaries and encyclopaedias, covert research is defined broadly in terms of deception. Michael Bloor and Fiona Ward define covert research as: ‘the undertaking of research without the consent of research subjects, by the researcher posing as an ordinary member of the collectivity, or by the experimental manipulation of research subjects without their knowledge’ (2006: 43). They usefully provide a range of examples and discuss the typical advantages and disadvantages. The limitation and omission here is that they suggest that the tradition is not currently vibrant, stating: ‘Although covert qualitative research projects are still sometimes undertaken, the controversy surrounding covert methods has probably made such studies less common than they were previously’ (Bloor and Ward, 2006: 45).

Levine (2014) presents a voluminous multi-disciplinary Encyclopedia of Deception, based mainly on psychological studies about lying and deception in different contexts, from the everyday to high-profile political scandals. My work is not trying to build psychological models of deception that can be applied and tested. There is also an established literature on deception from moral philosophy (Bok, 1978, 1982; Martin, 2009) which centres on the examination of the relationship between truth, self-deception and lying, and the ethics of such behaviour in a very specific manner. Neither shall the book cover the literature on spying and espionage, much of which historically and politically analyses the more militaristic roots of espionage (Calder, 1999; Knightley, 1987; Goldman, 2006). Interestingly, some of the immediate assumptions about and mythic images of covert research are tied up with spies and spying. What Knightley (1987) refers to as the ‘second oldest profession’ and a still highly clandestine occupation and subculture. The more contemporary and popular images of covert research have shifted to investigative journalism, which is more accessible and one that we explore in the book. My lens and gaze on deception is thus primarily sociological although the range of deceptive scenarios that are critically explored and concepts used shall range across the wider family of social science disciplines.

1.2 Media scandals, whistleblowing, exposé documentaries and citizen journalism

What we have in broader societal terms is the contradiction between protectionism and voyeurism in society. On the one hand, we have increased our pursuit of the primacy of the private, yet on the other hand, we are intrigued by voyeuristically ‘peering’ and ‘watching’, and all the better if we remain unnoticed. The public tune in, with significant viewing figures, to various televised programmes to watch the degradation ceremonies unfold in different contexts. If the cameras are hidden or at least normalized, this seems to enhance the viewing pleasure.

Deception in public life is not new. Historically, an interesting example of deception and its unintended consequences was when the famous actor and filmmaker Orson Welles broadcast The War of the Worlds on the radio in 1938 in Columbia, USA. The first two-thirds of the sixty-minute broadcast were presented as a series of simulated news bulletins, which suggested to many listeners that an actual alien invasion was currently in progress. This resulted in mass panics in certain quarters and an outcry by the media. Within one month, newspapers had published thousands of articles about the broadcast and its impact. Adolf Hitler, the infamous Nazi leader, even cited the panic. The hoax broadcast was repeated in Ecuador in February 1949, and resulted in local riots.

In terms of popular culture and media constructions, various comedic characters trade on dupery and fakery and conduct various breaching and transgression experiments. What I call ‘popular passing’. Banksy, the famous English graffiti artist is even more exotic. Without revealing his true identity, he has worked in clandestine ways over a sustained period of time in the art world.

Deceptive tactics, or what have been classically called ‘muckraking’, have been normalized for a lengthy period of time in the press. The Leveson public inquiry was set up by the government in the wake of the phone hacking scandal at the News of the World, a British newspaper, and amid wider issues of the work culture and professional ethics of the British Press. Employees of the newspaper were accused of engaging in a culture of phone hacking and police bribery (Mawby, 2014) in the pursuit of stories. The inquiry involved News Corporation owner Rupert Murdoch and his son being called before a parliamentary committee, and resulted in several high-profile resignations and convictions. Advertiser boycotts led to the closure of the News of the World in July 2011, after 168 years of publication. The Leveson Report was published in November 2012. Efforts are being made to replace the Press Complaints Commission by a new regulatory body (Cohen-Almagor, 2014).

It is clear that secrecy forms part of our popular culture and public imagination. Whistleblowing at work is an established and successful way of exposing corruption, injustice, scandal and forms of wrongdoing. Indeed, whistleblowing has been promoted by a government national inquiry, with an anonymous telephone reporting system established, for reporting poor medical care and unacceptable professional standards in various NHS (National Health Service) hospital Trusts in the UK. This was partly a response to the ‘culture of fear’ in openly reporting medical malpractice in what was commonly titled ‘freedom to speak up’. Such whistleblowing is subject to the Public Interest Disclosure Act of 1998, with whistle blowers protected from potential harassment or discrimination. Whistleblowing is also linked to resistance in the workplace (Miethe, 1999; Near, 1995; Near and Miceli, 1996; Perry, 1998; Rothschild and Miethe, 1994; Tuda and Pathak, 2014). What Perry (1998), in his examination of these activities, elegantly refers to as ‘indecent exposures’. De Maria (2008) links whistleblowing and protest together and views them as important sources of ethical resistance to corruption and forms of wrongdoing. For him, the field is still largely unexplored and will likely expand.

Edward Snowden, the CIA whistleblower has caused an international storm around his claims of surveillance of the Web in 2013 by the American government. In a similarly politicized context, Julian Assange, who founded Wikileaks in 2006, has caused controversy by putting sensitive information, often military-based, into the public domain. It made particular global headlines in April 2010 by publishing confidential footage showing US soldiers firing at civilians from a helicopter in Iraq. In this way, Wikileaks represents a sort of public whistleblowing. Lindgren and Lundström (2011) view such activities as part of wider movements in ‘hacktivist mobilization’ and a technological ‘pirate culture’ which is broadly anti-authority.

Some undercover investigations have controversially hit the headlines. In September 2006, the BBC’s Panorama programme broadcast a special investigation into corruption in English football, entitled ‘Undercover: Football’s Dirty Secrets’, which included meetings between agents, managers and high-ranking football club officials, filmed undercover by reporter Knut auf dem Berge, a former freelance scout, posing as a prospective football agent based in America who was looking to set up a new football agency called Dynamic Soccer. The footage purported to show agents and managers accepting backhanders and illegally contacting players under contract to other clubs, and included some high-profile clubs and managers. The strong reaction to the programme resulted in the Football Association establishing an inquiry, headed by Lord Stevens, a former Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, to investigate the claims as well as further police investigations of bribery in 2008. More recently, in September 2016, Sam Allardyce, was forced to resign his high-profile post as national England football manager due to an undercover sting by journalists from The Daily Telegraph posing as overseas businessmen. Allardyce, on hidden camera, offered advice on getting around banned third party ownership in the game and was very open to taking paid offers for overseas speaking engagements.

In a different context, Margaret Haywood was a working nurse who was involved in secret filming for a BBC Panorama programme exposing poor care in the Royal Sussex Hospital in 2005. She was subsequently struck off the professional register for misconduct. Her case caused widespread media coverage and more academic discussion in healthcare (Belshaw, 2010; Wainright, 2009). In 2011 the BBC’s Panorama team of covert investigative journalists discovered the systemic abuse of patients with severe learning disabilities at Winterbourne View, a residential care home near Bristol. Six out of eleven care workers who admitted a total of thirty-eight charges of neglect or abuse have been jailed. The Care Quality Commission has also launched an official government inquiry. Three former care home workers who mistreated an elderly female resident with Alzheimer’s disease at the Granary Dementia Care Centre, near Bristol, were prosecuted. One received a jail sentence and two others have suspended sentences in 2013. The abuse footage was captured using hidden cameras, this time planted by the concerned and suspicious family of the resident rather than a professional journalist.

Still using ‘sting’ tactics, undercover journalist Mazher Mahmood, known as the ‘fake Sheik’ due to his faked persona, snared former professional champion boxer Herbie Hide by getting him to supply cocaine at a hotel in Norwich, England. Despite reservations about the ‘entrapment tactics’ adopted by Mahmood, Hide was sentenced and imprisoned to twenty-two months in November 2013. The same journalist attempted a similar sting on a celebrity music judge Tulisa Contostavios in August 2014, but this failed. Ironically, Mahmood himself was then investigated by the police and found guilty, with his driver, of conspiring to pervert the course of justice in this case and has been sentenced to fifteen months in jail in October 2016. His various undercover investigations over the years are covered in his rather glamorized and self-styled confessions of ‘the king of the sting’ (Mahmood, 2008). In the political arena, two former foreign secretaries were also exposed in 2015 by undercover journalists in the ‘cash for access’ scandal.

Controversial undercover investigations by female journalists faking pregnancy have been done into Crisis Pregnancy Centres (CPC) in the UK in 2014, both by The Daily Telegraph newspaper and independently by Education For Choice, a sexual health charity. The CPCs are not endorsed by the National Health Service and are currently unregulated by the government. There are over a hundred in the UK and are proving increasingly popular with young, particularly vulnerable and desperate, women. Such critical undercover journalistic work, although sensitive, can clearly be seen to be in the public interest.

Undercover investigations of North Korea, which many view as a rather repressive regime, were undertaken by journalist David McNeill. Posing as an ordinary tourist attending an International Film Festival, he exposed widespread poverty and illegal food markets before being caught out by the authorities in 2010. Journalist John Sweeney, who posed as a fake professor on a student exchange trip in 2013 to North Korea, also gained media attention. Sweeney’s reasoning was that such covert methods are justified to explore closed and secretive societies with strong state censorship and dubious human rights records. Undercover work into the Mafia in Naples, Italy was carried out by celebrated Italian journalist Roberto Saviano, who wrote a bestselling book called Gomorrah (2007) that was then made into an award-winning film and television series of the same title. Gomorrah made global media headlines and brought attention to the use of covert methods to expose transnational corruption and crime. Undercover officers in the National Public Intelligence Unit, based in London, have recently come under formal investigation and possible prosecution for unethical practices and reckless behaviour in a number of cases. This included one officer marrying and having children with someone under investigation and another, Kennedy, who was investigating environmental activism for eight years, living as the partner of one woman in the movement under false pretences.

Citizen journalism is also known as public, participatory, democratic, guerrilla and street journalism (Allan et al., 2007; Allan and Thorsen, 2009; Domingo et al., 2008; Thurman, 2008). It is on the rise, particularly because of the widespread use of mobile technology and in situ amateur reporting of a range of different events. There are clear concerns with sensationalism, selectivity and bias but it has obvious aspects of covertness as it is an expedient form of documentation, which has either assumed consent or is purely bypassed in crowd contexts. It is usefully seen by some as a form of ‘bearing witness’ (Allan et al., 2007).

60 days in Jail is a remarkable documentary, similar to the Rosenhan experiment, one of the covert exemplars, except that it involves members of the public rather than trained academics, criminal justice professionals or journalists. The series was screened in March 2016 in the UK on Channel 4 and has aired in several countries around the world, with a second series already made. The series, produced by the American Arts and Entertainment Network group, followed seven people as they volunteer to go undercover for sixty days in Clark County Jail in Jeffersonville, Indiana in the USA. Their goal was to gather evidence about any wrongdoing and illegalities. There is some senior gate-keeping but the vast majority of inmates and guards are not aware of their role. They are trained beforehand and given fake but credible cover stories and criminal charges. The production team needed extensive legal advice to be able to conduct such an inquiry with the amount of concealed recording devices that were required. Despite reservations about glamorizing prison life by this intrusive media game, it puts the use of covert methodology firmly in the p...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Publisher Note
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Acknowledgements
• Contents
• About the Author
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 What is Covert Research?
• 2 The Roots of Covert Research
• 3 Debates About Covert Research
• 4 The Classic Exemplars in Covert Research
• 5 Doing Covert Research in the Social Sciences
• 6 A Covert Case Study of Bouncers in the Manchester Night-Time Economy
• 7 A Revival in Covert Research
• 8 Conclusions
• References
• Index