Transforming Research Methods in the Social Sciences

Case studies from South Africa

Elizabeth Archer, Brendon Barnes, Floretta Boonzaier, Brett Bowman, Kate Cockcroft, David Edwards, Gillian Finchilescu, Paul J.P. Fouché, Thomas Geffen, Paul Goldschagg, Saraswathie Govender, Lynlee Howard-Payne, Debra Kaminer, Shose Kessi, Peace Kiguwa, Despina Learmonth, Malose Makhubela, Jacobus , Sumaya Laher, Angelo Fynn, Sherianne Kramer, Sumaya Laher

• Publisher: Wits University Press
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781776143566
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

Social science researchers in the global South, and in South Africa particularly, utilise research methods in innovative ways in order to respond to contexts characterised by diversity, racial and political tensions, socioeconomic disparities and gender inequalities. These methods often remain undocumented – a gap that this book starts to address. Written by experts from various methodological fields, Transforming Research Methods in the Social Sciences is a comprehensive collation of original essays and cutting-edge research that demonstrates the variety of novel techniques and research methods available to researchers responding to these context-bound issues. It is particularly relevant for study and research in the fields of applied psychology, sociology, ethnography, biography and anthropology. In addition to their unique combination of conceptual and application issues, the chapters also include discussions on ethical considerations relevant to the method in similar global South contexts. Transforming Research Methods in the Social Sciences has much to offer to researchers, professionals and others involved in social science research both locally and internationally.

1	Research as practice: Contextualising applied research in the South African context

Sherianne Kramer, Angelo Fynn and Sumaya Laher

Introduction

Research is at its core concerned with knowledge production and dissemination. This chapter engages with the politics of research and knowledge production by outlining the ways that research is practised and ‘made’ in South Africa specifically and in the global South¹ more broadly. In addition, this chapter presents the implications of South African research politics for participation in global knowledge economies. Further, the chapter interrogates issues of open access and argues for the necessity of open access research resources to capacitate research in the global South. These arguments provide the frame for the relevance of the chapters in this book. Hence, this book is a response to two fundamental issues facing the social sciences in South Africa, namely the active production of knowledge relevant to the South African context and access to this knowledge beyond the spheres of university scholars with subsidised access to scholarly publications. As such, this book is both intentionally open access and context specific.

Throughout this chapter, and book, there are references to South Africa, developing contexts, and low- and high-income contexts, and we embed these references in broader discussions concerning global South and global North differences in terms of politics, economics, resources and cultures. However, this is not meant to imply that global North and South contexts always operate in opposition to each other. In fact, this book specifically aims to disrupt binary theorising and so would argue that elements of the global South are of course present in the global North and vice versa. Hence this book applies to global issues. Additionally, whilst comparison between the global North and South might imply that these are homogeneous contexts, we have tried to demonstrate as far as possible that both occupy constantly changing research landscapes with diverse political, economic and cultural issues and tensions that inform these landscapes. As such, discussions concerning global North and South contexts in this book should not be understood monolithically. Rather, both global North and South contexts should be treated as complex, dynamic and multifarious, and thus as both having quite complicated implications for research as practice.

Knowledge production and the political nature of research

The examination of research politics and who has access to the knowledge economy must be prefaced by a discussion of the context and modes of knowledge production. Here we refer to the mechanisms by which knowledge is selected, made and disseminated as well as the sociocultural norms that dictate what may or may not be considered as worthy and valuable knowledge.

Traditionally, knowledge has been produced by and disseminated within university and other higher education structures. Gibbons and colleagues (1994) use the term ‘Mode 1’ to describe research practices whereby universities hold ‘the monopoly in providing training, credentialing, and knowledge production’ (Jansen, 2002, p. 509). Contemporary modes of knowledge production have taken a more interactive and dynamic approach such that research is distributed more widely and is far more heterogeneous, reflexive, application-based and transdisciplinary in nature (Hessels & Van Lente, 2008). This ‘new’ mode of knowledge production was coined by Gibbons et al. (1994) as ‘Mode 2’. In their book The New Production of Knowledge, Gibbons and colleagues (1994) distinguish between Mode 1 and Mode 2 knowledge-making mechanisms and argue that the transformation of research such that it is based on practice, overlaps disciplines and is produced by and within a variety of organisations is core to a number of modern research practices, including the globalisation and commodification of knowledge and the massification of higher education systems.

More recent postmodern attempts to establish the nature of Mode 2 knowledge production have focused on research quality, especially with regards to its ability to present itself as ‘contextualised science’. Specifically, these postmodern depictions of Mode 2 are focused on how science must be socially aware, socially responsible and constantly engaged in conversation and an exchange of ideas with society. This results in a socially robust set of knowledge productions that includes non-academic and non-scientific participants in the research process, thus boosting research credibility and reliability (Nowotny, Scott, Gibbons & Scott, 2001). While Mode 2 knowledge production seems to certainly dominate the form and nature of contemporary science, criticism has been lodged against this nomenclature of knowledge. These critiques claim that while contemporary research may be increasingly applied, there are still scientific projects that are structured as pure basic research. In addition, the claim that research is transdisciplinary, that it is evolving to attain a universal framework, may be premature given that most journals and scientific projects are still discipline specific (Hessels & Van Lente, 2008). Notwithstanding these and other criticisms, the massification of higher education systems and increasing international competition for the production and dissemination of knowledge have certainly contributed to the demand for a shift in the nature, form and politics of research such that it more closely aligns to a Mode 2 model.

The shift to knowledge-producing systems that are widely socially disseminated has a number of international and local implications. For universities, these challenges relate to sharing resources with other kinds of institutions, learning to collaborate with partners that are not necessarily academic or scientific, and working with funding and policy requirements that traverse disciplines and are diffused across applied contexts (Godin & Gingras, 2000; Jansen, 2002). This of course has repercussions for the way knowledge evolves, especially for postcolonial contexts such as South Africa.

The postcolonial politics of ‘making’ knowledge

The demand for accountable, socially relevant and contextually sound research has resulted in the global shift towards applied, transdisciplinary knowledge-making practices. In turn, traditional knowledge ‘producers’ such as universities and other higher education structures are collaborating with partners in the health, government, education and community sectors as a means to produce research that targets ‘real world’ social, economic and political issues (Waghid, 2002). Gibbons and colleagues’ (1994) Mode 2 proposal for knowledge production makes for an appealing model for South African and other global South contexts as it offers the opportunity for developing contexts to become globally competitive whilst pooling resources through its transdisciplinary (and thus heterogeneous) structure. The outcome is a socially accountable and reflexive model of knowledge production that is localised to ensure that research is focused on social issues rather than on the traditional Mode 1 focus on individual academic interests (Winberg, 2006). This is significant because it allows South African research to remain locally focused whilst engaging in internationally endorsed modes of knowledge-making such that traditional, and often oppressive, global North research practices become undone.

Some of these practices, such as the exclusion of global South scholars from international journals, the privileging of English and other Eurocentric languages in journals and academic texts (Canagarajah, 1996) and the unequal distribution of scientific resources to the global South, are thus overcome through South African scientists’ participation in Mode 2 models of knowledge production. This said, knowledge has become a commodity and its production is also attached to professional privileges (such as promotion) (Jazeel & McFarlane, 2010). Accordingly, research practice, at least in the global South, exists at the intersection of various tensions. These tensions play out in the struggle between various, and sometimes opposing, research objectives including the need to be socially accountable, the call for context relevance, funders’ requirements, professional demands and expectations, global visibility and the moral appeal for research to contribute to social change and policy. Knowledge production, and specifically Mode 2 models of it, thus must take cognisance of particular issues in developing contexts so that these struggles and tensions are reduced. For Winberg (2006), the key to this balancing act is to focus on the transdisciplinary aspect of Mode 2 research practice.

Nowotny and colleagues (2001) call for socially robust knowledge-making practices. Winberg (2006, p. 161) argues that transdisciplinarity can achieve this through the use of ‘appropriate technologies, environmentally sensitive production methods, [and] ethical exploitation of indigenous knowledge’. In addition, knowledge production in developing contexts should be achieved through reflexive practices that endorse novel approaches to problem solving, deconstruct traditional research approaches and reconstruct transformative and localised frameworks for making knowledge. This reflexive method of knowledge production should be advocated in developing contexts such that students and young scholars are empowered with critical and reflexive research skills that ensure a transformative, thoughtful and context-driven yet internationally valuable research base. This, of course, has major implications in South Africa, where knowledge and those that make and use it are often a function of apartheid legacies such as uneven access to higher education facilities, unequal employment opportunities in research-based institutions and underrepresentation of previously disadvantaged groups in knowledge-making contexts (Waghid, 2002).

This book endorses research methodologies that subscribe to Mode 2 approaches. Rather than focusing on traditional research methods that are often rigid, applied to single disciplines, Eurocentric and based on individuals’ academic interests, this book pays special attention to research methods that are ethical, reflexive, socially accountable, transdisciplinary, context specific and based on social needs, especially those in the developing world. In so doing, this book calls for a transformative approach to using research methods in making knowledge. This transformative approach, coupled with the open access nature of the book and the diverse nature of its authors, is key to the dismantling of oppressive practices in knowledge production, made possible by the global North foothold in the knowledge-making market and the inheritance of oppressive practices of systems such as apartheid.

Global inequalities in research practice and knowledge production

Research practice is, at least in global North models, mostly taught as if there is a neat linear movement from data collection to analysis and interpretation. However, South Africa is characterised by a range of culturally diverse communities that are in constant flux and are dynamic in nature. They are also usually typified by racialised tensions, gender inequalities, socioeconomic disparities and high levels of violence (Kramer, Seedat, Lazarus & Suffla, 2011). As a consequence, any research conducted in South African contexts is likely to be challenging with regards to access to resources for data collection purposes and issues related to power differentials between researchers and participants. In turn, research in the global South is often met with a variety of challenges and obstacles in early phases of the research process which makes the ‘neat’ linear movement to data analysis and interpretation both messy and unlikely. It is thus important to surface these issues at the outset of this book so that these South African-specific tensions are more easily understood in the context of later chapters.

Data collection begins with the practice of ethical procedures such as obtaining informed consent. Given that South Africa is characterised by linguistic diversity, there may be linguistic barriers between researchers and participants, whereby participants may not fully understand what they are consenting to. In addition, there is a high percentage of uneducated people in South Africa and the African region, which implies that some participants may be illiterate and thus unable to read an information sheet or give written consent. This has obvious implications for the objective of ethical imperatives in research – the integrity, safety and protection of participants (Benatar, 2002). As such, the researchers in this book have explicitly shared the ethical considerations that they made in using their research methods, and the ways that they may have overcome particular ethical dilemmas related to working in the South African context.

Data collection in the context of the global South also presents a variety of challenges to researchers. Firstly, the use of both quantitative and qualitative instruments that are developed and interpreted by a professional group of researchers may be inappropriate or irrelevant in particular contexts (see Laher & Cockcroft, 2017). Even when Eurocentric or Americanised instruments are adapted and translated so that they are context appropriate, these adaptations are still conducted by researchers that are likely to be external to the community in which the participants are immersed (Murphy & Davidshofer, 2005). In addition, the way the researchers use the instruments and treat the participants may inadvertently locate this group as ‘experts by virtue of their access to theory, resources and knowledge legitimating mechanisms’ (Kramer et al., 2011, p. 513). This power dynamic is further exacerbated by the fact that very often researchers are external agents entering communities of interest and they very rarely are sufficiently immersed in the context (Homan, 2004; Potter & Kruger, 2001). The views of the researchers are thus often prioritised and the voices of interest to the research regularly remain silenced. It is therefore essential for researchers to sufficiently engage with their own ideological biases and assumptions (Benatar, 2002) and to simultaneously attempt to identify and mobilise the participants’ voices, especially those that are disadvantaged and marginalised. In this way, South African research will refrain from replicating the oppressive practices of the past that so often filter into research practice in the country as a consequence of engrained apartheid legacies. Many of the chapters in this book use the call for context-based understandings of research methods as a me...