Participation in Workshop on Contextual Ethics and Power Relations in Leuven

All members of the PolMig team recently returned from the first phase of fieldwork in Kenya, Malawi, Liberia and Ghana. We went armed with theories, reports and categories as the usual academic toolkit. But the more we engaged various research participants, who were so generous with their time, their lived experiences and their perspectives, the more the toolkit felt inadequate.

So many other questions kept popping up: How do we reconcile northern ethical templates with ‘southern’ lived realities? How do we write this up without drowning out the very voices we are trying to amplify? How does ‘participatory research’ become more than just a checkbox?

Then there is the quiet toll that rarely makes it into reports. The mental health of the researched: how do much our questions have the potential to reopen wounds, raise (false) hopes, or leave people suspended in uncertainty? And the mental health of the researcher: the sleepless nights after an interview, the guilt of leaving, the loneliness of holding stories you cannot fully process. 

Opportunely, soon after returning from fieldwork, Sophia and Edwin were invited to participate in a workshop on Contextual Ethics and Power Relations: Rethinking Research Practices with Local Communities between 27 and 28 May in Leuven. This fitting workshop was organised by what we’ve come to call a ‘sister project’ – a fellow ERC-funded project: Life Narratives of Violence among Refugees from Africa’s Great Lakes Region (AGLR). This event convened researchers from multiple projects and partners and provided a safe space to collectively reflect on responsibility, power, equity and justice - beyond procedural formalities in research on/with people on the move.

The takeaways will stay with us. They are already shaping our continued conversations in the PolMig Project towards more ethical, more meaningful and more humble approaches in research.