From Remote Control to Collaboration: Conducting NGO Research at a Distance in Tajikistan

ABSTRACT

Using a domestic violence-prevention project in Tajikistan as an example, we examine how international non-governmental organisations’ (NGOs) knowledge production-at-a-distance, working through in-country teams who in turn rely on their local brokers, raises questions around ownership, power and privilege. These include issues around language and translation; motivations and agendas; and the neo-coloniality of data extraction and analysis. Yet, long-distance approaches can also have an emancipatory dynamic, leading to new forms of coproducing knowledge, although the frameworks for this continue to be defined by the Global North, even if the categories of ‘Global North’ and ‘Global South’ are becoming increasingly blurred.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. For more detail on the project and its impact, see https://www.whatworks.co.za/resources/policy-briefs/item/462-working-with-families-to-prevent-violence-against-women-and-girls-in-tajikistan.

2. For more background information on the consortium, see https://www.whatworks.co.za/about/about-what-works .

3. This practice depends on the organisation, with some not mentioning the author(s) at all, some mentioning them in the acknowledgements, some having authors’ names on the first page but not the cover and yet others publishing outputs using the authors’ names.

4. As others in this special issue have noted, reduced access to ‘the field’, to use the problematic term, due to security reasons is also a growing concern for academic researchers.

5. Legally, marriage is forbidden under the age of 18 in Tajikistan, but this is often ignored in practice.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the United Kingdom Department for International Development's What Works to Prevent Violence Against Women and Girls consortium.

Notes on contributors

Henri Myrttinen

Henri Myrttinen has been working as a researcher and NGO practitioner on gender, peace and security for over 15 years and holds a Ph.D. in Conflict Resolution and Peace Studies from the University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. He has been working on gender-based violence prevention research and programming for a decade, including in Tajikistan.

Subhiya Mastonshoeva

Subhiya Mastonshoeva holds a Master of Global Affairs degree, International Peace Studies concentration from Keough School of Global Affairs, University of Notre Dame. She has over ten years of practical and research experience on the intersection of gender, security and peace in Central Asia, particularly Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Her past researches focus on sexual and gender-based violence, gender and disabilities.