A collaborative self-study of ethical issues in participatory action research with refugee-background young people in grassroots football

ABSTRACT

This collaborative self-study explores the ethical ambiguities and dilemmas that emerged in participatory action research (PAR) with refugee-background young people in a grassroots football programme. The project comprised a six-month PAR in a football programme in Melbourne, Australia. Participants included the first author and 13 African Australian refugee-background young women. The ethical issues encountered concerned: (a) challenges of negotiating identities and the ethics and politics of knowledge production; (b) dilemmas in the collective struggle against, and resistance to, forms of oppression; and (c) the need to share power and the accompanying fear of losing research control. We recommend that PAR projects with refugee-background young people consider critical ethic of care as a framework for anticipating and navigating ethical issues that may arise. Such a framework can give form to sensitive conversations to reveal power relations, capture complexities and contradictions inherent within caring, and guide collective practices towards recovering dignity and equity within PAR.

KEYWORDS:

• Research ethics
• refugee-background young people
• participatory action research
• football
• ethic of care

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Although I recognise that the term ‘third-world woman’ can have a derogatory connotation or be considered outdated, I use this terminology to emphasise my oppressed and/or othering positionality. In Sister Outsider, Audre Lorde (1984) described how women of colour and Third World women in solidarity should educate White people in order to regain humanity. It highlights the perseverance of Third World women in the face of oppression, and I use this term to express solidarity with women of colour around the world.

2 For more information about the Activist Phase and the process of co-creating a sport programme, see Luguetti, Singehebhuye, and Spaaij (2020).