Using a community-based participatory approach to research and programming in Northern Uganda: two researchers’ confessional tales

Abstract

Sport and physical activity are increasingly being used to promote personal and community development, particularly in developing nations such as Uganda. However, most sport-based research and programming efforts in developing nations have taken an outside-in globalisation approach or a top-down development approach, which may overlook the voices, knowledges and needs of the communities being served. With these concerns in mind, we took a community-based participatory (CBP) approach to our efforts in Uganda. While this approach is optimal for community-engaged research and programming, there are many challenges associated with CBP. During our time in Uganda, we reflected on these challenges in separate reflexivity journals, which are presented in this article in the form of two confessional tales. Through personal, functional and disciplinary reflexivity, we explore the challenges we faced pursuing a CBP approach to research and programming, along with the effective and ineffective strategies we used to try to overcome these challenges. Topics discussed in these confessional tales include goal setting, communication, flexibility, patience, relationship-building and empowerment.

Keywords:

• confessional tale
• community engagement
• participatory research
• sport for development and peace
• sport-based youth development

Acknowledgement

Thank you to the Women’s Leadership Group for their collaboration and inspiration.