Planning your community-led action research project

Introduction

Community-led action research is a useful tool to support community empowerment and community voice. It is an approach which can help put power in the hands of communities and is something that is within reach of many.

However, it’s important to think carefully before undertaking a community-led action research project. It can be tempting to ‘get wired in’ straight away but we think it’s well worth spending some time with your community organisation or group to make sure it’s the right approach for you.

In this section we suggest how you might go about planning and laying the groundwork of a community-led action research project.

We have prepared the following tools and guides that you may find helpful to work through with your group or organisation – especially those tasked with delivering the project.

Section Content

In Thinking through community-led action research we outline some things that we think are important to consider when embarking on a community-led action research project.

You should think about your Research question. Your research question is a guide to your research and so is a living thing throughout your project. Don’t stress about getting it exactly ‘right’ – the ‘right’ question is one that helps you think and do your community-led action research.

In order to help you relate your research to the action you wish to take in your community we help you to look at Where are we on the action research cycle.

To help you get down to How to plan your research we take you through some key things to think about when you’re looking at the difference you want to make through your research.

Community-led action research is a collaborative and participative endeavour so it’s good to assess the relevant stakeholders in your community who could help you by doing stakeholder analysis.

As in all research, it is important to make sure that research conducted by the community follows ethical guidelines. Our ethics section contains some basic guidelines and links to templates for providing informed consent to people taking part in your research.

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