Scholar-Activist? On Relational Accountability and an Ethic of Dissemination

In this article, we open up Yarning as a fundamentally relational methodology. We discuss key relationships involved in Indigenous research, including with participants, Country, Ancestors, data, history, and Knowledge. We argue that the principles and protocols associated with the deepest layers of yarning in an Indigenous Australian context create a protected space which supports the researcher to develop and maintain accountability in each of these research relationships. Protection and relational accountability in turn contribute to research which is trustworthy and has integrity. Woven throughout the article are excerpts of a yarn in which the first author reflects on his personal experience of this research methodology. We hope this device serves to demonstrate the way yarning as a relational process of communication helps to bring out deeper reflection and analysis and invoke accountability in all of our research relationships.

Download Full-text

Developing an Indigenous goal-setting tool: Counting Coup

Turtle Island Journal of Indigenous Health ◽

10.33137/tijih.v1i1.34007 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 1 (1) ◽

pp. 49-57

Author(s):

Iitáa Dáakuash ◽

Alma McCormick ◽

Shannen Keene ◽

John Hallett ◽

Suzanne Held

Keyword(s):

Chronic Illness ◽

Goal Setting ◽

Indigenous Communities ◽

Self Management ◽

Future Research ◽

Goal Theory ◽

Management Intervention ◽

Management Interventions ◽

Indigenous Paradigm ◽

Relational Accountability

Chronic illness self-management best practices include goal-setting as an important tool for developing better self-management habits and are often included as elements of chronic disease self-management interventions. However, the goal theory that many of these tools employ relies on individualistic principles of self-efficacy that are not culturally consonant within many Indigenous communities. During the creation of the [blinded] program, a chronic illness management intervention, we developed a goal-setting tool specific to the [blinded] Nation. Emerging from an Indigenous paradigm and methodology, Counting Coup serves as a goal-setting tool that promotes the [blinded] culture, connects individuals with their ancestors, and focuses on achievement of goals within relationships. Future research and practice should be grounded in the historical and cultural contexts of their communities when designing and implementing goal-setting tools. Limitations to Counting Coup as a goal-setting tool include the need for program facilitators to have a relationship with participants due to Counting Coup’s foundation in relational accountability and that the environmental context may pose difficulties for participants in moving towards behavior change.

Download Full-text

Relational accountability in Indigenous governance

Routledge Handbook of Critical Indigenous Studies ◽

10.4324/9780429440229-26 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 295-309

Author(s):

Jean Dennison

Keyword(s):

Indigenous Governance ◽

Relational Accountability

Download Full-text

A contingency framework on partnership risk

International Journal of Public Sector Management ◽

10.1108/ijpsm-09-2013-0128 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 27 (4) ◽

pp. 317-333 ◽

Cited By ~ 4

Author(s):

Tobias Krause

Keyword(s):

Design Methodology ◽

Risk Mitigation ◽

Mitigation Strategies ◽

Role Conflicts ◽

Content Type ◽

Risk Mitigation Strategies ◽

Shared Equity ◽

Relational Accountability ◽

Agency Capture ◽

Practical Implications

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyze and compare the specific contingencies of partnership risk in shared equity public-private partnerships (PPPs) with the contingencies of privately held, loose related PPPs. Design/methodology/approach – Drawing on instrumental and relational accountability perspectives, the author formulates theoretical propositions on partnership risk. Findings – The author conclude that loose related PPPs are characterized by high expertise and a higher risk of contract incompleteness by reason of opportunism. Shared ownership PPPs are characterized by lower opportunism but stronger goal ambiguities and role conflicts. These relationships are threatened by political micromanagement, agency capture and bailout problems. Research limitations/implications – The study offers an analytical frame of propositions and provides avenues for further research on partnership risk. Practical implications – The author suggest risk mitigation strategies for tight and loose related PPPs. Originality/value – Identifying crucial contingencies from both an instrumental and a relational perspective, the study makes a contribution to cooperation research in PPPs.

Download Full-text

Ethical accountability and high-stakes recordkeeping: Discussions from the Sex Work Activist Histories Project

Proceedings of the Annual Conference of CAIS / Actes du congrès annuel de l'ACSI ◽

10.29173/cais1200 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Danielle Allard ◽

Shawna Ferris ◽

Amy Lebovitch ◽

Jenn Clamen ◽

Micheline Hughes

Keyword(s):

Sex Work ◽

High Stakes ◽

Community Partners ◽

Relational Accountability

Including both academic and sex work activist community partners, panel members will discuss established and developing practices and key findings from the Sex Work Activist Histories Projects’ first two years as we collected and archived sex work activist histories. We draw from feminist and Indigenous frameworks of ethical, affective, and relational accountability (among groups, between academics and non-academics involved in the project, and between people and their records/histories) to productively consider how project relationships might be cultivated that are mutually accountable to the varied and complex analytical and affective positionalities of project members as they work together.

Download Full-text

A Co-Created Methodological Approach to Address the Relational Dimension of Environmental Challenges: When Critical Legal Analysis Meets Illustrated Storytelling

Sustainability ◽

10.3390/su132313212 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (23) ◽

pp. 13212

Author(s):

Margherita Paola Poto ◽

Arianna Porrone

Keyword(s):

Methodological Approach ◽

Legal Analysis ◽

Transformative Experience ◽

Educational Approach ◽

Relational Dynamics ◽

Wide Audience ◽

Environmental Threats ◽

Beneficial Effects ◽

The Individual ◽

Relational Accountability

Environmental education research needs to take into account the relational dimension of the ecological challenges of our time. It requires the development of methodological techniques that prioritize community concerns, and generally foster positive relational dynamics of the research and study group. This leads to the construction of a research and educational approach around the collective and cocreated interpretation of stories related to ecological bonds and knowledge, and the adoption of illustrations enabling participation, inclusion, and interaction among the parties. Through the lens of critical legal analysis and participatory research, we explore the beneficial effects of cocreating knowledge with the help of a specific learning toolkit (LT), built around storytelling and designed to stimulate respectful relationships between participants. The LT addresses a wide audience of indigenous and local communities, students, and researchers. Founded on participated storytelling, collective interpretation, and illustration, the toolkit includes (1) the project cover, (2) an illustrated handbook based on an indigenous story, and (3) the illustration and conceptualization of a silent book. Through the interpretation of stories on the ecological bonds between humans and nonhumans, we analyze how the process of looking for common solutions to environmental threats makes participants reflect on their relational connection to the theme and each other. We also observe how the discussion generates a sense of responsibility that comes with bringing a new idea into being. The result is that both education and research become part of the solution to the challenge itself in the shape of a harmonious relational and transformative experience. The solution lies in the recognition of the individual and collective capacity to change systems by changing relationships. Only through a collective effort towards a common sense of relational accountability and trust we can heal the wounds of our planet, and our individual and collective wounds.

Download Full-text

Thesis as kin: living relationality with research

AlterNative An International Journal of Indigenous Peoples ◽

10.1177/1177180120948270 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 16 (3) ◽

pp. 163-170

Author(s):

Lauren Tynan

Keyword(s):

Knowledge Production ◽

Short Form ◽

Indigenous Research ◽

Research Practice ◽

Doctoral Studies ◽

Research Paradigms ◽

Latin Word ◽

Asking Questions ◽

Relational Accountability

As a trawlwulwuy woman of tebrakunna country, Australia, I invite scholars to embrace research and writing as kin, extending an ethic of relational accountability to all relations, including the thesis. “Thesis as kin” derives from an Aboriginal ontological translation of the English (originally Latin) word “thesis,” broken into two parts, “the” “sis”, revealing the short form for sister “sis” as the primary entity. “Thesis as kin” can similarly be translated as “thesis askin,” an agentic provocation that situates knowledge production with the thesis itself and suggests the thesis is askin’ (asking) questions. Not limited to doctoral studies, imagining thesis as kin respectfully and humbly responds to scholars’ calls that Indigenous research paradigms centre relationality. This article advocates for a research practice beyond consumerist reproduction, towards a process of kinship. It is an attempt to caretake all our relations by living the processes of relationality with research.

Download Full-text