Beyond the margins of neoliberalism: Biological and Neurological Foundations of Action Research

This text maintains that the presuppositions of individualistic empiricism have been instrumental for the neoliberal revolution, which turns supposed aggressiveness and natural selfishness into a foundation of society. The combination of science that denies the relational, emotional and subjective nature of humans with the naturalisation of individualism and competition as supposed bases of human behaviour combine to hinder Action Research’s aim of “self-determination” (Fricke, 2018). However, true relational parameters, located in and empathic with the living, fit perfectly with the assumptions of AR. Therefore, we explain how discoveries in biology not only show that the bases of Action Research are not heretical from a scientific point of view, but that they fit in perfectly with the true parameters of behaviour identified by the life sciences.

Action Research as Pre-Service Teacher Inquiry Physical Education

The newest Canadian Elementary Health and Physical Education (2019) provincial curricula promotes inquiry as a pedagogical mode. AR complements this inquiry mode of instruction with its grounding in experience and practice which infuses educational roles. AR as practice-based inquiry helps new educators identify and reveal resolutions; however, first a need to want to improve needs to be identified, before next steps are taken. AR has the potential to open doors of perception, trigger new insights, and cultivate teacher development within teacher training and beyond while in-service. Admittedly, teachers change, no matter how incrementally, which permeates professional development, as witnessed in over 100 years of action research drawn upon herein. Extant AR literature is grounded in the educational development of participants as they teach. Development in AR is not actually a problem needing investigation; instead it remains a possibility that needs recursive attention to ensure it exists within the training of educators globally. Herein AR is illustrated via narrative accounts that reflect experiences while teacher training in an Ontario Faculty of Education programme.

Using action research to develop a real-time measure of job satisfaction in the operating room setting

This paper outlines how action research was used to develop a real-time job satisfaction measurement tool for the operating room (OR) setting. It offers insight into how collaborative action research can be used in a complex interprofessional setting to create a practical, valid and relevant tool. The study was conducted within one New Zealand hospital OR department during the period of March 2018 – June 2019. Using action research cycles, researchers and hospital personnel collaboratively created an innovative one-minute daily job satisfaction measure called the Morale-o-Meter. Complexities relating to its development and acceptability are explored and reflected upon, in order to draw insight for other researchers who are looking to use this methodology in a similar setting.

Co-construction of territorial and sociodemographic data in a poor informal neighborhood with high socio-environmental vulnerability in the city of La Plata, Argentina

This paper presents the results of a census carried out in the largest of the 164 informal settlements currently in existence in the city of La Plata, capital of the province of Buenos Aires, Argentina. The objective is to define territorial and sociodemographic data of this poor informal neighbourhood with high socio-environmental vulnerability, paying special interest to the macro variables related to housing, education and work, as well as perceptions about the neighbourhood and future prospects. Therefore, the aim is to generate co-constructed scientific knowledge in tandem with the community, which in turn recovers knowledge and demands from the territory with a concrete potential for transformation. This work is part of a Participatory Scientific Agenda based on the interaction of the community, political, economic and scientific-technical actors.

Action research and politics: power, love and inquiry in political transformations

Motivated by a real case of action research with political aims, we focus attention on the importance of power dynamics and emotional work for all involved in the facilitation and manifestation of new policy. The paper introduces an extension of contemporary action research called Action Research Transformations (ART). In ART, reflexive co-agency operates as a core concept and practice, because it furthers the possibility of moving toward mutuality. This enables policy makers and researchers, working together, to move from power over to power with, and increases the transformative potential of the projects they develop together.

‘We seem to be moving in circles’. How facilitative action research generates transferable and workable breakthroughs in policy networks that are stuck

Action Research can make an important contribution in bringing transformative action to contemporary complex societal problems. Critique upon its limited scope opens the discussion about transferability of outcomes. This paper discusses how facilitative action research enabled transferable and workable breakthroughs to policy practitioners feeling stuck in designed governance networks around complex care and safety problems in the Netherlands. Experiments with facilitated, collaborative conversations of relational inquiry with policy practitioners were conducted in practices in three different cities. Evidence from the three practices suggests that for breakthroughs to be transferable and workable, they need to be able to support a process of reliving and re-experiencing. Reliving and re-experiencing was enhanced when the researcher added a level of abstraction to the conversation by using systems-thinking inspired visuals. This way, policy practitioners were able to grasp the complexity of their situation as well as to see the unintended consequences of their actions. Subsequent naming of the visuals enhanced both the appropriation of the abstracted situation as well as facilitating the broader communication of the experience beyond the group of practitioners involved. Finally, by actively bridging the different practices in three different cities, the researcher was able to connect experiences and so enhance the feeling of reliving and re-experiencing beyond the individual practices. This way, a broader base of knowledge and experience about the problematique, and possible breakthroughs in the complexity of collaboration in designed policy networks, was created.

An action researcher in an advisor’s hat: A short reflection on lessons the OECD has learned from undertaking action research in the realm of policy and politics

Action research has enormous potential for policymakers, and those who advise them, to work in more iterative, reflective, and collaborative ways. For complex systems facing wicked problems, any approach that gets it closer to framing a problem well and drawing upon diverse forms of knowledge to bring about change, is good. Advisors who do action research in policymaking or political settings should be sensitive to the fact that this methodology may confound expectations regarding the ‘traditional’ advisor role. As such, some careful navigation of this approach (and what it means for the relationship and perception policymakers may have with those they engage to advise them) is required. This opinion piece shares lessons from an advisor working in the OECD’s innovation team, which embraced the action research methodology to reflect on and design innovative policy interventions with public sector policymakers. Action researchers who are using this methodology to produce policy advice may be more successful in auguring, and better navigating, new kinds of relationships with government if they heed the following lessons: frame the value of action research with decision makers, diversify your data and follow the story, and prime practitioners to participate.