Handbook on Participatory Action Research and Community Development

This Handbook is a critical resource for carefully considering the possibilities and challenges of strategically integrating participatory action research (PAR) and community development (CD). Utilizing practical examples from diverse contexts across five continents, it looks at how communities are empowering themselves and bringing about systemic change. Chapters provide models for sustainably integrating the two practices and explore the transformative potential of decolonizing innovations and incorporating community organizing. With contributions by leading scholars and practitioners from the global south and north, the Handbook explores ways to build infrastructure to bring PAR and CD together, how to use PAR and CD to build people’s power and capacity, and how to integrate PAR and CD in relation to community and organizational capacity building. It further gives practical advice and academic analysis on youth PAR, how to use PAR and CD in crisis situations such as earthquakes and pandemics, and envisions radically alternative PAR and CD approaches. This is a timely resource for social science scholars looking to better understand PAR as an important research method. It rethinks the theories underpinning both PAR and CD, offering important lessons for community development practitioners and non-profit professionals, as well as higher education professors interested in community engagement.

Table of Contents:
Contents: 1 Introduction: reflecting upon the development of participatory action research and community development efforts 1 Randy Stoecker and Adrienne Falcón PART I STRUCTURES AND PROCESSES FOR INTEGRATING PARTICIPATORY ACTION RESEARCH AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT 2 Flipping the script: community-initiated urban research with the Liberal Arts Action Lab 23 Megan Brown, Jack Dougherty, and Jeff Partridge 3 Toward a community development science shop model: insights from Peterborough, Haliburton and the Kawartha Lakes 43 Randy Stoecker, Todd Barr, and Mark Skinner 4 Elevating community voices 60 Jenice Meyer and Katelyn Baumann 5 Sociocultural intervention as a resource for social transformation in Cuban communities of the twenty-first century 80 Manuel Martínez Casanova and Adrienne Falcón PART II ORGANIZING COMMUNITIES 6 Community organizing for environmental change: integrating research in support of organized actions 99 Dadit G. Hidayat and Molly Schwebach 7 The birth of a community of practice in Québec to support community organizations leading participatory action research as a tool for community development: what it teaches us 118 Lucie Gélineau, Sophie Dupéré, Marie-Jade Gagnon, Lyne Gilbert, Isabel Bernier, Nicole Bouchard, Julie Richard, and Marie-Hélène Deshaies 8 The centrality of storytelling at the nexus of academia and community organizing in rural Kentucky 139 Nicole Breazeale, Dana Beasley-Brown, Samantha Johnson, and Alexa Hatcher PART III BUILDING ORGANIZATIONS AND NEIGHBORHOODS 9 Putting theory into practice: leveraging community-based research to achieve community-based outcomes in DeLand, Florida 160 Maxwell Droznin, Kelsey Maglio, Asal M. Johnson, Cristian Cuevas, and Shilretha Dixon 10 From mission to praxis in neighborhood work: lessons learned from a three-year faculty/community development initiative 180 Laura L. O’Toole, Nancy E. Gordon, and Jessica L. Walsh 11 Early childhood wellness through asset-based community development: a participatory evaluation of Communities Acting for Kids’ Empowerment 200 Farrah Jacquez, Michael Topmiller, Jamie-Lee Morris, Alexander Shelton, Cynthia Wooten, Lakisha A. Best, Alan Dicken, Monica Arenas-Losacker, Giovanna Alvarez, Crystal Davis, and Shanah Cole 12 The complexities of participatory action research: a community development project in Bangladesh 218 Larry Stillman, Misita Anwar, Gillian Oliver, Viviane Frings-Hessami, Anindita Sarker, and Nova Ahmed PART IV GROWING YOUTH POWER 13 Youth participatory action research as an approach to developing community-level responses to youth homelessness in the United States: learning from Advocates for Richmond Youth 239 M. Alex Wagaman, Kimberly S. Compton, Tiffany S. Haynes, Jae Lange, Elaine G. Williams, and Rae Caballero Obejero 14 Volunteerism as a vehicle for civil society development in Ukraine: a community-based project to develop youth volunteerism in a Ukrainian community 259 Danielle Stevens, Tetiana Kidruk, and Oleh Petrus 15 Design your neighborhood: the evolution of a city-wide urban design learning initiative in Nashville, Tennessee 281 Kathryn Y. Morgan, Brian D. Christens, and Melody Gibson PART V RESPONDING TO CRISIS 16 Rethinking participatory development in the context of a strong state 302 Ming Hu 17 Tracing power from within: learning from participatory action research and community development projects in food systems during the COVID-19 pandemic 321 Laura Jessee Livingston 18 The information and knowledge landscapes of mutual aid: how librarians can use participatory action research to support social movements in community development 341 Alessandra Seiter PART VI EXPANDING OUR THINKING 19 Be and build the city: an experience of sociopraxis in Cuenca, Ecuador 359 Ana Elisa Astudillo and Ana Cecilia Salazar 20 Leading with locally produced knowledge: development in Jemna, Tunisia 379 Ihsan Mejdi and Celeste Koppe 21 Relationship as resistance: partnership and vivencia in participatory action research 394 José Wellington Sousa 22 Re-storying participatory action research: a narrative approach to challenging epistemic violence in community development 415 Daniel Bryan and Chelsea Viteri Index