Understanding Global Development Research
Fieldwork Issues, Experiences and Reflections
- Gordon Crawford - Coventry University, UK
- Lena Kruckenberg - University of Leeds, UK
- Nicholas Loubere - Lund University, Sweden
- Rosemary Morgan - Johns Hopkins University, USA
For experienced and inexperienced researchers and practitioners alike, this engaging book opens up new perspectives on conducting fieldwork in the Global South.
Following an inter-disciplinary and inter-generational approach, Understanding Global Development brings into dialogue reflections on fieldwork experiences by leading scholars along with accounts from early career researchers. Contributions are organised around six key issues:
- Meaningful participation in fieldwork
- Working in dangerous environments
- Gendered experiences of fieldwork
- Researching elites
- Conducting fieldwork with marginalised people
- Fieldwork in development practice.
The experience-led discussion of each of the topics conveys a sense of what it actually feels like to be out in the field and provides readers with useful insights and practical advice. A relational framework highlights issues relating to power, identity and ethics in development fieldwork, and encourages reflection on how researcher engagement with the field shapes our understanding of global development.
A must read for all students, researchers and aid workers contemplating field work in emerging economies.
This is an up-to-date, thought-provoking and well-balanced publication that brings together the best insights of leading and young scholars at the nexus of development and participatory field research. Its relational, ethics- and power-sensitive perspective makes this book special.
Sample Materials & Chapters
Crawford et al - Understanding Global Development Research - Introduction