Amina J. Mohamme, the Deputy Secretary General of the United Nations has written an endorsement of the recently published SAGE Handbook of Participatory Research and Inquiry.
The Handbook presents contemporary, cutting-edge approaches to participatory research and inquiry. It has been designed for the community of researchers, professionals and activists engaged in interventions and action for social transformation, and for readers interested in understanding the state of the art in this domain.
The Deputy Secretary General writes:
‘Achieving the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and meeting commitments to the Paris Agreement requires impactful solutions that reach the poorest and most marginalized to deliver on the promise of the SDGs to leave no one behind.
With the Covid-19 pandemic and its impacts on rising poverty and hunger, the climate crisis and increasing environmental pressures, we must redouble our efforts to achieve our goals.
This requires drawing on the richness of ideas and experiences across communities, including young people, women and girls and indigenous peoples, for a deeper understanding of their challenges and what works in practice to overcome them, so we can act on that knowledge to create a sustainable and inclusive future for all.
Participatory research is an essential tool to deliver on that objective. Participatory research sets out open and inclusive approaches that engage the poorest and most marginalized – so we can gain knowledge and understanding of the issues that affect their lives and turn those into action.
Participatory research empowers young people to learn and apply research techniques to discover solutions for their own issues – grounded in the belief that youth are valuable experts and that power between youth and adults should be shared.
It can support governments in establishing better ways of listening to people whom they are meant to serve and taking their views into account, especially groups that are frequently overlooked. This is essential to rebuild trust and foster a renewed social contract between governments and their people and within societies.
This handbook provides a comprehensive overview of different participatory research methods that researchers with varied expertise in the field can use to support the type of social transformation that we need.
I encourage all researchers to make full use of it to accelerate achievement of the SDGs and fulfil the Paris Agreement towards a better, more sustainable and peaceful future for our people and planet’.
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