The Citizen lab of Lisbon, Novembr 2024, had the theme: co-production is essential for Involve.
Several speakers from different backgrounds, from scientific corners, NGOs and social services came together to help think about co-production. You can find the main lines of the conversation here.
Co-production within research has become a prerequisite. Involving the research target group has become a prerequisite for good sociological research.
Involve is building on the results of the REInVEST research project. A research project that interviewed the target population (migrants and people in poverty), but involved them in the research. The interviews were a start-up for a broad conversation about the impact of disinvestment in social services. Together with the target group, policy recommendations were written. All of this led to an elaborated form of PAR with an emphasis on human rights and the capability approach.
Involve continues to work on this. By now there is more experience and we see the challenges and opportunities of co-production.
Six observations
There are six observations we can already make:
– Co-production can have different meanings and scopes, ranging from dialogue sessions to creating a project together. One can speak of minimal to maximal forms of co-production.
– In all these forms, there should always be a gain for the participants: first and foremost for the target group of the project, but also for others such as the NGOs, researchers or institutions working together. Profit for the participants can mean an improvement in living conditions, concretely for the participants or for the target group and similar groups in general.
– Coproduction always requires a cultural shift; in the academic research culture, in the institutional culture (way of making decisions for example), within the NGOs themselves. This is more and different from top-down or down-top; it takes a different position where all stakeholders learn from each other and each and every one brings his or her own expertise and strives to build an alliance with the others’ expertise. In the process, academic knowledge is transformed, as well as the various forms of experiential knowledge (of target groups, but also on NGOs and of other stakeholders) are enriched. This calls for listening to each other and for respectful empathy on the one hand, it also calls for challenging each other to get out of one’s “comfort zones” and integrate different types of knowledge.
– It is a long-term project; it requires more time, more respectful dialogue between equal partners, more mediation, more return to a previous phase, … The iterative nature of the process is fundamental.
– It is an empowerment process. Each participant, especially the target group, has more opportunities, more capacities to have a voice, to be heard and taken seriously and, in the end, to have an impact on society.
– In all these projects, NGOs play a fundamental role. Namely, they can mediate between the researchers, the institutions and the target group. They not only provide the contacts with the target group or the institutions, but also are involved in the whole process and monitor the participatory and empowerment process.
It is clear that co-production does not happen by itself. It requires a lot from all participants. This comes with a lot of challenges.
Challenges
The first challenge is how we acquire knowledge or how we value knowledge. Co-production assumes that all or almost all elements or aspects of something are included or addressed. This means that in addition to academic research knowledge, there is also knowledge of the target group, of the NGOs, of the institutions. These are four forms of knowledge with their own characteristics, ways of acquiring, disseminating and communicating. In a horizontal way of working, these forms are of equal value, must also be equally developed and be equally integrated in the process. This is especially a challenge for researchers and institutions. NGOs have more experience with these horizontal forms of knowledge, but even here paternalistic and extractive forms may be present. In all four forms of knowledge, there is a risk that target group knowledge is taken out of its immediate context and presented to a group of outsiders who use and instrumentalize this knowledge for their own purposes. Research projects are especially at risk of being instrumentalized in such a way.
To gain this comprehensive knowledge, it is necessary for the research project to develop a common language with all participants (target group, NGOs, institutions and researchers). A common language ensures that everyone understands each other. Creating this language is a common aim shared by all stakeholders in the co-production of knowledge. Herein lies a challenge for the target group and the NGOs. They often tend to see themselves as recipients of knowledge, they expect researchers to present the process, language and methods. Co-production expects higher commitment from all.
The same goes for the research project itself: the research tools have to be developed together. These obviously do not start from a blank page (the academic theoretical and methodological knowledge is a useful starting point), but they must be critically examined and adapted to the co-production process. The creation of the common language provides precisely the opportunity to take this step and develop jointly the conceptual framework and the methodologies.
All this requires respect, respect for every effort and input. This presupposes a basic democratic attitude: an ethic of listening and taking a multi-perspective stance. Co-production, in other words, is a democratic school of learning.
So far, we are speaking within the boundaries of the project. The second big challenge is how do we step outside? How do we bring other people into the co-production process? This challenge certainly applies to institutions and governments, who are not always (rarely?) willing to share their decision-making prerogatives. This simultaneously shows the limits of co-production. In what ways can co-production have impact? We have already written that there must be gains for the target audience, this means that something changes for the better for them. How can participative-action-research contribute to reaching this objective? Is it through taking parts with vulnerable people, building a coalition able to oppose exclusionary social structures and institutions? Is it through reinforcing the democratic power of target groups? At that point, a scientific project tends to become an activist project. So is it still a scientific project?
For co-production to succeed, we need aspirational spaces. Specifically, this means that we need to create spaces and times where people are allowed and encouraged to “dream,” or rather develop and express expectations about a different and better future. Aspirational spaces are moments of dialogue about how the concrete environment can be improved. Within these spaces, emotional and other experiences take place. It is also about how research is conducted. This changes the image of science, we will conduct research in a different, horizontal way, where all experiences find a place. However, creating aspirations is not enough per se, there must be opportunities for testing, experimenting and realizing such aspirations: indeed, fostering aspirations without creating the opportunities to realize them, at least in part, is the surest way towards frustration and resignation.
4 concrete projects
Concrete projects were presented during the Citizen lab. These sometimes answer the above challenges.
Coproduction within an NGO or socio-economic project always assumes that the goal of the NGO is empowerment of the participants. Coproduction is then a way of working that, depending on the project, can fully shape the project. One of the speakers gave the example of an NGO funded by the target group (persons with mental health problems). The individuals, their families, researchers who support the project and all other staff work together to have the rights of the target group recognized. Both the target group and their families, and everyone else manage the organization. It was a learning process for everyone. For example, the facilitators had to let go of lead. Organizing, deciding together is paramount. Thus, this target group is co-responsible for policy, organization, and communication.
Another example zoomed in on the possibilities of intercultural mediation. The intercultural mediator can speak on behalf of someone but can also get the individuals involved to think along about what it means to have a different cultural background. The example presented was about discrimination within a health facility. The mediator, following the complaint, initiated a conversation where the two parties were together. The goal was for the two parties to be able to tell each other their story, the why and the how. The mediator helped them with questions, with providing resources (e.g., internet search), and with arriving at a “solution” that satisfied both of them. Both parties became empowered and succeeded in dealing with each other in a different way.
A third example was about the academic investigation itself. For science to have impact it must start from the needs of individuals, more, it must not stop there. Her message was that as a researcher you have to build on the strengths of the target group and let these people support the research project.
The last speaker elaborated on the need to have impact. Scientists always move on a narrow line: on the one hand they want to help governments with proposals and on the other hand they want to challenge governments. To overcome this staggered position, science must be disruptive. And disruption comes from people’s voices. In doing so, scientists must use media, learn how to deal with media, so we can really provide answers to politicians.
A final message was for the project itself. People need good institutions, but at the same time we must also dare to protect people from institutions. Services are not always an answer.