Rights, 'right on' or the right thing to do? A critical exploration of young people's engagement in participative social work research

This paper provides a detailed analysis of the participative processes of a
research project with young people that was overtly ‘participative’ in its aim. In
doing so it attempts to contribute to debates about participative research. In this
paper we join with others in critiquing the notion that research which aims to be
participative is necessarily more enabling for participants, is ethically or morally
superior to other types of research or produces ‘better’ research. Nonetheless,
we argue that participatory research can make a central contribution, in
providing an ethical, epistemological and political framework and in the potential
for rich ‘findings’. We understand participative research with children and young
people to mean that which involves participants in some of the process of
research, such as question-setting, research design, ethical review, data
generation, analysis or dissemination rather than simply providing data through
more or less engaging methods. We understand participation as not being
something just about children or about children in opposition to adults, but as
part of a complex inter-subjective relationship between adults and children
(where both adults and children are being encouraged to step outside normative
generational roles). An analysis of participation can potentially examine microexchanges
between adults and children, between children, and between adults,
as well as a broader picture. In what follows we argue that, whilst the discipline
of childhood studies has engaged critically with the notion of children’s
participation in society, there has been less critical discussion, and perhaps
indeed some complacency, about the claims made for participatory research
with children.