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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons

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The Qualitative Report

Public Affairs, Public Policy and Public Administration

Reflexivity

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Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Qualitative Insider Research In A Government Institution: Reflections On A Study Of Policy Capacity, Bobby Cameron Nov 2021

Qualitative Insider Research In A Government Institution: Reflections On A Study Of Policy Capacity, Bobby Cameron

The Qualitative Report

Embarking on a qualitative Ph.D. research project in public administration is often daunting for novice researchers. For those students who consider adopting an emic or insider approach for their research, the ethical, methodological, and analytical challenges that lay ahead may seem insurmountable at times. In this article, I reflect on my experience as a Ph.D. student completing qualitative research with my colleagues to study policy capacity in a provincial government in Canada. I review how I constructed an ethical framework by integrating policy from Research Ethics Boards and government. Throughout the article, I deal primarily with ethical considerations and the …


Conducting Field Work With Microfinance Programs’ Participants In A Non-Western Setting: A Reflexive Account, Mohammad Shahjahan Chowdhury Jul 2021

Conducting Field Work With Microfinance Programs’ Participants In A Non-Western Setting: A Reflexive Account, Mohammad Shahjahan Chowdhury

The Qualitative Report

While volumes of procedural guidelines are available on how to conduct fieldwork, in practice a researcher encounters various challenges and dilemmas in the field. This paper presents a holistic view of the puzzles this researcher encountered in gaining access, negotiating positionality, application of the pre-determined methodology, and ensuring ethics during his fieldwork with microfinance program participants in a non-Western setting. This paper contributes to the fieldwork literature by enhancing a researcher’s understanding of the unanticipated challenges.