Community Research in Other Contexts

Learning from Sustainability Science

Bibliographic Data

ID12807237
AuthorsLinda Silka (0000-0003-0729-7102, University of Maine, corresponding author)
Year2010
Volume5
Issue4
Pages3-11
Publication date2010-12-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1556-2646 • E-ISSN: 1556-2654
PublisherSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1525/jer.2010.5.4.3
PMID21133782
OpenAlexW2335411174
LanguageEN
Citations received7
References cited25

In health research, community based participatory research (CBPR) has seen remarkable growth as an approach that overcomes many of the ethical concerns raised by traditional approaches. A community of CBPR scholars is now sharing ideas and devising new approaches to collaborative research. Yet, this is occurring in isolation from similar efforts using different nomenclature and occurring outside of health research areas. There is much to be gained by bringing these parallel discussions together. In sustainability science, for example, scholars are struggling with the question of how stakeholders and scientists can coproduce knowledge that offers useful solutions to complex and urgent environmental problems. Like CBPR in health, sustainability science is denigrated for perceived lack of rigor because of its applied problem focus and lack of positivist approach. Approaches to knowledge creation in sustainability science involve "new" ideas such as wicked problems and agent-based modeling, which would be equally applicable to CBPR. Interestingly, sustainability research is motivated less by recognition of the corrosive effects of the inequality of power than from frustration at how limited the impact of research has been, a perspective that might be useful in CBPR, particularly in conjunction with the use of some borrowed tools of sustainability science such as wicked problem analysis and agent-based modeling. Importantly, the example of sustainability science has the potential to keep CBPR from entering into a new orthodoxy of how research should be done

Community engagement · Community-based participatory research · Engineering ethics · Management science · Participatory action research · Political science · Public relations · Social sustainability · Sociology · Sustainability · Sustainability science · Community Health and Development · Engineering · Health Policy Implementation Science · Sustainability and Climate Change Governance

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