Participatory Action-Research, or PAR, is an innovative and radical approach to economic and social change that recognizes how important it is for people who are involved to have the critical voice in determining the direction and goals of change. This demands a commitment from social scientists and policy makers to deprofessionalize and share their expertise, and to listen to the feelings and needs of the common people, particularly those forgotten and left voiceless by the dominant institutions of society. Action and Knowledge draws on twenty years of experience with the techniques and philosophy of PAR using case studies from Asia, Africa, Latin America and North America to show how widespread this approach to development has become since it emerged as a new way to empower the oppressed two decades ago. It shows how PAR can successfully bring about change by actively involving people in generating knowledge about their own condition and how it can best be transformed. Action and Knowledge gives a constructive message to social action groups, grassroots organizers and government officials in both industrialized countries and the Third World on ways to stimulate social and economic change, and will also lead to further dialogue with scholars, teachers and students.

This multidisciplinary event was attended by 1,850 people from 61 countries brought together professionals from a broad spectrum of disciplines, ranging from engineering and the sciences to the arts, politics, economics and social sciences. Contributors included Manfred Max-Eduardo Galeano, Robert Chambers and Orlando Fals Borda.

Action and Knowledge draws on twenty years of experience with the techniques and philosophy of Participatory Action-Research (PAR). PAR is an innovative approach to economic and social change, which goes beyond usual institutional boundaries in development by actively involving the people in generating knowledge about their own condition and how it can be changed. PAR requires a strong commitment by participating social scientists to deprofessionalize their expertise and share it with the people, while recognizing that the communities directly involved have the critical voice in determining the direction and goals of change as subjects rather than objects. PAR has its origins in the work of Third World social scientists more than three decades ago as they brought new ways to empower the oppressed by helping them to acquire reliable knowledge on which to construct countervailing power. It has since spread throughout the world, as reflected in this book with contributions from Asia, Africa Latin America and North America in the form of case studies of actual experience with the PAR approach. PAR is not static and fixed but dynamic and enduring, as the case studies and the theoretical chapters that precede and follow the case studies amply reveal.