This article presents a number of contributions from an e-forum debate on issues of evidence, legitimacy and authenticity in Deliberative and Inclusionary Processes which grew out of a citizen jury and scenario workshop in southern India. It is based around the question: how can we ensure that citizen jury processes are fair and unbiased so that their 'verdicts' are accepted as trustworthy by all relevant actors?
Robert Chambers remembers the life and work of Jimmy Mascarenhas, who passed away recently, and who was an integral part of the participation community. Much of his work took place in India, pioneering participatory approaches for watershed management and conservation and evolving some of the principle methods of participatory approaches such as using visual means and living in the villages while training.
In this reflective article, as part of the special 50th issue of PLA Notes, Robert Chambers recalls the milestones and breakthroughs in the evolution of participation. He comments that many of the innovations are occurring everyday in workshops and practices in the South, but sadly this is not represented in the literature which tends to be dominated by Northern writers.
This paper considers ways in which farmers' own analysis, method and scope, can be documented and explored. It draws out the partially complementary nature and some of the differences with regard to PRA and FPR (Farmer Participatory Research). PRA methods tend to emphasize the visual, while FPR methods are more verbal and observation based. Visual methods have strengths. Farmers have greater capacity to diagram and analyse than most outsiders have supposed, and farmers are proving to be good facilitators of analysis by other farmers.