Resources

This article describes the use of participatory appraisal as a means to assist person-centred planning in the lives of young drug users. It describes how, when working with young drug users, it is essential to work with the individual and whatever issues they choose to present. Participatory appraisal provides the tools to enable workers to facilitate change by encouraging clients to priorities their issues, while offering interventions when and if appropriate. An example of the structure of a contracted, six-session programme with a client is given.

This article describes the Most Significant Change (MSC) approach to project monitoring across an Australian extension project whose aim was to enhance the viability of the dairy industry. The MSC approach is participatory, in that all the project stakeholders are involved in deciding the sorts of change to be recorded. The process involves collecting stories of change, emanating from the field level and the systematic selection of the most significant of these stories by project steering committees. This article highlights the experiences gained during a 12-month trial with the project. The authors suggest that this approach constitutes an appropriate and credible process for monitoring change, helps to promote organisational learning, and can be inspiring for those involved.

This article introduces an approach towards enabling citizenship called the 'learning community'. The 'learning community' tries to draw the community into a strategic planning process that is empowering, inclusive, builds a sense of community and is sustainable. It is also ongoing, reflective and collaborative. It aims to link into the development of a new institutional tier in Northern Ireland, in which communities, politicians and professionals can develop partnerships in regional level planning. The article describes the new tools used to facilitate participation and learning, including a participatory planning website - the 'local website'. It concludes by discussing the lessons learned from the experience of piloting the approach in rural County Down, Northern Ireland.

The Duthchas Project was set up in 1998 in the Scottish Highlands and Islands. It aims to develop local strategies and actions for sustainable development based on the collective knowledge of local people and to ensure that this knowledge/involvement is generated through the use of participatory methods. There are 21 project partners which include the communities from the three pilot areas, along with governmental and non-governmental agencies. This article describes the basis of the project and how it is implemented, a process which has included open public meetings, action plans, publicity, community interviews, a travelling exhibition and the production of a video by the local communities. The article ends by reflecting on what has been learned so far.

This short article describes an English as a Second Language (ESL) literacy programme called Pebbles in the Sand which was initiated in Canada by the Calgary Immigrant Women's Association (CIWA) in July 1999. The programme used REFLECT methodology to develop a non-traditional programme to meet the needs of new Canadian immigrant women who face multiple barriers accessing mainstream services. The article details how the pilot project was set up using a participatory community-based approach, how the ESL component was incorporated and how a community development process emerged, along with a Pebbles in the Sand Manual.

The author describes PLA approaches as a set of recipes for the field of Participation. The purpose of this article is to describe another such recipe called "Imagine" which is a version of Appreciative Inquiry. This begins with a group asking appreciative questions then using those questions to talk to a wider group. Their answers are developed into provocative propositions (challenging statements about how the future should be) and these are presented to the wider group of people who need to be involved in making them come true. The article first describes the whole process, then illustrates the various stages and finally reviews it's strengths and weaknesses.

This article is a personal reflection by the author of his work bringing innovative participatory approaches used in the South, to countries in the North. After 10 years working for Southern organisations he became increasingly aware and uneasy of what appeared to be a "one-way PRA crusade" which assumed that the North was already participatory enough, with no room for improvement. Seven years ago he started a Northern training journey, designing and facilitating PA workshops and events in countries such as Canada, Albania, Austria, the UK, Italy, Japan, Lebanon and New Zealand. This article reflects on that journey tracing its development, difficulties and learnings through the 1990s to the present day, and concludes by looking at where it might go in the future.