Reimagining institutional ethics procedures in research partnerships with young people across Majority/Minority World contexts

Abstract

While institutional ethical procedures are critically important, the relevance and applicability of these procedures on the ground create tensions that are sometimes at odds with what is considered ‘ethical’. In this paper, we reflect on the dissonances between formal institutional ethics procedures and community-based research practices by drawing on our experiences of a project involving co-production with young people in India and Brazil. The project is an international collaboration between partners from both Majority and Minority World contexts, across universities, community organisations and government bodies. Young people were involved in advisory and co-researcher capacities, and played a vital role advising the project team, conducting research projects, and developing engagement and advocacy strategies. The project was planned prior to, but started during, the Covid-19 pandemic, and therefore required methodological adjustments. In this paper, we situate the role of institutional ethics procedures to reflect on the tensions and power imbalances in: (1) research co-production with young people, (2) collaborative cross-country research with partners, as well as considering (3) the relevance of ethical guidelines in different research contexts. We problematise the top-down nature of these procedures, and highlight the importance of reflexivity, conversations, and relationships in ethics. With growing research in the Majority world (funded by the Minority world), there is an urgent need to recognise and build on the expertise of experienced local civic society organisations in ethical research and safeguarding, to work in genuine, respectful partnership with those we do research with.