Despite populations in both the developing world and in regions affected by conflict having increasingly been the subject of social science research there remains a perception that ethical issues of such research remain under explored (e.g. Jacobsen and Landau, 2003). A suggestion has been made that research into others‟ suffering can only be justified if alleviating that suffering is an explicit objective (Turton, 1996). In most cases of research in and after conflict this will not be the case and researchers must seek justifications for their work from the wider context. Here a general discussion of the ethics of this study will be made, and justifications sought for the methodologies chosen in terms of their being no negative impact on the subjects of the study. In most cases respondents are poor, of low formal educational attainment, often women and from socially marginalised ethnic or caste groups. They are also people who have survived the traumatising effect of conflict, live in an environment that may still be highly divided and are being questioned about the traumatic issue of a missing relative. Such research subjects are vulnerable in many ways, and there are significant ethical issues to be addressed. The reactions of families to the study, which reveal their understanding of the ethical and practical context of the research, are discussed in the relevant analysis chapters.
The most immediate concern in areas emerging from conflict is the physical security of those being interviewed. In an area of contested control (e.g. in areas of rural Nepal that remain under de facto Maoist control) it can be potentially compromising for someone to be seen even talking to a foreigner, so such issues must be understood even before moving to the field. The engagement with family associations permitted the situation in any area to be understood and precautions taken, such as inviting a family member to be interviewed outside their community.
Social science research demands that subjects understand the terms in which they participate in research and that they give informed consent to those terms. However, in contexts in conflict in developing states, relationships between the researcher and the researched are likely to be asymmetric (Long and Long, 1992). To find what have been called “routes to accountability” (Brown et al., 2004), the
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consideration of ethics thus has to go beyond the terrain of confidentiality, consent, and risk/benefit considerations: in these cases, ethics is as much about being attentive to a collective morality that resonates in the context as to do with respect for the individual rights of the subject. As such, the best approach is one that prioritises an understanding of the context and its local mores, and one which attempts to be as participatory as possible, in the sense that local people, and the peers of those being researched wherever possible, provide the logic for the form of contact with subjects. In this research the main tool to ensure an informed and participatory approach is the relationship that was built with associations of families of the Missing. As self-organised groups of families, these associations are able to provide introductions to research subjects and to act as a mediator between the researcher and the researched. Those leading family associations share culture and status, in almost all its forms (economic, ethnic, caste, social) with their members, but are often somewhat better educated. They are thus able to understand the nature of the research and the demands made on the researched in a way that places them well to explain it to other families. The concrete issues to be understood and consented to by all subjects include confidentiality and the anonymous transmission of statements they give. It also had to be understood that the research did not aim to benefit its subjects, other than through the advocacy that will result. In practice subjects were told that the interview was being conducted and recorded such that „their words can be taken to those in Government and their needs made clear‟. This was effective shorthand for the process of research and advocacy and was understood and consented to by all respondents, with the exception of two who did not consent to the interview being recorded.
Interviewing those who have lived through conflict about their experiences is necessarily highly invasive. This is particularly true where, as in this study, the psychological impact of events is under explicit investigation. Whilst there is a literature on working with traumatised victims of conflict from a therapeutic viewpoint, there is little written on how researchers without an agenda to intervene therapeutically should proceed. Some researchers “believe that with skilful and sensitive interviewing, subjects actually benefit from talking openly about their experiences” (Bell, 2001: 185), and there is some quantitative data to support this (Newman and Kaloupek, 2004), largely regarding the emergence of new insights as a result of subjects‟ participation. Negative effects of trauma victims participating in research have also been found: there is a danger that having reopened the trauma, the researcher can cause emotional distress
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and then leave the subject in an environment that is unsympathetic (Bell, 2001; Newman and Kaloupek, 2004):
This second injury occurs when the victim perceives rejection or a lack of anticipated support from his/her family or society which leads to the sense of helplessness. Another component of second traumatisation is the failure to allow the telling of the story, the giving of testimony, which leads to the failure to recognise one‟s own strengths and restore a sense of control over one‟s own life. (Ilic, 2004: 380)
However, most literature emphasises the retraumatisation potential of public truth telling (e.g. Broneus, 2008; Ilic, 2004), particularly in judicial settings, a very different experience from this research. Retraumatisation is most likely to occur in those persons showing symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (Kammerer and Mazelis, 2006), but it is important to understand that having a disappeared relative is not a pathology (Boss, 2004), and that the vast majority of families live with no clinical symptoms of PTSD.
Smyth (2001) draws attention to the timing of interventions with the traumatised: meeting subjects too soon after traumatic experience may report early shock and denial, in contrast to the true impact of trauma. In this study the most recent violations occurred at least 2 years previous to contact with victims and the vast majority significantly before this (see Figure 4 and Figure 10). Bell (2001) suggests that interviews should be made in the company of peers and that efforts should be made to provide support for subjects following interviews. In the contexts of this research however little professional therapeutic service is available and peer support must be relied on. Efforts were therefore made to create the most supportive environment possible for those telling their stories. Wherever possible, interviews were made either in a family context or in a group of peers. Those individuals and families being interviewed were met only after confirming with the family association that they were not considered to be psychologically vulnerable. On the basis of the experience of the research it is believed that, using the protocols described for selecting participants and conducting interviews, the emotional distress experienced by participants during this research is minimal risk.27
27
Minimal risk is defined as the probability that harm or discomfort anticipated in the research are not greater in and of themselves than those ordinarily encountered in daily life or during the
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Social science research has traditionally adopted a very Northern „primacy of the individual‟ approach and considered the individual as the most appropriate unit of study. This focus has practical implications for researchers when seeking informed consent from individuals located in traditional and highly deferential communities. In this study these problems will be lessened somewhat by the fact that the family is the unit of study, itself a more natural approach in these contexts. It became clear during data collection that hierarchy within the family impacts on the ability of some, notably women and especially wives of the Missing, to talk freely. In response to this wherever possible women were met in peer groups and focus groups with other women. The quality of the data gained in such environments reveal the need to create space for the disempowered to talk freely, independent of the constraints of local and traditional hierarchy.
A challenge to researchers working with poor and vulnerable populations is ensuring that the relationship between subject and researcher is understood. There are many contexts in which a researcher may seek to reward research subjects or try to „give something back‟ to those assisting the research. This has clear dangers: research will always be transactional in some sense, and if there is ambiguity about what research subjects receive in exchange for participation this can lead to unrealistic expectations and disillusion, and potential bias. Most foreigners meeting conflict victims are working for aid agencies and as such, despite efforts to ensure his role is understood, a researcher may be thought of in the same terms. The greatest defence against this was ensuring that those leading Associations of Families of the Missing are able to explain to families the exact role and limitations of the research. The advocacy approach taken in collaboration with family associations allows a clear understanding of the role of the researcher to be communicated to research subjects.
The emancipatory component of the research sought to enhance victim agency in a range of arenas, from the household to national policy level, in an effort to ensure that the entire research exercise was characterised by an empowerment agenda. This is a natural ethical aim of the study given that it is driven by a perception that victim agency is both deprioritised in most transitional justice processes. The greatest potential for
performance of routine physical or psychological examinations and tests (National Commission
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empowerment lay with those most marginalised, most often women. At the village level, the research represented the first time that some wives of the Missing had been spoken to by an outsider, reflecting patriarchal imperatives that a male head of household will always represent a victim family. The empowering aspect of such contact should not be over-estimated, but permitting such a woman to make contact with a family association and to assert her independence from her father-in-law for example, can be transformative. In some communities groups of women were found who had forged solidarity through regular contact and sharing of their issues, but had no outlet or means to address these: the research served to connect such women to a family association and potentially to the broader community of victims. Similarly, bringing together women in a community on the basis of their shared victimhood who had not either perceived or exercised that solidarity is a route to both empowerment and mobilisation. The importance of such collective action was seen in Timor, where the difference emotionally and psychologically between organised female victims and those who remained isolated was extreme (Section 7.3). In Nepal one consequence of the close work in some districts with the family associations was that the male leadership was confronted, through the interviews of the study, with the issue of the lack of women‟s representation. At the national level, the study sought explicitly to increase victim agency through empowerment of the family associations. In both contexts, the published reports were intended to be a tool that family associations could use to assert an agenda that deviated from that of the agencies that purported to represent victims, while the launch of the study was a rare opportunity for victims to speak on their own terms to a national audience (including the media). Reflections on the overall impact of the study, including empowerment perspectives, are made in Section A4.5.
5.4 Summary
The research methodology allows the needs of families of the Missing to be understood in a contextually rooted way, whilst simultaneously serving families and their organisations. The participatory element that drove the interaction with families, in Nepal more than in Timor-Leste, permitted a relationship to be built with the family associations over a period of months. This both created trust with families and their organisations and as a result increased the quality of the data collected. More than this, the participatory approach was empowering for family associations, giving access to the expertise of the researcher, without which it would have remained a challenge for families to produce a
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study of their needs that would carry weight with the authorities and potential donors. The resulting reports, published in a range of local languages in both contexts, are something around which families and their associations have been able to advocate. This study has begun to allow rights agencies and the authorities in the concerned states to appreciate a victims‟ agenda that has for the years since the end of conflict remained largely invisible.
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