PLA 24: Critical Reflections from Practice
This issue of PLA Notes brings together social anthropologists, policy makers, NGO development workers, economists, ecologists and trainers to reflect critically on the practice of Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA).
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October 1995
Guest Editor: Andrea Cornwall
This edition is devoted to a much-needed debate about the use of PRA.
PRA has proven to be a powerful and often beneficial strategy for participatory development. Despite these and other positive changes, there remain many questions about the use of PRA. Some of the key areas of concern which have been identified by PRA trainers and practitioners were outlined in the article entitled 'Sharing Our Concerns' in PLA Notes 22.
This issue is divided into two sections. The first focuses on PRA and Social Anthropology, while the second deals with Politics and Practicalities.
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Follow the links below to download the whole issue or individual articles in pdf format.
Contents
Editorial: critical reflections on the practice of PRA
Irene Guijt and Andrea Cornwall
PRA and Social Anthropology
Context and Complexity: Anthropological Reflections on PRA
Andrea Cornwall and Sue Fleming
Participatory Rural Appraisal: A quick-and-dirty critique
Paul Richards
PRA and anthropology: challenges and dilemmas
Ian Scoones
Trades in different worlds: listening to refugees' voices
Rachel Hinton
Social analysis in participatory rural development
David Mosse
Participatory appraisal and education for empowerment?
Korrie de Koning
Consensus or cover-up? the limitations of group meetings
Johan Pottier and Patrick Orone
Politics and Practicalities:
PRA, social tremors and rolling heads: thoughts on PRA and empowerment
Judith Appleton
Participatory methods: precipitating or avoiding conflict?
Parmesh Shah and Meera Kaul Shah
Linking PRA-based research to policy
Victoria Johnson
Making the best of going to scale
Robert Chambers
Only playing with beans? participatory approaches in large scale government programmes
Christoph Backhaus and Rukman Wagachchi
Participatory approaches in Save the Children Fund, UK
Louisa Gosling
Development of PRA in Francophone Africa: Lessons from the Sahel
Bara Gueye
The respective merits of RRA and conventional methods for longer-term research
Kathrin Schreckenberg
PRA: a new literacy?
Anna Robinson-Pant
Tips for Trainers: What is PRA? a participatory learning game
Rachel Hinton