Participatory Approaches :

Participatory rural appraisal (PRA) is an approach used by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and other agencies involved in international development. The approach aims to incorporate the knowledge and opinions of rural people in the planning and management of development projects and programmes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participatory_rural_appraisal

PRA can be described as a family of approaches, methods and behaviours that enable people to express and analyse the realities of their lives and conditions, to plan themselves what action to take, and to monitor and evaluate the results. Its methods have evolved from Rapid Rural Appraisal (RRA). The difference is that PRA emphasises processes which empower local people, whereas RRA is mainly seen as a means for outsiders to gather information.

http://portals.wi.wur.nl/ppme/?Participatory_Rural_Appraisal_(PRA)

Origins of participatory rural appraisal :

The roots of PRA techniques can be traced to the activist adult education methods of Paulo Freire and the study clubs of the Antigonish Movement. In this view, an actively involved and empowered local population is essential to successful rural community development. Robert Chambers, a key exponent of PRA, argues that the approach owes much to "the Freirian theme, that poor and exploited people can and should be enabled to analyze their own reality."[

By the early 1980’s, there was growing dissatisfaction among development experts with both the reductionism of formal surveys, and the biases of typical field visits. In 1983, Robert Chambers, a Fellow at the Institute of Development Studies (UK), used the term Rapid Rural Appraisal to describe techniques that could bring about a 'reversal of learning'. Two years later, the first international conference to share experiences relating to RRA was held in Thailand [. This was followed by a rapid growth in the development of methods that involved rural people in examining their own problems, setting their own goals, and monitoring their own achievements. By the mid 1990’s, the term RRA had been replaced by a number of other terms including ‘Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA)’ and ‘Participatory Learning and Action’ (PLA).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Participatory_rural_appraisal

PRA provides a structure and many practical ideas to help stimulate local participation in the creation and sharing of new insights. The emphasis on ensuring community feedback broadens the group of people involved. It is increasingly linked to participatory planning processes (e.g. using adapted forms of logical framework analysis). Although PRA was not intended to collect statistically significant information, it is increasingly used in combination with other methodologies to fulfil more scientific information needs and is easily made complementary.

There is no single way to ‘do’ PRA, although there are core principles and over 30 methods available to guide teamwork, do sampling, structure discussions and visualise analysis. The combination and sequence of methods will emerge from the context. Optimal ignorance and triangulation of findings guide the fieldwork in recognition of the need to know enough without knowing it all and to ensure that the qualitative insights are cross-checked by different sources using different methods.
Principles of PRA

Different practitioners would find different principles but most would agree to include the following :

1. Using optimal ignorance: this refers to the importance of knowing what it is not worth knowing. It avoids unnecessary details and irrelevant data. It does not measure more precisely than is needed. It optimizes trade off between quality, relevance, accuracy and timeliness.
2. Offsetting biases: especially those of  rural  development tourism, by being relaxed and not rushing, listening not lecturing, probing instead of passing on to the next topic, being unimposing instead of important , and seeking out the poorer people and their concerns.
3. Triangulation: using more than one, and often three, sources of information to cross-check answers.
4. Learning from and with rural people: directly, on the site, and face-to-face, gaining from indigenous physical, technical and social knowledge.
5. Learning rapidly and progressively: with conscious exploration, flexible use of methods, opportunism, improvisation, iteration, and cross-checking, not following a blueprint program but adapting through a learning process.

Methods :

PRA employs a wide range of methods to enable people to express and share information, and to stimulate discussion and analysis. Many are visually based, involving local people in creating.

For example:

maps showing who lives where and the location of important local features and resources such as water, forests, schools and other services; flow diagrams to indicate linkages, sequences, causes, effects, problems and solutions; seasonal calendars showing how food availability, workloads, family health, prices, wages and other factors vary during the year; matrices or grids, scored with seeds, pebbles or other counters, to compare things - such as the merits of different crop varieties or tree species, or how conditions have changed over time.

PRA activities usually take place in groups, working on the ground or on paper. The ground is more participatory, and helps empower those who are not literate. Visual techniques provide scope for creativity and encourage a frank exchange of views. They also allow crosschecking. Using a combinations of PRA methods a very detailed picture can be built up, one that expresses the complexity and diversity of local people's realities far better than conventional survey techniques such as questionnaires.

A selection of participatory methods and their uses :

Behaviour and attitudes :

PRA depends on facilitators acting as convenors and catalysts, but without dominating the process. Many find this difficult. They must take time, show respect, be open and self-critical, and learn not to interrupt. They need to have confidence that local people, whether they are literate or not, women or men, rich or poor, are capable of carrying out their own analysis.

The use and abuse of PRA :

Unfortunately, there has been much abuse of PRA by outsiders keen only to extract information quickly, and use it for their own purposes. Such practice is unethical because local people are brought into a process in which expectations are raised, and then frustrated, if no action or follow- up results. To avoid this, those wishing to use PRA methods in a purely extractive way need to be transparent about their intentions, and refrain from calling what they do PRA.

In PRA, facilitators act as a catalyst, but it is up to local people to decide what to do with the information and analysis they generate. Outsiders may choose to use PRA findings - for example, to influence policy or for research purposes. In all cases, however, there must be a commitment on the part of the facilitating organisation to do its best to support, if requested to do so, the actions that local people have decided on. 
 

Practical applications :

Since the early 1990s, PRA approaches and methods have evolved and spread with astonishing speed. Originating mainly among non-government organisations (NGOs) in East Africa and South Asia, they have since been adopted by government departments, training institutes, aid agencies, and universities all over the world. They are now being used in at least 100 countries, with PRA networks existing in over 30. PRA has been applied in almost every domain of development and community action, both urban and rural.

Examples include :

• Natural resources management
• Establishing land rights of indigenous people
• Slum development
• HIV/AIDS awareness and action
• Anti-poverty programmes
• Disaster management
• Negotiation and conflict resolution
• Adult literacy

Source: http://portals.wi.wur.nl/ppme/?Participatory_Rural_Appraisal_(PRA)