Empowering Methodologies in Organisational and Social Research

This chapter considers the meaning and practice of empowering methodologies in organisational and social research. We begin by explaining the reasons why empowering research is urgently needed, which are related to the repositivisation of research in a context of global academic precarity. Next, we reflect on the situatedness of knowing and knowledge in the context of core-periphery relations between the global North and South. We discuss the epistemological arguments on which empowering methodologies rely and the ethical and political purposes they serve, drawing on concepts developed by feminist epistemologists and methodologists. We then consider the sensory, affective, embodied practice of empowering research, which involves listening, seeing, moving and feeling, which we suggest can facilitate a more diverse, creative and crafty repertoire of research possibilities. Finally, we identify three aspects of empowering research, showing how they relate to each of the chapters that comprise this volume.