Guest blog: Participatory knowledge as evidence in policymaking in Scotland

From 2021 to 2022, Dr Hayley Bennett, University of Edinburgh, collaborated with the Poverty Alliance research team using an ESRC impact placement to undertake a project exploring ‘participation’ in policymaking. In this blog, she summarises the discussion paper, 'Participatory governance: creating space for participatory research or crowding it out?'

Over many years the Scottish Government has sought to increase participation in policymaking, including working with various civil society and third sector organisations and research partners.

There are many ways that participation and ‘lived experience’ can influence different stages of the policy making process. This project considered two aspects; first the use of participatory and qualitative research, and second the use of what I term participatory instruments, such as ‘client panels’ and ‘experts by experience’ groups embedded in specific policymaking processes or service delivery plans. As we know, lived experience has the potential to challenge existing power relations, and bring in alternative knowledge and experiences into decision-making. However, this ‘participatory turn’ across numerous policy areas, departments, and organisations raises important questions around practices, ethics, purpose, and use. For some policy scholars and social researchers one question centres on how these new forms of knowledge interplay with other types of research and evidence. Is this broad commitment to participation creating more space for qualitative and participatory research methods? Or are specific types of participatory approaches crowding out other methods?

This project drew on previous research insights from my time in the What Works Scotland programme to design and undertake a series of ‘conversations’ with policymakers, stakeholders and researchers. There are a wide range of activities and practices often described as ‘participatory’ with no clear understanding if there are shared practices, meanings, ethics or values. The discussion paper seeks to encourage reflection and critical engagement with some of the shifting practices and ways that policy makers, researchers, policy organisations, ourselves, and others work. We considered how participatory research, and qualitative research more generally, continues to face a number of established barriers, alongside new barriers to evidence-use. There are encouraging practices, particularly in local government and research shaped by community development professionals. However, the move towards participatory policymaking needs greater engagement and critical examination from various professional perspectives, particularly social researchers.

The project centred on 14 conversations with people involved in policy making in Scotland (i.e. social researchers, policy officers/policy leads, senior local government officers, academic researchers, third sector roles). These conversations covered topics such as understanding and use of the term ‘participation’, experiences of participatory approaches, and specific questions about policy making processes and evidence use. The discussion paper reveals that there was a lack of shared understanding across various research, organisational and policy communities on the differences between participatory instruments, consultation approaches and participatory research.

Some discussants thought that there is less need to commission or use qualitative and participatory research evidence if there is already a participatory instrument in place – for example, if the government has access to an experience panel where they can ask service-design questions or quickly gather views. For some, there were concerns about quality and limited contextual analysis of experiential insights gained from participatory instruments. Similarly, while most discussants understood that the production of participatory research involves trained social researchers, there was less clarity about the skills and training provided to people involved in creating participatory instruments (such as client panels). This includes the training provided to facilitators, as well as specific training for policy officers on how to use and treat the insights as a form of evidence in the policy making process. Some discussants thought that the civil service code was enough to ensure that participatory instruments were suitable, while others thought much more specialist training was required akin to advanced qualitative data analysis and participatory research competencies, including the role of theory, analysis and ethics.

It is hoped that by participating in these conversations, this project and discussion paper can contribute to increase awareness around the design and use of participatory approaches, especially the use of ‘lived experience’ as a form of evidence in policy making. Increasing numbers of professions and policymakers are engaged in this dynamic space: asking critical questions, seeking to develop new skills and knowledge, and demonstrating more openness and awareness of participatory approaches, principles and values. Universities, the third sector, research consultants, peer researchers, local authorities and various Scottish Government units could better support participatory research approaches through the development of a community of practice combining experienced participatory and qualitative researchers, with policy specialists who are developing participatory instruments, or who are trying to draw on various forms of research and knowledge.

This work recently featured on the front page of the Social Research Association publication Research Matters.