Systemic Action Research

Description

Danny Burns:

"Typically action research has focussed at the level of the ‘group’. The group may think systemically, but the ‘reach’ of individuals and groups is limited, and the system that they can engage with is necessarily constrained by the lenses though which the group members view the issues. Systemic action research is a way of “scaling up” the action research model so that it can work across large social and organisational systems. It involves multiple inquiries running in relationship to each other. As a result it is able to bring into view and interact with the many complex inter-relationships which affect interventions on the ground.

The Systemic is important because any intervention we will be affected by

 Underlying patterns and social norms

 Complex power relationships between multiple stakeholders

 Activity beyond the normal “field in view”

 Non linear effects of multiple linear interactions

 Different (sometimes contradictory) impacts at different levels of the system."

(http://nccpe.ilrt.bris.ac.uk/sites/default/files/NCCPE%20Systemic%20Action%20Research.pdf)

How To

"Stage One: Exploratory Group discussions, interviews, data collection In the first stage the aim is to get as many narratives around the central issue as possible.

Stage Two: Multi stakeholder meeting (staging post 1) to analyse early inquiry findings Here we can bring together all of the data generated in the first phase. The multi stakeholder meeting might comprise members of what we think will be our on-going multi stake holder platform, people who have been involved in inquiries, and some outsiders who can help to reflect on the issues. This stage should identify the lines of inquiry that seem most central to the question in hand, and those lines of inquiry that seem most promising for generating action.

Stage Three: Issue based inquiries interspersed with action This is the heart of the process. Here we open up multi-stakeholder meetings to analyse the issues that have been identified. Stakeholders are brought in because of their specific relationship to the key question identified. Typically each meeting might last a few hours to half a day. The first few meetings are likely to explore the issue in detail, generate maps of likely relationships, seek additional data for sense making. After this, the meetings should generate action between meetings. This could take the form of small interventions to test understanding and create change, or larger interventions on the scale of a project. These actions are observed and assessed, and learning takes place in the meetings as the action evolves.

Stage Four: Large event analysis, resonance testing, and action planning This is our second staging post. Here we analyse the main messages that are emerging from our inquiry process. This can lead us to construct more formal action experiments which may be a precursor to major policy change, mainstreaming of new approaches etc.

Stage Five: Pilots and Action Experiments Pilots and Action Experiments may last anywhere between say three months to a year or two.

Stage Six: Large event (staging post 3) to assess implications of action experiments This is the third key staging post. Here we are likely to involve key institutional players as well as those involved in both the inquiries and the action experiments. A large event can include anything from 50 to say 100+ people. Depending on what is appropriate, pragmatic and helpful. This large event will analyse the data that has emerged from stage 5 and explore the implications for policy, strategy, organisational change, and new models of delivery.

Stage Seven: Task groups braided to create policy, strategy, new models…

The final stage is to organise implementation task groups. But these too are subject to learning. As change is implemented it should be documented, reflected upon and modified as a result." (http://nccpe.ilrt.bris.ac.uk/sites/default/files/NCCPE%20Systemic%20Action%20Research.pdf)

More Information

• NCCPE, www.publicengagement.ac.uk

• Systemic Action Research: An architecture for leadership as learning. Danny Burns January 2009 [1]