I thank you for this interesting theme which got me back to the a period between 1996 and 2002 wherein I accumulated a great practical experience with the use of participatory tools in community development, and hence discovering Robert Chambers' philosophy of participation. Involving development beneficiaries in drawing themselves social and resource maps, mobility/historical maps and transects, etc. was not so easy as we were a team of community and participatory R&D specialists seeking to apply Robert Chambers' philosophy in its deepest sense, that is: IT IS NOT THE FACT OF USING PARTICIPATORY TOOLS THAT MAKES US "PARTICIPATORY-ORIENTED" BUT IT IS THE WAY OF USING THEM. And that way was, for us, not to make development beneficiaries speak and then it is for us to spot their information on a participatory tool but rather to train them on the use of these tools and then assist them in the field exercise while they draw some of these tools. And that way made all the difference for us to learn from them – YES we learned from them before they started learning from us – and understand very well their mindset and thoughts. Though later, we did re-spot all needed information from what we collected on some geographical maps to make things clearer and included all tools drawn by beneficiaries as parts (or annexes) of our reports.
And just to conclude, it is not useless to say again that participatory tools are good visualization tools to enhance beneficiary participation and communication in all development activities.
RE: Can visual tools help evaluators communicate and engage better?
Dear Ram,
I thank you for this interesting theme which got me back to the a period between 1996 and 2002 wherein I accumulated a great practical experience with the use of participatory tools in community development, and hence discovering Robert Chambers' philosophy of participation. Involving development beneficiaries in drawing themselves social and resource maps, mobility/historical maps and transects, etc. was not so easy as we were a team of community and participatory R&D specialists seeking to apply Robert Chambers' philosophy in its deepest sense, that is: IT IS NOT THE FACT OF USING PARTICIPATORY TOOLS THAT MAKES US "PARTICIPATORY-ORIENTED" BUT IT IS THE WAY OF USING THEM. And that way was, for us, not to make development beneficiaries speak and then it is for us to spot their information on a participatory tool but rather to train them on the use of these tools and then assist them in the field exercise while they draw some of these tools. And that way made all the difference for us to learn from them – YES we learned from them before they started learning from us – and understand very well their mindset and thoughts. Though later, we did re-spot all needed information from what we collected on some geographical maps to make things clearer and included all tools drawn by beneficiaries as parts (or annexes) of our reports.
And just to conclude, it is not useless to say again that participatory tools are good visualization tools to enhance beneficiary participation and communication in all development activities.
Kind regards
Mustapha Malki, PhD
MEL Specialist