Action Research

CLARISSA uses Action Research to understand the dynamics which drive the worst forms of child labour (WFCL) and to generate participatory innovations which help toward shifting these underlying dynamics and mitigating their worst effects.

The programme is generating a rich understanding – particularly through children’s lived experiences – of the complex underlying drivers of harmful work and working children, their parents and guardians and employers are themselves defining, piloting and evaluating their own innovative actions that aim to increase children’s options to avoid WFCL.

The programme’s evaluation research is focused on how this programming modality works, asking: How, in what contexts, and for whom can PAR generate effective innovations to tackle the worst forms of child labour? For more detail see How does participatory action research generate innovation? Findings from a rapid realist review by Mieke Snijder and Marina Apgar.

Below are examples of PAR groups facilitated by the programme:

PAR group of children working in the leather supply chain in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Issue: financial management within families.

PAR group of night entertainment business owners in Kathmandu, Nepal. Issue: worker documentation within their sector.

PAR group of children working in the adult entertainment sector in Kathmandu. Issue: children re-entering the worst forms of child labour after having participated in alternative livelihoods programmes provided by NGOs.

PAR group of Business owners running small leather processing enterprises in Dhaka. Issue: building positive intersections between informal and formal actors in the leather sector

Advocacy group of street-connected children, domestic child labours and children with experience of working in the adult entertainment sector in Nepal. Issue: how to communicate their circumstances effectively with policy- and decision-makers

Needs-based organising group of children living in Dhaka. Issue: creating a clean environment in their community.