Risks as everyday life
Doing fieldwork is probably the most rewarding task for researchers
despite the risks that are involved. However, it can remain a daunting
task for researchers to carry out fieldwork, despite the fact that they
have some risk awareness. Risk, however low-level, is often an inherent
part of conducting research in the field, and there are various
standards and guidelines in place that seek to ensure that the risk of
harm to researchers is as low as possible (Alpay & Paulen, 2014; Craig,
Corden, & Thornton, 2000; Daniels & Lavallee, 2014). Methods for
protecting researchers are therefore well-documented (Daniels &
Lavallee, 2014; Kovats‐Bernat, 2002; Paterson, Gregory, & Thorne, 1999)
and form part of the ethical framework for the conduct of research.
The significance of risks faced by researchers doing fieldwork warrants
proactive risk management and forms part of the research process itself
(Kovats‐Bernat, 2002; Parker & O’Reilly, 2013; Peterson, 2002). It is
now accepted that the risks posed to researchers are multi-dimensional
and include physical and emotional aspects. However, physical harm has
been more widely discussed in the literature than emotional harm
(Belousov et al., 2007; Lee-Treweek, 2000; Sharp & Kremer, 2006).
Several factors contribute to this emphasis. These include a structural
approach to risk analysis by institutions (Health and Safety Executive,
2016; Higgitt & Bullard, 1999) in which the ‘tangibility’ of physical
harm often takes priority. For example, risks of catching a disease or
physical injury are generally perceived to be easier to identify and
manage than non-quantifiable emotional harm. Nevertheless, it has become
widely recognised that emotional harm, such as anxiety and isolation,
can be at least as significant for researchers (Bloor, Fincham, &
Sampson, 2008). Moreover, physical and emotional harm may be
inter-related, so that discussing them in isolation is not meaningful.
For example, a physical injury could have emotional effects on a
researcher that could outlast the time it takes to heal. As such, an
overall understanding is needed among all involved when planning for
risk management.
The regulatory frameworks in many organizations, such as universities,
have pre-identified and standardised risk and management practices in
place. These are helpful as far as they go, but maybe insufficient to
capture the detail required for research in particularly challenging
contexts. ‘Best practices’ and universal standards can, therefore,
become a double-edged sword. On the one hand, they demand every project
to meet appropriate minimum standards; on the other, the standardisation
that is often inherent in such procedures may lack sufficient
flexibility to capture and accommodate the finer details of risk
associated with particular projects. Therefore, researchers must
proactively engage in order to identify specific risks (physical and
emotional) associated with their fieldwork.
To this end, it is now common to employ standard risk-assessment
procedures (i.e. proactively identifying different types of research
risk and assessing their potential likelihood and severity) and risk
management procedures (i.e. proactively planning to minimise or
eliminate these risks) in a coordinated effort of procedures, processes,
roles and responsibilities (Green, 2016). The situation is therefore
widely considered to have moved on from that described by Kenyon and
Hawker (1999: p. 322), in which: ‘…only one of our 46
respondents has ever been issued with safety code of practice, [so]
the majority of safety practices mentioned by our sample have been
personally developed and directed ’.
However, some key questions remain. For example, to what extent a
‘one-size-fits-all’ approach is reinforced in universal risk management
standards and to what extent this shifts significant responsibility for
risk management towards researchers in the field, so that researchers
may find themselves underprepared for what they might find in
particularly high-risk environments. Researchers being harmed during
fieldwork is a more common and severe occurrence than might be generally
thought. This could range from the renowned ethnographer Ken Pryce’s
body being washed up on a Caribbean beach (Bloor, Fincham, & Sampson,
2010) and the case of anthropologist Myrna Mack, who killed while
researching internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Guatemala
(Lee-Treweek & Linkogle, 2000) to difficulties in creating safe places
where researchers could act as independent witnesses without
intimidation and mistreatment (Brun, 2013). As researchers continue to
carry out fieldwork in dangerous environments, and the dangers they face
become an inherent part of fieldwork, there is a need to review these
arrangements in the light of researcher experience. The article will
explore risked informed decision-making and individual-institutional
boundary responsibilities of assessing and managing risks at the
pre-fieldwork stage and during fieldwork.