Action Research
Action Research has developed and published actionable knowledge since 2003. Our intention is to support learning for transformations among people, organizations, communities and societies at multiple levels, inner and outer: personal, organizational, methodological, conceptual/discursive. We also share authors’ blogs and interviews while seeking to provide community for international scholar-practitioners.
Action Research is not a method, but an orientation to inquiry, with diverse schools, labels, theories and practices. We honor the original working definition from the founding of the journal in which we understand action research as a participatory, democratic process concerned with developing practical knowing in the pursuit of worthwhile human purposes, grounded in a participatory worldview which we believe is emerging at this historical moment. It seeks to bring together action and reflection, theory and practice, in participation with others, in the pursuit of practical solutions to issues of pressing concern to people, and more generally the flourishing of individual persons and their communities.
Today, in the face of our eco-social crisis, we highlight what is transforming and how lives of all beings are being improved.
Choicepoints for quality
The journal’s seven quality choicepoints articulate our understanding of action research in practice. We use these for assessing and developing articles. In sharing them we make the review process more transparent.
The quality choicepoints invite a combination of objective, intersubjective and subjective elements that are needed in action research that empowers us to impactfully shape and catalyze the world of our aspirations.
At first an action researcher might read the seven choicepoints as a sequence of priorities; a more seasoned scholar-practitioner may also see the integrative and impactful interdependence. Because action research is constantly evolving, these choicepoints continue to evolve as well.
Please refer to the Submission guidelines for a full description of each choicepoint.
- Quality of intention and transformative purpose
- Quality of partnership
- Quality of contribution to action research theory/practice
- Quality of participative methods and processes
- Quality of sustaining
- Quality of learning as developmental reflexivity
- Quality of writing
Quality matters
Clarifying our view of quality should, on the one hand, allow us to avoid practice that is poorly articulated and, on the other hand, prevent borrowing uncritically from conventional, yet inappropriate, quality standards of Ivory Tower scholarship.
We are aware that action research is difficult work. We do not look for individual papers to be perfect in all seven choicepoints. We invite clarity on choices made as authors navigate a middle path between responding to problems within living communities and contributing to research-based theory while needing to engage the interest of stakeholders or the larger society in grappling with greatest human concerns.
We welcome diverse approaches and labels
Action Research embraces many approaches that meet our quality choicepoints. Our Associate Editors are engaged in debates about the limits of a ‘disinterested’ social science; we are committed to developing the perspectives of diverse schools. We invite a ‘big-tent’ attitude to quality action research when selecting and developing papers and special issues. Our 20+ years of publications point to the breadth of work we have developed to publication. Simultaneously we seek to provide a model of social science for the 21st Century as more scholars and practitioners are encouraged to actively respond to planetary crisis as we work toward and create a just and sustainable world.
Ambition is welcome!
"Action Research offers a greatly-needed forum at a time of growing recognition around the world that engagements between researchers and practitioners are central to generating both new knowledge and innovations in practice relevant to many critical problems." L. David Brown, Harvard University, USA
This journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).
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Action Research has developed and published actionable, peer-reviewed knowledge since 2003. Today we foster the widespread impact of the action orientation to knowledge creation in response to our times. In the face of our eco-social crisis we highlight what is changing and how transformations are happening that make the lives of all beings better.
We invite a combination of objective, intersubjective and subjective elements that are needed in action research that empowers us to impactfully shape and catalyze the world of our aspirations. We additionally seek to establish an international community for action researching scholar-practitioners.
The journal’s seven quality choicepoints articulate our understanding of action research:
- Quality of intention and transformative purpose
- Quality of partnership
- Quality of contribution to action research theory/practice
- Quality of participative methods and processes
- Quality of sustaining
- Quality of learning as developmental reflexivity
- Quality of writing
Interdisciplinary
Action Research is essential reading for both academics and professionals engaged within the fields and disciplines of:
- International Development
- Organizations
- Social Work
- Management
- Education
- Policy
- Urban Studies
- The Arts
- Gender and Race
- Healthcare
| Hilary Bradbury | AR + Action Research Plus Foundation |
| Marina Apgar | Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK |
| Koen Bartels | University of Birmingham, UK |
| Felix Bivens | The Regenerative School, USA |
| Cherese Childers-McKee | Northeastern University, USA |
| Simon Divecha | Independent Scholar-Practitioner, Australia |
| Victor Friedman | Ruppin Institute, Israel |
| Barbara Groot | Leyden Academy, Netherlands |
| Tetsu Hirasawa | Chuo University, Japan |
| HO, Denny Kwok-leung | Hong Kong Polytechnik, China |
| Micol Pizzolati | University of Bergamo, Italy |
| Chris Riedy | University of Technology, Sydney, Australia |
| Joanna Wheeler | University of Western Cape, South Africa |
| Julia Wittmeyer | DRIFT Institute at Erasmus University, the Netherlands |
| Mary Brydon-Miller | University of Cincinnati, USA |
| Maria Teresa Castillo Burguete | CINVESTAV, Mexico |
| Dusty Columbia Embury | Wright State University, USA |
| Kent Glenzer | Middlebury Institute of International Studies at Monterey, USA |
| Paul Gray | Boston College, USA |
| Davydd James Greenwood | Cornell University, USA |
| Hsiao-Chuan Hsia | Shih Hsin University, Taiwan |
| Sofia Kjellström | Jönköping University, Sweden |
| Hok Bun Ku | The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, China |
| Miren Larrea | Orkestra-Basque Institute of Competitiveness |
| Ann Mitchell | Open University, UK |
| Alfredo Ortiz | University of the Incarnate Word, USA |
| James Traeger | Hult Ashridge Business School, UK |
| Lyle Yorks | Teachers College, Columbia University, USA |
| Steve Abah | Default for Journals, UK |
| Muhammad Ashiqur Rahman | Research Initiatives, Bangladesh |
| Oguz Baburoglu | Sabanci University, Turkey |
| Frank Barrett | Naval Postgraduate School, USA |
| Richard Boyatzis | Case Western Reserve University, USA |
| L. David Brown | Harvard University, USA |
| Denis Clement | Gent, Belgium |
| David Coghlan | Trinity College Dublin, Ireland |
| John P. Cooke | Stanford University, USA |
| Andrea Cornwall | School of Oriental and Asian Studies (SOAS), London |
| Bob Dick | Southern Cross University |
| Olav Eikeland | Work Research Institute, Norway |
| Ibrahim Abu Elhaija | Masar Institute of Education, Israel |
| Michelle Fine | City University of New York Graduate Center, USA |
| Werner Fricke | Institute for Regional Cooperation, Germany |
| John Gaventa | University of Sussex, UK |
| Kenneth Gergen | Swarthmore College, USA |
| Bjorn Gustavsen | Work Research Institute, Norway |
| Budd Hall | University of Victoria, Canada |
| John Heron | South Pacific Centre for Human Inquiry, New Zealand |
| Marcia Hills | University of Victoria, Canada |
| David Jamieson | University of St. Thomas, USA |
| Karim-Aly Kassam | Cornell University, USA |
| Stephen Kemmis | Charles Sturt University, Australia |
| Bertha Koda | University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania |
| Donna Ladkin | Antioch University, USA |
| Morten Levin | Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway |
| M. Brinton Lykes | Boston College, USA |
| Judi Marshall | Lancaster University, UK |
| Victoria J Marsick | Columbia University, Teachers College, USA |
| Mwajuma Masaigana | Default for Journals, UK |
| Geoff Mills | Southern Oregon University, USA |
| Meredith Minkler | University of California, Berkeley, USA |
| Susan Albers Mohrman | University of Southern California, Los Angeles, USA |
| Sonia Ospina | New York University, USA |
| Peter Park | Fielding Graduate Institute, USA |
| Mike Pedler | Henley Business School, UK |
| Michel Pimbert | Coventry University, UK |
| Ann Rippin | Bristol University, UK |
| Tom Rodriguez-Villasante Prieto | Default for Journals, UK |
| Jenny Rudolph | Boston University, USA |
| Shankar Sankaran | Univeristy of Technology, Sydney, Australia |
| Marja-Liisa Swantz | Finland and Tanzania |
| Rajesh Tandon | Society for Participatory Research in Asia, India |
| Steve Taylor | Worcester Polytechnic Institute, USA |
| Katharine Tee | Brigham and Women's Hospital, USA |
| William Torbert | Boston College, USA |
| Philip Tsao | Stanford University School of Medicine, USA |
| Yoland Wadsworth | University of Melbourne, Australia / Action Research Issues Association, Australia |
| Tom Wakeford | University of Edinburgh, UK |
| Ailing Zhuang | NPO Development Center Shanghai CHINA, China |
Manuscript submission guidelines can be accessed on Sage Journals.