The Research-Fatigued Community: A Case for Participatory Action-Research?

The intensification of environmental crises, heightened by the threat of climate change, brought communities championing environmental justice to the center of much attention from academia, mainstream media, and civic organizations. Whereas communities usually welcome initiatives that raise awareness for a cause, many are starting to display symptoms of research fatigue. Existing research generally focuses on the causes and consequences of research fatigue in communities in their post-disaster phase (whether caused by natural or technological disasters), as community members often see little benefit in continuing to participate in research efforts. Less is known about situations where research fatigue builds up in anticipation of potential technological disasters and where the communities have successfully forestalled polluting industries from settling in their communities. To address this gap, we examined the case of Roșia Montană in Romania, where the community shut down a proposed gold mining project over concerns about the potential risk to human and environmental health resulting from the use of cyanide in gold extraction. We draw on data from a longitudinal study employing in-depth interviews (n=45), participant observation, document analysis (n=215 news articles), and journaling (e.g., entries reflecting on the excessive number of soft and hard “nos” to our interview requests, even when rapport was built). We have identified three potential reasons that may explain research fatigue in Rosia Montana, which notoriously succeeded in averting environmental contamination: hypervisibility and media attention; misquoting and online vilification; and finally, a desire to move on and focus their efforts on community build-up now that the crisis is over. Our results suggest that continued community participation in research may be contingent on their perceived ability to influence (new) research agendas and secure funds for projects that meet tangible community needs. We conclude by proposing participatory action research as a change of framework in community research.