Political Agency and Capabilities Formation Through Participatory Action Research

This paper draws on a participatory action research (PAR) project as a potential space for undergraduate students at one South African university to develop as political agents. Participation and reasoning, grounded in reciprocal relationships, which are fundamental in a PAR project are introduced. The contributions of the capability approach and the case for the significance of relational capabilities of voice and participation as both objectively and ethically good is proposed, before turning to Arendt as a partner to capabilities in her conceptualization of speech and action as constituting the public sphere through participation. The claim is made that a PAR project might establish such a public space thereby enabling political agents to “appear”; this is especially important in connecting PAR to democratic actions. The paper turns to the operationalization of these ideas by considering empirical data from a gender equity PAR project at a South African university. The evidence suggests the possibility for the formation of student researchers as political agents and identifies the relational and relationship-embedded political subjectivity capabilities that matter for personal and collective development and change. In conclusion, the paper argues that a PAR project can be capabilities-promoting, advancing freedoms so that subjects can come into being in a common project, even if that project is temporary.