Citizenship, migration and gender: Polish migrant women in the UK and Poland.
5. Rationale for the Study
6.4 Ethical considerations
The research will comply with the Social Policy Association Guidance on Research Ethicsxii as these are of particular relevance to this project. The research and data collection process will be based on two principles: informed consent and confidentiality. The overall aim and objectives of the research will be explained to potential participants prior to the interview. Each participant will have the right and opportunity to ask questions and/or withdraw (without reason) at any stage of the research process. All participants will be asked to sign consent forms. All participants will be asked whether they give consent to being voice recordedxiii. If a participant does not give consent to being voice recorded, detailed field notes
will be taken. All participants will be guaranteed anonymity and confidentiality, where possible, subject to the limits imposed by harm minimisationxiv. The research participants will be informed that the research findings will be published as a PhD thesis, in academic journals and presented at national and international conferences. The research outputs will be stored securely on the University F: Drive with restricted access to data (password protected) and removal of personal details. Paper-based data will be stored in locked filing cabinets at the researcher’s University office. The researcher will also ensure her own safety by carrying a mobile phone when going to an interview location and informing at least one person of her whereabouts.
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NOTES:
i World systems theory also emerged in the 1970s and 1980s and argued that the world could be divided into ‘peripheral’ and ‘core’ regions and migration is one way of exploiting the peripheries for the core regions’ benefit. In this way, the core capitalist nations control the world economy and maintain the poorer peripheries’ dependency on them (Castles & Miller, 2009). It is a relationship dependent on unequal resources distribution between the two regions. A more interdisciplinary approach is provided by migration systems theory. Here, migration is seen as a result of previously developed and maintained links between sending and receiving countries. This could be the result of past colonisation, political influence or pre-existing trade and/or cultural ties between nations. Advocates of this theory claim that the international movement of people can be explained by the interconnectedness of macro and microstructures (ibid.). That could be the connections between a
nation-state and individual citizens, for example between Zimbabwean nationals and the UK, given the history and the fact that Zimbabwe is a former British colony. A more recent approach – the theory of transnationalism and transnational communities, argues that the rapid development of transport and communication technologies (e.g. the Internet, inexpensive air travel), enables migrants to maintain links between their home and host countries. In these circumstances, temporary and/or circular mobility becomes easy to pursue and may be very beneficial to migrants (Ryan, et al., 2009). ii They are: the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia. iii This strategy has been chosen as the researcher is interested in social actors’ meanings and
interpretations of reality.
It is to the process of moving from lay descriptions of social life, to technical descriptions of that social life, that the notion of Abduction is applied (Blaikie, 1993, p. 177).
The abductive strategy allows movement from the social actors’ interpretations (i.e. Polish migrant women’s) to more scientific understandings of the social world (i.e. academic theorists). It has been chosen over the inductive and deductive strategies as it requires the researcher to step into the research participants’ world and “discover their constructions of reality” (Blaikie, 2007, p. 10). This research strategy is particularly well suited to the chosen philosophical framework.
iv The researcher wishes to adopt the insider’s stance (Blaikie, 2007). It requires the researcher to be thoroughly immersed in the participants’ world and incorporate her own experiences. The researcher also wishes to take the role of an expert and make use of the existing knowledge on the subject. This kind of relationship is seen as particularly useful as the researcher is also a Polish migrant woman, which is an advantage here as she wishes to marry the two – the existing knowledge on the topic and her own experience and analyse these with data from the fieldwork. This will enable her to compare and contrast versatile data sources and achieve more accurate results than if she did not know much on the topic. Finally, when considering the relationship between the researcher and the research participants it is necessary to decide whether to do the research on, for or with people. In this project the researcher’s aim is to be a ‘reflective partner’, a ‘conscientizer’, where the aim is to better the participants’ situation in some way (Blaikie, 2007, p. 12). This will be achieved by giving them voice, thus, providing more balance to the existing literature on citizenship in relation to migrant women. v Feminist researchers argue that their research has to be based on women’s experiences and that “the cultural background of the researcher is part of the evidence” (Blaikie, 2007, p. 166). When adopting a feminist perspective, the researcher needs to recognise that women cannot be treated as research objects and that subjectivity is not necessarily unscientific or unwanted (Stanley & Wise, 1990). The project will be underpinned by the view that knowledge in social sciences has a male bias and balance is needed (Finch, 1991). A broad definition of feminism will be adopted: feminism is “a position with the political aim of challenging discrimination against women and/or promoting greater equality between the sexes” (Hoggart, 2012, p.136).
vi Europia is a community organisation based in Manchester ; EUROPIA works with and for Central and Eastern European (CEE) migrants with the aim to help them integrate into wider society, see
www.europia.org.uk.
vii Qualitative semi-structured interviews have been chosen to give depth of information and to allow informal conversation and, when and where appropriate, new questions to be formulated as a result of the interviewee’s responses. This method may be particularly beneficial in terms of more sensitive themes as the researcher may tailor her questions accordingly to the situation and the person she is interviewing. Interviews are favoured over structured questionnaires as the latter only give a limited chance of explaining social phenomena due to their more rigid structure. They were also favoured over the use of focus groups as some topics may be too sensitive to be explored in a group setting. Moreover, the depth of understanding and flexibility which can be achieved through in-depth interviewing make it appropriate for this qualitative research project (Babbie, 2004).
viii This type of analysis is particularly well suited as it is an interpretive process which can, but does not need to, produce a theory. Thematic analysis entails searching for noticeable, recurrent themes in the interview transcripts, coding and analysing them. Arguably, it is the most attainable type of
analysis, therefore especially useful for early career researchers (Braun & Clarke, 2006). Data collection and data analysis will be conducted simultaneously enabling recognition of the data saturation point. An N-Vivo software package will be used to aid data management.
ix Relevant sub-questions include for example:
a. To what extent are Polish migrant women’s lives gendered? b. How, if at all, do gender roles differ between the UK and Poland?
c. How do Polish migrant women understand gender roles in relation to work and welfare?
d. How do Polish migrant women experience and negotiate their gender roles in respect of work and welfare?
e. Has the migratory process affected Polish migrant women’s gender roles, and if so, in which ways?
f. Has migrating changed women’s gender roles? g. Has migrating made them redefine their gender roles? h. Has migrating made them feel more independent?
x Sampling until reaching data saturation point (Ritchie, Lewis & Elam, 2003, p. 80).
xi Issues of rigour. The following strategies will be adopted to ensure the study findings are credible and accurately reflect respondents’ accounts:
1) An on-going engagement with other academics (i.e. at conferences and other events, through publications, etc.) will ensure sound research design and data collection process;
2) An on-going engagement with different grass roots agencies working with Polish migrants (i.e. formal/informal meetings and other community events, etc.) will ensure an insider’s perspective and sound research in the field;
3) Providing respondents with extracts from their interviews will ensure their accounts and research findings are transparent;
4) An on-going critical reflexivity by the researcher with research supervisors will ensure sound themes generation and data analysis.
xii The Social Policy Association Guidance on Research Ethics can be found here: http://www.social-
policy.org.uk/downloads/SPA_code_ethics_jan09.pdf
xiii It will be explained that the researcher wishes to maintain eye contact and ensure that no information is lost in the process of transcription hence the use of the digital voice recorder. It will also be noted that the researcher will be the only person listening to the recordings.
xiv To maximise anonymity, all participants will be asked to choose an alternative name for themselves.