What is to be Done? The Place of Action Research

Source: Educational Action Research, Vol. 18, No. 4, December 2010, 417–427
(Reviewed by the Portal Team)

Action research aims to explore new ways of doing things, new ways of thinking, and new ways of relating to one another and to the world.
In this article, the author wants to explore the place of action research in shaping and making history by changing what is done.

In this presentation, the author has used the question ‘what is to be done?’ as a general question as well as because it has a specific relevance at this historical moment.
According to the author, the principal justification for action research is that it makes a direct contribution to transformative action and to changing history. The author argues that the first concern of action researchers should be the contribution of their action to history, not so much to theory.

To find out what needs to be done differently, we need action research that will inform our individual praxis and inform our collective praxis. The author gives sustainability as an example the way action research initiatives contribute to the life of the settings in which they are conducted.
There is a worldwide social movement for sustainability, and action research is already a part of this movement. . In many settings – in contexts of Education for Sustainability, for example – action research is already part of this movement.
The author concludes that as researchers, we are encouraged to make original contributions to knowledge; as action researchers, let us hope to do that but also to do something far more important. Let us hope to make history by living well, individually and collectively, and by living well in and for a world worth living in.