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- Convenors:
-
Aleksandra Szymczyk
(University of Manchester)
Jonathan Craig (University of Manchester)
Thomas Long (The University of Manchester)
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- Format:
- Panel
Short Abstract:
This panel considers the ‘ethical-moral mismatch’ (Tietlebaum 2019) in anthropological fieldwork. We invite reflections on reorientations emerging within our discipline as researchers balance diverging commitments to their interlocutors, epistemological integrity and broader moral responsibilities.
Long Abstract:
Anthropology's relational approach places epistemological emphasis on learning from our interlocutors. However, in an era of political tumult where it seems more important than ever that anthropologists not limit their focus to groups with whom they feel morally aligned, this is easier said than done. How should we balance our methodological commitments to our interlocutors when they diverge from, or directly contradict, our own broader moral responsibilities? Do our disciplinary approaches to cultural critique falter when confronting ideological ‘others’ (Harding 1991)? Or does the current political topography warrant a more permissive extension into the relativism quagmire?
This panel thus invites anthropologists to reflect on what Tietlebaum (2019) calls the ‘ethical-moral mismatch’. From critical stances to emphases on interlocutors' moral integrity, anthropologists have navigated this terrain with varying degrees of ethical proximity. We invite papers reflecting on experiences navigating ethical predicaments in the field, considering:
•How can we balance obligations to research participants, epistemological integrity, and commitments to social justice?
•What are the implications of differing degrees of moral alignment with interlocutors for ethnographic knowledge production? Could ‘too much’ or ‘too little’ imperil a project's epistemological integrity? Is ‘staying in your lane’ ethnographically perilous?
•How might we approach those with ‘dislikeable views’ (Pasieka 2019) in ways that allow for rich, holistic accounts?
By examining these critical junctions where politics, methodology, and ethics intersect, this panel aims to chart new routes in the discipline by considering how confronting contradictory imperatives in fieldwork might reorient anthropological approaches in an increasingly complex moral landscape.
Accepted papers:
Paper short abstract:
I discuss the ethical dilemmas faced by a community museum engaged in an urban renewal project that aims to foster community cohesion and grassroots governance, examining whether this advocacy merely serves as a tool for government agendas or genuinely supports residents to achieve positive impact.
Paper long abstract:
This paper examines the ethical and moral complexities community participatory museums face in rapidly urbanizing contexts, where they intersect governance, cultural identity, and anthropological research. Using Shanghai’s Hongqiao Airport New Village as a case study, it focuses on the community museum’s role in an urban renewal project centered on installing elevators in ageing residential buildings, revealing how varied resident needs and unequal access to resources complicate these interventions. As both an NGO worker, government project executor, and researcher, I navigate the ethical tensions between academic integrity, community trust, and the divergent needs of residents, some of whom benefit more from these upgrades than others.
Guided by Lefebvre’s (2004) spatial theory and Peter’s (1999) critique of anthropological ethics, this paper conceptualizes the Community Museum as a “third space,” a venue for resident engagement and negotiation. Beyond infrastructure improvements, the museum’s community art projects seek to bolster local identity and social cohesion, supporting a broader development model of “culture-led” and “community-driven” renewal. These projects aim to provide residents with creative avenues to voice their perspectives and negotiate their living conditions, yet they are also bound by the same structural limitations and inequalities that shape government-backed initiatives.
This study, aligning with the panel’s theme on “ethical-moral mismatches,” proposes an ethics-oriented framework for practice. It explores how anthropologists, in multi-layered roles, can support community museums in advancing social justice and cultural engagement while acknowledging the complex and often uneven impact of urban renewal projects.
Paper short abstract:
This paper grapples with ethical-moral visions and versions of the past which collide with the current consensus found in secular, liberal circles. It argues that it is the ‘moral responsibility’ of anthropologists to countenance, yet not condone, even the most troubling facets of human existence.
Paper long abstract:
This paper grapples with ethical-moral visions and versions of the past which collide with the current consensus found in secular, liberal circles. Recently, anthropologists have considered their ethical and professional obligations when faced with research participants who make claims that might be deemed racist, reprehensible, or historically false. This paper argues that it is incumbent upon anthropologists to countenance, yet not condone, such viewpoints. I draw on fieldwork with memory activists in Serbia and Bosnia (who, amongst other things, question that the slaughter of over 8,000 Muslims at Srebrenica in 1995 constituted ‘genocide’), and Confederate re-enactors in the American South (who, amongst other things, dispute that the American Civil War was ‘caused by slavery’). At one level, I attend to the shared moral space which fieldworker and interlocutor inevitably inhabit. During fieldwork, I encounter tense situations when interlocutors implicate me in their projects, either by seeking my academic authority to lend their ideas intellectual credibility, or by challenging any sense of anthropological moral superiority by reminding me of Britain’s historic moral failings. More broadly, I suggest that in a media landscape increasingly saturated with divisive political commentary, anthropologists are perhaps uniquely positioned to sit with radically different ethical-moral visions and articulations of historical consciousness. That is not to justify; it is to listen and to probe. The paper argues that it is the ‘moral responsibility’ of the anthropologist to illuminate even the most troubling facets of human existence even – indeed especially – when those views strike us as flawed.
Paper short abstract:
This paper reflects on my ethical, emotional and epistemological dilemmas while ethnographically exploring the world of far-right Polish immigrants and activists in the UK.
Paper long abstract:
Using my work among Polish far-right activists-immigrants in the UK, I will share some ethnographic encounters from the field, and my emotional and intellectual reactions to things I never saw – for example a Nazi swastika on a Polish body. These self-reflections full of ethical dilemmas, helped me to see my interlocutors in broader context. It also provided a dialectical perspective on what it means to engage in a violent white supremacy movement, because among questions I asked myself, was: how come I am not one of them? In the course of the study I developed a deeper research and ethical relationship with Mirek, an ex-neo Nazi, now a born again Christian. The title of this paper refers to a tattoo on his arm. For reasons which are essential to my argument, he elects not to erase it. The swastika in my view and the entanglement of his story and mine becomes a metonymy of our shared history – grand and small. The paper argues for the inevitability of autoethnographic reflections which serve not just as methodological tool, but one that gives us much needed emotional respite, hope and ethical firm ground to ask difficult political questions of today.
Paper short abstract:
Our paper examines (1) the conflicting ethics linked to the respect of research participants’ point of view and our convictions; (2) the normative expectations we meet in publishing our analysis of indigenous political subjectivities when they differ from the image of the "good Mapuche"
Paper long abstract:
On 4 September 2022, while we were conducting ethnographic fieldwork with Mapuche people in a rural region of southern Chile, the Chilean people rejected a proposal for a new constitution based on the principle of plurinationality. In a country strongly marked by centralisation and homogenising national narratives, this principle was presented as a major paradigm shift. This shift was particularly thought as a progress in terms of recognition Chile’s indigenous peoples. In our view, the Mapuche people we spoke to seemed to have everything to gain from this new constitution. However, the vast majority rejected it. Our paper returns to this crucial moment to examine (1) which kind of tensions arose from conflicting ethics linked to the respect for research participants’ point of view and our own convictions in terms of social justice and structural violence. Based on these tensions, we also explore (2) the issues at stake in terms of publication: which kind of normative expectations did we meet when giving an account of our indigenous interlocutors’ political subjectivities?
Paper short abstract:
I will reflect on my work as an Israeli-Dutch academic and activist who studies the Israeli security sector critically. I will explore how I have navigate my roles as an academic researcher and in my political work against the military occupation and atrocities Israel perpetrates.
Paper long abstract:
In this paper, I will reflect on the questions and dilemmas regarding ethics and positionality during my career as an anthropologist and activist. I will draw from my experiences as an Israeli-Dutch academic who studies the Israeli military and its security industry critically. I will explore how I have navigate my roles as an academic researcher and activist in my political work against the military occupation of Palestine and the current atrocities Israel perpetrates in Gaza and Lebanon. My academic work is deeply political, inherent to my subjective positionality as an anthropologist.
Questions that come up in my work are, for example, those concerning my positionality vis-à-vis my respondents. I’m a critical ‘left wing’ researcher who is studying people whom I strongly disagree with. As a social scientist, on the other hand, I also have a responsibility towards my research participants/informants. What does this mean for my methods?
Important here is also my experience as an outspoken activist. I am part of a group of critical Israelis who oppose the occupation. I see my academic work in a certain way as an extension of this political work. I will look at the ways that we as engaged researchers can combine political advocacy with thorough academic work. An additional issue of importance is the engagement in the public debate as academics. I will give examples of how I try to combine my academic work on the military and the security industry in Israel with political work that informs a wider public.
Paper short abstract:
This paper examines a millenarian community producing conspiracy theories, discussing how anthropological fieldwork creates an ‘ethical-moral mismatch’ for both parties, as accepting the researcher’s presence necessitates a tacit acceptance of the very institutions the interlocutors oppose.
Paper long abstract:
This paper examines the ‘ethical-moral mismatch’ (Tietlebaum 2019) in anthropological fieldwork with a millenarian community in Switzerland that produces and disseminates conspiracy theories. It explores challenges faced when an anthropologist engages with a group viewing modern science as the root of a global conspiracy. The research reveals a paradox: while the anthropologist’s academic affiliation is morally despised regardless of his discipline, his ethical approach is cautiously embraced by some members. This creates an ‘ethical-moral mismatch’ for both the researcher and interlocutors, as accepting his presence requires acknowledging institutions the interlocutors strongly oppose.
The paper examines the interlocutors’ anti-science moral viewpoint and their ethical commitment to sharing information with everyone, regardless of their background. This creates an ‘ethical-moral mismatch’ and internal tensions as the responses to the researcher differ. The researcher faces his own ‘ethical-moral mismatch’. Aware of the dilemma his presence causes, claiming to accept his interlocutors’ position simply to gain acceptance remains unethical. Also, by participating in their activities, the researcher inevitably supports positions that contradict his moral stance. By analysing experiences of navigating suspicion, hope for ‘awakening’ the researcher, and internal debates about the researcher’s presence, this paper contributes to discussions on approaching those with ‘dislikeable views’ (Pasieka 2019), especially when these views include disliking research. It examines how varying degrees of moral alignment impact ethnographic knowledge production and project integrity, offering insights into navigating complex ethical questions.
Paper short abstract:
In 2018-2019, I faced an ethical-moral mismatch when conducting research with Israeli settlers: allowing interlocutors whose politics I found morally repugnant become complex persons, and balancing this with the greater moral questions of the region.
Paper long abstract:
When embarking on research with traditionally non-Zionist ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) Jews, I did not anticipate that a significant proportion of my interlocutors would be participants in the settler-colonial project of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank. Though initially tempted to exclude interlocutors on the basis of their places of residence, I dismissed this as too biased of an erasure of the reality of Haredi society today. I then faced a three-fold challenge: conducting research with people whose politics I found morally repugnant, ethically allowing those interlocutors to become fully realised, complex persons free of my moral judgement, and balancing these two oppositions with the greater moral and ethical questions of my subjectivity in the region.
In a context where voicing my own opinions could at the very least lead to the inability to continue to find interlocutors, and at worst risk my physical safety, I found innovative methodological approaches to ethnographic practice, both in the field and after, both practical and theoretical. These have allowed me to reach my goal of realising the epistemological significance of political shifts in religious communities to the Far Right, and further my goal of understanding the politically radical other in a rapidly changing world.
Paper short abstract:
This paper argues that radical disagreement and an open acknowledgement of conflicting political and moral commitments in the field can serve as a basis for a productive researcher-informant relationships in the context of studying right-wing groups.
Paper long abstract:
In this paper, I draw on my experiences of ethnographic research with nationalist actors in Russia and Cyprus to reflect on the methodological challenges of anthropological engagement with right-wing groups. The resurging anthropology of the far-right has been dominated by ethical debates that mostly revolve around the dangers of inadvertently amplifying ‘hateful voices’ as well as the problem of researcher-informant solidarity in the context of studying ‘people we do not like.’ What is often missing from these discussions is the acknowledgement that the discomfort, if not the dislike is mutual. I suggest that reversing the question and asking about the implications of doing research with people who do not like us, can open promising avenues for rethinking the ethical dilemmas involved in studying ‘politically problematic’ communities. Given that most conservative actors have their own strong assumptions about the political values that motivate researchers affiliated with Western universities, ‘solidarity’ is hardly expected by either side. While this circumstance makes accessing the field more troublesome, it also creates possibilities for a more honest relationship with informants for those researchers who rise to the challenge—one in which ‘the ethical-moral mismatch’ (Tietlebaum 2019) is openly acknowledged and taken as a starting point for conversation.