Paper short abstract:

The project 'Biomedical and Health Experimentation in South Asia' researched researchers in Sri Lanka. With evidence from two public health interventions followed during the years 2011-2012, this paper will compare and comment on the different research practices within such research enterprises.

Paper long abstract:

The ethnographic material on which this paper is based on is drawn from a project titled 'Biomedical and Health Experimentation in South Asia'. This project undertakes a comparative examination of experimental research taking place in India, Nepal and Sri Lanka. Here we report specifically on a public health intervention project and a randomized control trial in Sri Lanka that was followed during the year 2011-2012. The paper explores the methodological and analytical consequences of undertaking ethnographic research among groups who are themselves undertaking research. It focuses on the relationships between ethnographers, researchers, public health practitioners and other stakeholders and highlights the different approaches to strategies for implementing research design, policy engagement, extent of local capacity, securing of funding and the ways in which collaborations are managed. The evidence assembled enables us to comment on the extent to which the methodology of RCTs contributes to the emergence of public health research in Sri Lanka and how the differences of the two projects inform research practice and its outcomes.