Tag: Ethnography

Fair warning:
If you’re not interested in Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)–and there’s no reason you should be–you should probably just skip this whole post.

Brief background: Federal regulations require IRB approval is required for all professors’ research on people. Since 1991 (I just learned this from Shrag’s blog), IRB approval was expanded to cover, among others things, participant-observation research (that’s what I do, with an emphasis on participant). You want to interview or observe somebody? You need IRB approval first. The purpose of the IRB is to protect research subjects. There’s a bit too much history about scientists doing bad things.

Professor Zachary Schrag, a man who keeps a blog about Institutional Review Boards, left me an interesting comment in regards to a previous post:

It’s quite possible that an inept IRB would have blocked Venkatesh’s research. But Venkatesh, by his own admission, “f[oul]ed up” by passing on information that people meant to tell him in confidence. So it is also possible that an adept IRB would have permitted the research while mitigating the harm. Not likely, perhaps, but possible.

Rather than deal in such speculations, I hope you will elaborate on your own experiences with IRBs that led you to distrust them.

I don’t distrust IRBs. My practical experiences have been more or less favorable. I just fundamentally question the very notion of needingIRB approval for non-experimental social-science research on capable adults. And I firmly believe that the simple nuisance and fear of conflict with an IRB limit social-science research.

But first let me deal in some speculations:

Not only do I think an IRB wouldn’t approve Venkatesh’s research. I don’t think an IRB doing its role of protecting research subjects shouldapprove Venkatesh’s research. The risk of some harm from his research was so great as to be virtually inevitable. But I think Venkatesh should do his research, and hence my problem with the IRB in general.

I read one review of Venkatesh’s book that went so far as to to use the word “evil.” I don’t think it is. With regards to potentially violating protection of research subjects, I would draw the line between malum in seand mala prohibita. In other words: drug dealing OK, murder not. I don’t think Venkatesh crosses this line. But for Sudhir’s sake, I’m glad nobody shot somebody while exclaiming, “Am I going to make your book now, Mr. Professor?! Is this what you want?!”

While in theory the IRB could have mitigated harm in Venkatesh’s case, it’s hard to imagine a scenario where this would actually happen. I’ve never heard of an IRB with follow-up. Thus the IRB, while failing in its basic mission, still managing to hinder good qualitative research.

Too often, the quantitative researcher’s goal becomes how to outwit the IRB. I know of many good researchers and otherwise ethical people who admit to lying and deceit when it comes to the IRB. They feel, rightly or wrongly, that such deceit is necessary for research in their field to survive.

For my book’s research, I honestly don’t remember or have a copy of what I gave to Harvard’s IRB ten years ago. I know it took three of four drafts and I agreed to make an announcement on day one of the academy stating who I was. It was good to be forced to make this announcement as it wasn’t easy to make (so thanks, IRB). That being said, I also didn’t want to remind my classmates every hour that they were being watched by a researcher. Is this ethical? I think so. My point was to be honest and overt. And I was. But I think I was supposed to post something that never got posted.

I never got IRB approval for my switch in research plans when I actually had to get hired as a police officer. Between the heat from the P.D. brass disallowing my original research plan (for not being a cop) and the heat from my dissertation adviser for my new research plan (for being a cop), well, I had other priorities.

Alas, my fear of preserving confidentiality and protecting my research subjects went so far that I didn’t leave any way to link specific people at different times to their actions and quotes. What if I get subpoenad(?!), I thought. This was a mistake. I could have written a better book if I had characters. I would have, if it weren’t for the IRB.

My own experiences with John Jay College’s IRB have been pretty good. But there are still problems:

1) The line between doing research and not doing research is not as clear cut as the IRB want to believe. My book is done. I’m no longer doing research for it. But when a friend calls or writes, I’m still going to note information for my records. Am I supposed to get IRB approval before going to a Bull Roast? Am I to stop going to Baltimore now that my “research” is complete? Am I to ignore everything I see and do since I don’t have IRB approval?

2) Signed consent forms are simply impossible in police research. First of all, cops won’t sign them. Second, the social situation is flux. You arrive on a scene and officers come and go. Are you supposed to ask every arriving officer for signature? If signed consent forms were required and if this requirement were actually enforced, qualitative police research would simply end. Researchers who say they’re going to get signed consent forms from police officers are lying. Yet IRBs love signed consent forms. It’s like court overtime pay is for police. Just give ’em some and they’re happy.

3) IRBs want a guarantee of confidentiality. I won’t do that unconditionally. Luckily, Baltimore police behave pretty well, at least within the bounds of reason.

For those interested (and you might be if you’ve read this far), I’ll include the more original parts of my successful IRB submissions for approval withoutsigned consent forms and withoutunconditional guarantees of confidentiality. And they said it couldn’t be done.

Requiring a signed consent form from every research subject would so limit my participant-observation research as to effectively kill it. Given the fluid nature of social interactions in a police station, it is not possible to have every police officer who enters a room or call for service to read, understand, and sign a consent form. My research methods are overt, but informal. While the bulk of police officers will be familiar with me and my research, it is inevitable that I will see and hear police officers who initially will not know who I am. Such confusion is usually clarified immediately by asking me or another police officer.

My research is confidential and offers minimal, if any, risk to police officers.

Police officers are not normally considered an “at-risk” group (quite the contrary, police officers are often seen as the group that places marginalized people at risk). Given the constant risk of observation by their supervisors, the public, the media, and internal affairs, an outside researcher who promises confidentiality present little risk. Police officers are used to being on-guard around people they do not know.
…
A Note on Criminal Behavior and Confidentiality

While IRB boards consider harms that may come to research subjects, the potential of research subjects harming others should not be ignored. Should a researcher remain quiet if confronted first-hand with research subjects who commit genocide, mass torture, or major war crimes? Of course not.

In reality, I do not expect to witness any war crimes. But I believe that in extreme cases, a researcher’s obligation as a human being come first. Were I to witness a police officer in severe violation of criminal law, I would have to weigh any promises of confidentiality with my moral and legal responsibility to do the right thing.

I would not violate confidentiality for violations of departmental regulation or even most criminal acts. In my years both as a police officer and as a researcher (often the two overlapped–I was a Harvard University graduate student researcher during my entire two-year tenure as a Baltimore City police officer), I have never participated in nor witnessed an act that would make me consider violating confidentiality.

But if, hypothetically, I witnessed a police officer rob and kill, or sexually abuse a 10-year-old child, or anally violate an innocent man with a plunger, I would feel little compunction legally and ethically to violate a vow of confidentiality. Of course the odds that I will witness such a scene are almost zero. I do not expect such a situation to occur. But I and the IRB must be aware that the possibility, however slight, exists.

I realize that it might facilitate approval of this project if I stated that all research subjects will sign consent forms and confidentiality would never be violated. But to pretend the former denies the reality of participant-observation research on police officers; to pretend the latter is morally irresponsible. I believe it is the combined duty of researchers and the IRB to promote ethical research and protect research subjects. This process begins with the presentation, discussion, and approval of an ethical and honest research proposal.

All researchers are free to use this for their own IRB submissions. I’m happy to try and help the field.

There’s a very interesting exchange on Slate.com between Sudhir Venkatesh and Alex Kotlowitz. These are two authors I respect deeply (and not just because Prof. Venkatesh was kind enough to offer to write a blurb for Cop in the Hood).

Their letters discuss the role of researchers vis-à-vis their research subjects. You should read all four.

I just finished reading Venkatesh’s Gang Leader for a Day. It’s a great book (and not just because Prof. Venkatesh was kind enough to write a blurb for Cop in the Hood)! I stayed up till 6am to finish it. Sudhir, as you may or may not know, got his hands on the books of a gang in Chicago. Like the actually financial books. With payments, employees, salaries. What a coup! He’s done great research in the old Robert Taylor Homes in Chicago. This book is the story of his research.

I’ve read two of Alex Kotlowitz’s books: There Are No Children Here and The Other Side of the River. They’re both great (and Mr. Kotlowitz didn’t write a blurb for my book). The former is about growing up Chicago projects and the latter about race and economic relations in St. Joseph and Benton Harbor, Michigan. He writes about cities and race honestly, fairly, and with great style.

In Gang Leader for a Day, Venkatesh arguably does some harm to his research subjects. This is a big no-no in the world of academic research. Venkatesh has gotten some flack for kicking a man who was in the process of getting a beat down. That doesn’t bother me, because in addition to arguably “deserving” the beat down, the man was attacking a friend of Venkatesh. More worrisome, at least to me, is Venkatesh taking part in business extortion and unintentionally “outing” the semi-legal hustles people use to get by in the projects.

Venkatesh could never have done his research if he had to go through a Human Subject Review Board (or I.R.B., Institutional Review Board). As a grad student, he somehow skirted this requirement. But I think the world would be a worse place without Venkatesh’s research. It’s good work and shame on the institution of I.R.B.s that wouldn’t allow it!

I’ve never been a fan of the I.R.B. Few professor are. I don’t think that overt non-experimental academic researchers should need approval to observe and interact with most human subjects. We’re not giving out experimental drugs. We’re not running experiments. We’re watching and talking and living. I don’t even like the term “human subjects.” It’s dehumanizing. They’re people, damnit! It’s condescending to think that adults aren’t smart enough to make their own decisions about what to say to whom. And if they’re not, well, such is life.

Nor am I convinced that research subjects who harm others deserve institutional protection. I believe academics should act under a code similar to journalists. But federal law disagrees with me. And the press has explicit constitutional protection that professors don’t.

Kotlowitz, a journalist, doesn’t have to worry about I.R.B.s. But as human beings, both Venkatesh and Kotlowitz are naturally concerned about harms that may come from their presence. They both wonder about the obligation they have to their (poor) research subjects. Especially since they, the authors, are likely to benefit both financially and professionally.

Most research is done on the powerless and abused. In my study of police, I wasn’t dealing with what is traditionally considered an “at risk” group. If anything, police are considered by others to be powerful abusers! I wasn’t particularly concerned about my research “changing” my subjects. I want my research to change things for the better. I want a better police department and better policing.

But I had my concerns. What if I saw a Rodney King? What if I was asked to conspire in crimes? Should I stop my “research” and quit my job? Should I turn in other cops? Luckily, and hard as it is to for police-haters to imagine, I didn’t see any criminal or horrible police behavior (though I do think that somebody needs to keep better tabs on correctional officers—jail guards in particular).

Perhaps I’m underestimating the value of my Ivy League education, but I feel that any of my police colleagues could write a book as good as mine. Unfortunately they can’t write as well(and I give my public high-school English teachers more credit for that than Harvard or Princeton).

Researchers who “do” rather than just “watch” are always accused of not being “objective.” I’m not a big fan of objectivity. For starters, unless you’re a psychopath, I don’t think objectivity is possible. And even if it were, I’m not convinced it’s good. Too often objectivity is just a euphemism for ignorance. Objective outside research—that is to say, most research—runs the risk of being too ass-kissing and desperate, simply in an attempt to gain the access that naturally comes from an insider. Ethnography can’t and shouldn’t strive for the same level of scientific validity as found in the hard sciences. Ethnography isn’t chemistry.

What’s strange to me is the dearth of good social-science research on the police. I do think that it’s tougher to write about police officers than it is to write about gang members. You can write about who a gang member is, because there’s something more exotic there (at least to outsiders). The lives of people who go to work usually isn’t that interesting (so kudos to Ehrenreichfor making it so). Workers provide for their families. I don’t think I have the writing skills to make a police officer interesting. But I do have the analytical skills to notice what police officers do. Luckily, what police do is often very interesting.

People also say police are closed to outsiders and hostile to researchers. That may be true, but only if you’re an outsider. Compared to Venkatesh befriending gang members, my becoming a police officer was a synch! And it’s very easy to become a police insider. They hire. And they even pay you.

You might say that my job as police officer was, to use Venkatesh’s language, a “hustle.” I used the police department to advance my academic career. I didn’t hide this fact. The Baltimore City Police Department knew this (and to their credit still hired me). Other police told me, “If you can use this job as a stepping stone to something better, more power to you.” I actually heard those exact words more than once. I had the luxury of being an insider.

If you’re studying the poor, or the working class, or prison guards, or restaurant workers, or taxi drivers, or drug dealers, you can simply become one or make friends with those who are. Maybe all groups aren’t open to outsiders, but most are. It’s human nature. The fact that most academics don’t even talk to the people they claim to study is either horrible class snobbery or a simple lack of cojones.