As government and community empowerment programs seek to break the cycle of poverty in Indonesia, research plays a crucial role. But one challenge in social welfare and poverty research is the lack of active participation by those directly affected. Often research misses the crucial step of listening to the voices of marginalized communities and incorporating their insights into policy and program development. Addressing this gap is essential to helping ensure that programs and interventions meet the needs of the people they intend to serve.
In social research, especially those involving marginalized communities, many factors may hinder people’s inclusion, including prejudice, stigma, social, educational, and economic gaps between policy makers, programmers, or researchers and community members. Empathetic and participatory approaches to research can help bring marginalized people to the center of the research process, empowering them to participate through a collaborative approach. These approaches help ensure the inclusion of those much affected, and that their voices are heard.
Recently, we conducted a study involving street workers in Jakarta for UNDP Accelerator Labs as part of their project on empowering the urban poor, particularly People in Need of Social Welfare Assistance (Pemerlu Pelayanan Kesejahteraan Sosial, PPKS) in the city. The process of this study began with building a rapport with street workers – such as buskers, ojek payung, pak ogah, and street tissue sellers, which was done by spending multiple days on the streets of Jakarta to meet and chat with them in their own environment, such as warung, roadside, and train stations – places where they work and feel comfortable and safe. This established relationship became the entry point for us to introduce them to our research objectives. As trust grew over the course of a few days, we also secured 22 PPKS street workers to be study participants through a snowball sampling method, where the street workers we met invited their friends to participate in the study.
Although the study process required more time than if the study had started immediately with data collection, the rapport building phase was crucial to ensure that the study participants felt comfortable communicating with us and actively participated in the participatory focus group discussions (pFGD), which was the main data collection method in this study. Rather than a typical l question-answer format, pFGDs emphasize the involvement of participants through interactive means such as diagrams, drawings, mapping, storytelling, photographs, and even drama. The flexibility of the activities, depending on the research questions and objectives, allow those who may find it difficult to share information verbally to have an alternative way that is fun and less intimidating. Further, a participatory approach means that study participants are given the opportunity to share first-hand what is important to them, rather than merely responding to specific questions which often entails researcher bias.
Planning the pFGD session also demands an empathetic approach. While held at Empatika’s office, the layout/set-up of the space was open and informal, utilizing multiple areas, including outdoor spaces, and using floor seating for both participants and facilitators. All sessions started with familiar ice-breakers that were fun for the participants. In one ice-breaking session, our facilitators sat and sang together with the study participants, many of whom are buskers, encouraging them to lead the musical accompaniment. This seemingly simple activity – was aimed to also help reduce the power gap between participants and researchers and encourage them to take ownership of the space and time.
Check out our video detailing more about our approach and the pFGD activities.
These approaches and activities helped uncover the study participants' life experiences, including insights that may often get overlooked or not communicated to decision-makers and policymakers. For example, we learned that not all study participants depended on their income from street work; some had other jobs such as music teacher and security guard, which they enjoyed. However, family and life responsibilities required them to earn extra money while keeping flexible hours. For them this was possible by earning money on the street, such as busking.
"I'm old, I just want to live to be useful to others, I was happy when I became a music teacher for street children. For the first time in my life, I felt useful to others."
- busker, 35 years old
As we explored their life challenges and aspirations through a scenario activity, a participant who is a busker with advanced musical skills shared his aspirations to become a café musician. His experience of stigma and discrimination faced while working on the streets have hindered his confidence to achieve his aspirations. He shared with us that encouragement could help him to overcome this situation, but only if it comes from the people he trusts.
Some of the study participants live and work on the streets because they do not have identity documents, such as birth certificates or national ID (Kartu Tanda Penduduk, KTP), which are necessary for formal employment. A River of Life activity highlighted that for many this was because they were abandoned on the streets by their family or relatives, or they were driven away from home because of a dysfunctional family situation.
“I still want to work on a fishing boat. But, I’m afraid that my salary will be taken away again like last time (he was unable to claim his salary working for a fishing boat because he didn’t have a national ID). But I don’t know how to make an ID. People have told me I must have a family card to make a national ID, but I’ve never had a family card either”
- young man, 18 years old
We captured the study participants' life stories and aspirations into persona cards to complement the study report. These persona cards were presented at the beginning of a solution brainstorming workshop organized by UNDP Accelerator Labs together with some social enterprises and MSMEs in Jakarta. These persona cards helped give context for the discussions and provided a nuanced understanding of the complex social and economic challenges faced by street workers in Jakarta. This complexity needs to be taken into account when seeking to develop relevant, community-level solutions which address the underlying challenges faced by street workers for a positive, long-term impact.
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