From “Visa Apartheid” to structural exposure Visa restrictions can no longer be treated as a peripheral issue; they are a central concern in global health. In 2025 alone, thousands of researchers, public health officials, and clinicians from low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) were denied entry to high-income countries for conferences, training, and governance meetings, not […]
Abstract Bringing Participatory Research projects to an end poses particular challenges, with scholars often articulating affects of guilt and disappointment at unfinished endings. A mismatch between institutionally defined deadlines, and the relational and political ongoingness of participatory research create contradictory demands. Drawing on three anchor cases, we offer three concepts to support conceptualising and planning […]
Generative AI has been widely embraced as a tool that could level the playing field in academic publishing, giving non-native English speakers and researchers in under-resourced settings a fairer chance. Brendal Aformeziem draws on a growing body of evidence to show that the reality is more troubling. AI is being adopted fastest by the researchers who need […]
Abstract This paper critically interrogates the role of Institutional Review Boards (IRBs) as ‘research ethics’ within the context of contemporary university-based social science research. While IRBs are ostensibly tasked with safeguarding ethical standards and participant welfare, I posit that they often reduce ethics to a perfunctory exercise as a move to innocence, serving as mechanisms […]
As a visual qualitative researcher, I believe in the value of methods that include images, such as photos, in the production and interpretation of knowledge (Glaw, Inder, Kable, & Hazelton, 2017). Photovoice in particular—a participatory visual qualitative method in which people take pictures to identify, discuss, and address their challenges (Wang & Burris, 1997)—changed my […]
Introduction The International Visual Sociology Association (IVSA) Code of Research Ethics and Guidelines sets forth the principles and ethical standards that underlie professional responsibilities doing visual research from a diversity of cultures, disciplinary orientations and methodological approaches, including but not limited to multi-national professions: sociology, anthropology, communications, art, history. These principles and standards should be […]
In the past decade, the global health community has recognized and increasingly challenged unfair knowledge practices to address epistemic injustice within the field. Bhakuni and Abimbola frame epistemic injustice as “pervasive wrongs related to knowledge production, use, and circulation in global health.” Structural barriers within academic publishing have resulted in perpetuating harmful power hierarchies in […]
Traditionally, the academic community has prioritized the academic value of research over its social impact and relevance. About a decade ago, a study estimated that up to 85% of biomedical research was avoidably wasted. This study highlighted that a key factor contributing to research waste was the limited utility and relevance of research for interest-holders, […]
Abstract Reflexivity is often framed in qualitative research as a means of enhancing methodological rigour and research quality. However, less attention has been paid to whether research that meets such standards is also ethically responsive to the needs of participants and communities. In this paper, I examine the role of reflexivity in advancing ethical research […]
In recent years, positionality/reflexivity statements have become increasingly common in global health, qualitative health research, and bioethics. Often framed as practices of reflexivity, recently they are also taken up as part of decolonial projects. Yet their growing prevalence invites a critical pause. I argue that thin positionality statements can function less as transformative practices and […]