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Ethics in participatory research -- Partnership, collaboration and power -- Blurring the boundaries between researcher and researched, academic and activist -- Community rights, conflict and democratic representation -- Co-ownership, dissemination and impact -- Anonymity, privacy, and confidentiality -- Institutional ethical review processes -- Social action for social change

Ethics in participatory research -- Partnership, collaboration and power -- Blurring the boundaries between researcher and researched, academic and activist -- Community rights, conflict and democratic representation -- Co-ownership, dissemination and impact -- Anonymity, privacy, and confidentiality -- Institutional ethical review processes -- Social action for social change

This paper engages with the challenge of re-imagining higher education. We start from the position that the ascent of the increasingly corporatized university is deeply problematic precisely because of the neoliberal realist position on 'the future' that it assumes and perpetuates: the view that there is no alternative to neoliberal capitalist market principles, that present and future realities can diverge only to the extent permitted by existing market forces and rationales (Amsler, 2011). In this context, 'education' takes the form of preparing and socializing the next generation of workers: a future focus severely limited in the possibilities it considers. Thus we are faced with a mutually-constitutive relationship where constrained visions of future needs and demands serve to constrain present educational offerings; a dynamic which becomes self-reinforcing and which admits little disruption. In this paper, we draw on the concrete body of practice known as action research to consider how we might prize open spaces for thinking much more expansively about what 'the future' might entail, and what forms of education are necessary in the present to keep open, rather than shut down, diverse possibilities and democratic debate around this. We focus on Critical Utopian Action Research (and to a lesser extent Systemic Action Research) as illustrative of key qualities of prefigurative and critical utopian engagement with educational presents and futures. We conclude that the capture of the university by neoliberal logics can be resisted and challenged through radical methodologies, like action research, which explicitly set out to be ongoingly anti-hegemonic, necessarily critical, self-reflexive, pluralistic, and non-recuperative (Firth, 2013; Garforth, 2009).

Stepping back from four years of work on the SAGE Encyclopedia of Action Research, its editors here take an opportunity to reflect on what they've learned through the process about the current state of action research and to consider how this might inform what comes next for the broader action research community. This is the first in a series of three planned articles—this first focusing primarily on how we define and mobilize the community of action research. Subsequent articles will feature Davydd Greenwood's reflections on the theoretical frameworks of action research and how they inform our understanding of change processes and Bob Dick's thoughts on current and coming methodological issues and innovations of action research.

In this brief article, we review the history of the human subjects review process and identify key aspects of that review as they relate to action research. In particular, we examine the issues of coercion, predictability, confidentiality, and risk –concerns central to the criteria used in current review processes but reflecting fundamental differences in the basic conceptualization of ethical practice as this is understood in action research.

Members of the editorial board of Action Research responded to the question, `Why action research?' Based on their responses and the authors' own experiences as action researchers, this article examines common themes and commitments among action researchers as well as exploring areas of disagreement and important avenues for future exploration. We also use this opportunity to welcome readers of this new journal and to introduce them to members of the editorial board.

This brief article offers an overview of the issue of intellectual property and the ways in which this intersects with the practice and dissemination of action research. Particular attention is paid to various forms of co-authorship and to the impact of developing forms of information and communication technologies on the question of intellectual property.