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1 Muddying the Waters: Participatory Action Research in Tver’ “You’re not from around here,” the fox said. “What are you looking for?” . . . “No,” said the little prince, “I’m looking for friends. What does tamed mean?” “It’s something that’s been too often neglected. It means ‘to create ties’ . . . ” “‘To create ties’?” “That’s right,” the fox said. “For me you’re only a little boy just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you have no need of me, either. For you I’m only a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, we’ll need each other. You’ll be the only boy in the world for me, I’ll be the only fox in the world for you . . . ” Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince What do foxes, little boys, and taming have to do with the topic of feminism in Russia? That was precisely my thought when Valentina, founder of Zhenskii Svet (Women’s Light) quoted from The Little Prince during a talk we gave about our work to the Cornell University PAR Network in 1999.1 I had asked her to present with me on our collaborative research project when I learned she would be in the United States six months after my return from the ¤eld, and she had responded with enthusiasm and jokes about our feminist tok shou (talk show). We told the story of our collaboration in the form of a dialogue, working from a series of questions we had drawn up: how did we, the British, U.S.-based anthropologist and the Russian activist and scholar, meet and come to undertake a collaborative project? Why did members of Valentina’s group agree to work with me, a “Western”outsider? Inevitably, in addressing these questions, we emphasized different things—I spoke of my theoretical and methodological preoccupations with power in the anthropological exchange, and how I hoped to achieve a more democratic form of engagement. She spoke of how she came to found the women’s group Zhenskii Svet, her goals and aspirations in organizing and her interest in collaborating with Western feminists. The quotation was elicited by a ¤nal question from the audience: how did we feel now that the project had ended? How were we mourning the loss of the relationships? Valentina paused, and with a glint in her eye that quite disarmed me said that it reminded her of Saint-Exupéry’s The Little Prince: “You remember? That you are responsible for those whom you have domesticated, or something like that.” Everyone laughed; it was a wonderful performative moment and a great way to close, but I was thrown. I had only dim recollections of the book and couldn’t quite remember the context she was referring to. Domesticate? What did she mean? This chapter is about power and politics, the power dynamics inherent in social research and the politics of ethnographic engagement. It tells the story of my own attempt to achieve a more democratic form of research through participatory action research methodology and how this brought me into contact with Valentina and Zhenskii Svet. In the ¤rst half of the chapter I consider the particular ethical challenges of conducting research in post-Soviet Russia and explain why power emerged as such a pressing concern. I introduce participatory action research (PAR), a social change methodology I embraced as a means to achieve a more dialogic form of feminist research practice. In the second half of the chapter, I introduce my partners—Valentina and Zhenskii Svet. I arrived in the group at a particularly critical juncture in its development. Originally committed to working on a voluntary basis, members of the group had begun to question this as they became steadily more impoverished. My presence as a foreign outsider stimulated discussions about the future of the group and the potential for collaboration with international donor agencies. The chapter ends as we began to contemplate a collaborative research process, laying the ground for the story that unfolds through subsequent chapters. I recall our joint presentation and Valentina’s quotation from The Little Prince Valentina and author present to the Cornell University Participatory Action Research Network, February 1999. 20 Empowering Women in Russia for a number of reasons. First, it recalls her playfulness and the tone and spirit of our engagement. Second, it evokes the edginess of our collaborative work. Although this was of course...

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