Poverty knowledge and action research: Lessons from the Ramanagaram Financial Diaries

This piece is an attempt to synthesize our learnings about poverty and action research using the financial diaries methodology among the urban poor at Ramanagaram, a town 60 km away from Bangalore, India. We introduced a participatory component in the financial diaries methodology by asking our respondents (all women) to be the diary writers. This helped narrowing the gap between the researchers and researched towards understanding data on the lives of the poor. It spurred an on-going relationship with our diary writers and enabled us to take a critical look at several mainstream conclusions about poverty. For example, eating out and expenditure on snacks by women, especially in women-headed households is not to be considered a temptation good but an expense arising from the informal nature of her employment, allowing her little time towards household chores. Similarly, buying a TV (sometimes by borrowing money) was often prompted by the drudgery of onerous job–work done from home, rather than from the need to emulate the Joneses. A small self-help livelihoods venture grew out of the interaction, which we helped setup. This study reinforces the need to have more action research with the poor, if meaningful solutions need be sought to their problems.