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This comprehensive work presents a thorough review of RRA applications to irrigation. The paper is introduced with a brief overview of the emergence and needs that led to the widespread emergence of RRA. It provides a good background to understanding the basis and rationale for the widespread adoption of RRA, and its particular usefulness to irrigation system analysis. The bibliographic selection is deliberately selective and not aimed to be comprehensive. However, it still provides a useful selection of material on irrigation applications of RRA.

Aerial photographs were used in rural Nepal as a basis for natural and human resource appraisal, leading to the development of a management plan for a village area. A standard 1:20,000 aerial photograph enlarged to 1:5,000 proved most useful. "Presentation of natural and human resources data on an aerial photographic base permits integration of otherwise unwieldy data". Rural Nepalis were adept at interpreting the photographs without any formal training, being able to pick out their own homes, farmland, water sources etc. The author suggests this is because Nepalis often look from ridges into valleys "in the same manner as presented by aerial photography". The aerial photographs therefore provided an effective bridge between planners and non-literate villagers when discussing plans for their area.

En este artÝculo se presentan, en forma comparativa, las conclusiones que para el quehacer del investigador social, el autor extrae de dos experiencias bien diferentes de inevstigaci¾n activa. Seg·n Zamosc, la tradicional tÚcnica de la investigaci¾n participante es rebasada por los investigadores que se comprometen con las comunidades que estudian. Se da lugar, de esta manera, a tres tendencias: investigaci¾n participativa convencional, investigaci¾n comprometida e investigaci¾n activa. Se analiza aquÝ, como una prßctica investigativa se transforma en una prßctica social dependiendo del paradigma te¾rico del investigador y de las circunstancias en que se desarrolle. Zamosc cita com ejemplo el trabajo realizado por los investigadores del grupo La Rosca, con la Asociaci¾n Nacional de Usuarios Campesinos ANUC, en la dÚcada de los setentas, trabajo que contribuy¾ a la radicalizaci¾n de sectores del campesinado colombiano aglutinados por esta organizaci¾n. AllÝ se gener¾ una fuerte pugna intestina que giraba alrededor de diversas tendencias impulsadas por grupos de izquierda, lo cual desemboc¾ en la liquidaci¾n del movimiento. Sin embargo, el balance de este trabajo mostr¾ un amplio abanico de posibilidades investigativas y de capacitaci¾n para sectores populares. El otro caso se refiere a la experiencia de investigaci¾n activa del campesinado fiquero, en la cual el autor particip¾ entre 1977 y 1980. Parece ser que el resultado de esta actividad fortaleci¾ la organizaci¾n de los fiqueros al tiempo que pone, tambiÚn, de manifiesto perspectivas de anßlisis crÝtico de la metodologÝa de la investigaci¾n activa

This is an extensive report of a community appraisal, undertaken as part of a social forestry and upland development programme in Mindoro and Cebu, Philippines. The appraisal focused on two problem areas identified by an earlier rapid appraisal: (i) agricultural production and soil conservation, and (ii) social organisation and conflict. The appraisal team decided information was required on these two areas for the formulation of interventions. Fieldwork methods included community or group meetings, key informant interviews, semi-structured interviews, direct observation and measurement. The findings from the two study sites relating to the two problem areas defined above are presented in detail. On the basis of these findings, recommendations specific to the two study sites are made.

This paper examines the relationship between RRA and the theory and practice of development, and asks how it contributes to a new paradigm. It begins with an overview of the history of western thought as it relates to the origins of the conventional (evolutionary, unilineal, positivistic) development paradigm. It then sketches alternative paradigms which question notions of progress and change. They suggest alternative understandings of 'systems' and action, leading to recognition of the potential roles of local people in applying their own knowledge in determining their own development, and the need for learning processes in development activities. These processes are increasingly seen as determined by their context. RRA is suited to responding to the needs and opportunities inherent in this new paradigm in many ways. Although realising this potential depends on the acceptability of information generated by RRA to decision-makers, questions of data validity are not always relevant: openness and multiplicity of feedback circuits compensate for small sample sizes and rapidity. RRA can also facilitate dialogue and has the potential to change practitioners as well as 'objects' of development. Thus in the right situation, RRA can be a valuable supplement to conventional research methods - if done well - but should not replace them.