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This article presents a critique of an agency study which used rapid research methods to investigate the role and consequences of structural adjustment programmes and the introduction of a multi-party system in Tanzania. The authors compare the findings of the agency study to their own village-level studies. They argue that the genuinely poor were not included in the analysis by the agency study team, thereby casting doubt on the study's provisional findings that 'trade liberalization has been good for rural people'. They suggest that special efforts need to be made to ensure that 'the unseen and unknown' come to the fore when using rapid research methods.

Over the last year exercises termed participatory poverty assessments have been carried out as part of the process of preparing World Bank Country Poverty Assessments in a number of countries. In Ghana, Zambia and Kenya such exercises have been carried out in rural and urban areas using methods based on the RRA/PRA 'family'. The article questions some of the assumptions underlying the methods, drawing on experiences in Ghana and Zambia. It argues that assumptions of community, mutual knowledge and homogeneity in livelihood patterns derive from the rural-based traditions of the RRA/PRA approach and are not relevant to an urban context.