From marginalisation to empowerment
Addressing social injustices
As Professor of Social Policy at ARU, Margaret Greenfields has worked extensively in the field of social inclusion and social justice, with an emphasis on undertaking collaborative research with communities at risk of marginalisation.
Having originally trained as a community lawyer, Professor Greenfields takes a collaborative approach to research, involving a wide variety of stakeholders including community groups.
In this article, we take a look at her motivations and methodology – and the impact of her work.
Background and motivation
Professor Margaret Greenfields has dedicated her career to addressing social injustices faced by marginalised (underserved) communities, including refugees and asylum seekers, Romani, Traveller and Roma populations and people who are experiencing homelessness. Her research projects are often collaboratively designed with community groups and aim to fill gaps in policy and practice that impact excluded groups. A key motivation for her work is a determination to challenge social injustice, drawing on her experiences in former legal and policy roles.
Professor Greenfields' research focuses on co-designing effective, accessible, and cost-efficient solutions to policy and practice concerns. Her work is at the interface of social policy, professional practice and legislation, engaging with practical policymaking and governance to enhance the public good through breaking down barriers to access and delivery of services.
"Professor Greenfields' research contributes to a deeper understanding of inclusion health, health inequities, migration issues and the experiences of ‘under-served’ minoritised communities."
Research process
The research methodology employed by Professor Greenfields, whilst tailored to individual projects, generally includes mixed-methods, combining statistical analysis, literature and policy reviews, surveys, focus groups, and creative methods to capture the experiences of service users and typically ‘unheard/underserved’ communities. This approach allows for a comprehensive exploration of challenges and solutions, which are then presented to policymakers with detailed recommendations and advice on implementation.
Working with excluded populations, such as those experiencing housing insecurity or impacted by their legal status (such as asylum applications or being an undocumented migrant), presents significant challenges. Maintaining contact with participants throughout lengthy projects can be difficult, and external pressures such as policy changes, frequent movement or destitution can cause community members to drop out of research studies. To overcome this, her research team emphasise the need to build long-term relationships rooted in trust with civil society agencies; and have developed responsive mechanisms to retain contact with participants, such as using WhatsApp messages, vlogs and recordings or images captured on phones to collect data. They also often adapt their research activities to gather as much data as possible in shorter timeframes and address communication barriers through innovative approaches such as translated graphics or peer-researcher voiced audios.
Findings
Despite decades of research, Professor Greenfields frequently encounters 'zombie issues' such as deep and persistent poverty, rapid policy swivel, communication barriers, poor policymaking, inadequate housing, and mistrust in state agencies, which impact on service users’ well-being, and delay sustainable service improvement. Her findings frequently highlight the importance of working closely with communities and civil society agencies, which often have well-thought-out solutions to persistent problems which can be delivered at low cost through their extensive local networks. Meaningful dialogue and collaboration between civil society, commissioners, policy makers and overstretched statutory service providers can lead to significant improvements through leveraging relatively modest resources.
Professor Greenfields' research contributes to a deeper understanding of inclusion health, health inequities, migration issues and the experiences of ‘under-served’ minoritised communities. By co-producing knowledge with a range of stakeholders, her work addresses areas where understanding may be lacking or where new challenges are emerging, with the aim of pre-empting problems which may risk spiralling out of control.
Recommendations from Professor Greenfields' research are designed for a wide range of stakeholders and aim to promote longitudinal monitoring, incremental and responsive policymaking, and appropriate, targeted, dissemination. This approach helps ensure that researchers and policymakers do not continually reinvent the wheel, allowing for more effective support and services to be delivered, in partnership with community organisations, to those most in need.
"Recommendations from Professor Greenfields' research [allow] for more effective support and services to be delivered, in partnership with community organisations, to those most in need."
Collaboration
Collaboration is a cornerstone of Professor Greenfields' research. Her projects involve a wide variety of stakeholders, including medical schools, local authorities, government agencies, civil society organisations, and community groups. Community co-researchers who receive training in diverse research methods play a crucial role in her work, often going on to further education or using their experience to influence and advocate for their own communities.
Future directions
Several of Professor Greenfields' studies are ongoing, with a focus on implementing findings tailored to local circumstances. As public services face extreme pressure, her research aims to explore how evolving findings and recommendations can be effectively implemented.
The long-term overarching vision for Professor Greenfields' research suite is to bring about positive change for the communities she works with, in a manner which is sustainable, feasible and cost-effective for practitioners and policymakers. Accordingly, her work aims to improve service formulation and leverage funding and development opportunities to maximise benefits for communities of interest.
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- Professor Margaret Greenfields