Pluriversal Participatory Action Research

The programme

Tuesday 10th of June

• 9.30 - 10.30: Introductory lecture Liesbeth Huybrechts on the role of Pluriversality in Participatory Action Research.
  
  
• 10.30- 15.00 (lunch between 12.00 - 13.00): Workshop: How to visualize actor-networks bridging local and supra-local scales?
  
  The participants will explore participatory tools to map actors, dependencies, conflicts spanning multiple scales and time periods. The participants will work in small, interdisciplinary groups and apply the tools to their own cases.
  
  Moderation: Liesbeth Huybrechts, Oswald Devisch & Bjørn Sletto

Wednesday 11th of June

• 9.30 - 10.30: Introductory lecture Bjørn Sletto on decolonizing participatory action research.

• 10.30- 15.00 (lunch between 12.00 - 13.00): Workshop: How to integrate pluriverse methods in my fieldwork?

  The participants will apply a series of analytical frameworks to their own cases addressing concepts such as informality, insurgence, participation, power inequalities and decoloniality.

  Moderation: Bjørn Sletto

Thursday 12th of June

• 9.30 - 10.30: Introductory lecture Emma Tilquin on pluriversal governance versus participatory action research.

• 10.30- 15.00 (lunch between 12.00 - 13.00): Workshop: How to contribute to pluriversal governance via my research? How to upscale my findings?

  The participants will apply a series of concepts and frameworks to analyse the governance of their cases and to visualise how this governance has changed over the years in order to then speculate about the future scenarios.

  Moderation: Emma Tilquin & Bjørn Sletto

Friday 13th of June

• 9.30 - 10.30: Introductory lecture Rayner Moodley on the potential of digital technologies in participatory action research.

• 10.30- 15.00 (lunch between 12.00 - 13.00): Workshop: How to understand the role of technology space in my Participatory Action Research? The participants will explore potential roles of technology within their cases

  Moderation: Rayner Moodley & Bjørn Sletto

Date and location:

• Tuesday June 10th - Friday 13th 2025
• Daily from 9h30 - 15h00
• Location: Campus Old Prison, Martelarenlaan 42, 3500 Hasselt (room: FR 1.02 and FR 2.03)

Registration

• You can register via this Google Form.
  
  
• For PhD students and postdocs, we would like to draw your attention to the cancellation and no-show policy of UHasselt

More information

• Research Group Civic & Policy Design

About the speakers

• Emma Tilquin is an Urban inequality and Inclusion expert at Enabel, the Belgian International Cooperation Agency. Enabel's mission is to promote Sustainable international cooperation and is a key partner of the Belgian government in implementing its international cooperation policy and also carries out assignments for Belgian and international commissioners (EU, Flanders, Brussels, Gates Foundation..). She works in the Urban Development Unit on issues related to participatory local governance, inclusion, gender transformative cities and supports projects in partner countries on these themes. She has previous experience in Montreal in social innovation and cocreation projects.
  
  
• Jeroen Stevens (provisional) is an architect-urbanist, and Professor in Urbanism at the KU Leuven. He held positions as Fulbright & BAEF Fellow at Columbia University, New York, and obtained a PhD in Architecture and Urbanism from the KU Leuven and the Mackenzie University in São Paulo. Committed to action research and transdisciplinary dialogue, his research and teaching inquire the intersection of urbanism and social justice in global metropolitan settings. His focus on housing rights and grassroots struggles is rooted in collaborations with social movements, cultural collectives, human right associations, governmental institutions and academic partners worldwide. Jeroen teaches courses on housing & urbanity, architectural theory, and the social dimensions of urbanism and planning; while his publications and exhibitions explore the critical capacity of narration, cartography and photography.
  
  
• Bjørn Sletto's research focuses on environmental and social justice, informality, and insurgent and decolonial planning. He is particularly concerned with the co-production of knowledge in planning processes and the role of citizen planners in producing just and sustainable urban landscapes. His work engages with intersections of race, gender, class, and other markers of difference, drawing on ethnographic and arts-based approaches in order to foster transformative research, pedagogy, and plan-making in marginalized communities.  He has lived and worked in indigenous villages and border cities in Venezuela, investigating environmental conflicts and land rights struggles and conducting participatory mapping projects with the Pemon in the Gran Sabana and Yukpa in the Sierra de Perijá. As the director of the Institute of Latin American Studies’ (LLILAS) Research Initiative in Participatory Mapping, Bjørn works closely with partner institutions in South America to further international scholarship on territoriality and map-making. For the past 15 years, he has conducted activist research accompanied by his students in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, focusing on the role of critical pedagogy for insurgent planning in informal settlements.
  
  
• Rayner Moodley is the Head of Department for Architectural Technology and Interior Design at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology. He is a registered professional planner with the South African Council of Planners with 16 years of experience across public, private, and academic sectors. He also currently serves as Acting Vice President of the South African Planning Institute and was recently recognised as a national award winner. Specialising in digital urbanism and spatial planning, his PhD research explores the intersection of digital innovation and equitable urban development in South Africa. Rayner is passionate about sustainable cities and advocates for inclusive, people-centered planning practices. His work contributes to bridging technological progress with socially just urban futures.
• Liesbeth Huybrechts is a Professor working in the fields of participatory design, design anthropology, and spatial transformation processes within the research group Arc, Civic and Policy Design at the Faculty of Architecture and Arts at Hasselt University in Belgium. Her research focuses on designing for/with participatory exchanges and capacity-building processes between humans and the material/natural environment, as well as the ‘politics’ of shaping these relationships. She explores these themes in various research projects (fundamental, funded by the European Union, or commissioned by governments, public, and private organizations), in educational projects, and in her work in coordination and policy.
  
  
• Oswald Devisch is Professor in Civic Urbanism at the Faculty of Architecture and Arts, Hasselt University, Belgium. He is coordinator of the research cluster Civic and Policy Design exploring themes such as autonomous transformation processes, collective learning, strategic participation and the gamification of participatory planning.