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<journal-meta>
<journal-id journal-id-type="publisher">global-journal-of-human-social-science-f-political-science</journal-id>
<journal-title-group>
<journal-title>Global Journal of Human-Social Science - F: Political Science</journal-title>
</journal-title-group>
<issn publication-format="print">0975-587X</issn>
<issn publication-format="electronic">2249-460X</issn>
<publisher><publisher-name>Global Journals Publishing Group Incorporated</publisher-name></publisher>
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<article-id pub-id-type="publisher-id">146123</article-id>
<title-group>
<article-title>Short Methods Note: Operationalising Agency and Uncertainty in a Peace and Conflict Studies Research Project â€“ Sri Lanka</article-title>
<subtitle>Navigating Agency and Uncertainty in Peace Research</subtitle>
</title-group>
<contrib-group>
<contrib contrib-type="author"><name><surname>Hearnden</surname><given-names>Dr. Scott Robert</given-names></name><xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1" />
</contrib>
</contrib-group>
<aff id="aff1">AUSTRALIA, University of Sydney</aff>
<pub-date publication-format="electronic" date-type="pub" iso-8601-date="2026-01-17">
<day>17</day>
<month>01</month>
<year>2026</year>
</pub-date>
<volume>25</volume>
<issue>F4</issue>
<fpage>33</fpage>
<lpage>35</lpage>
<abstract><p>Introduction-Researching questions of peace with justice, within environments that restrain researcher agency, and which evoke uncertainty, requires the adoption of long-term perspectives and a good dose of patience. From the restrictions placed upon the researcher by external institutional structures to the relationships established between researcher and participants during data collection, agency and uncertainty remain factors in post-positivist scientific projects. Critical and contemplative analysis of the data, and importantly of the structures, within which knowledge is acquired as well as a preparedness for processual adjustments over time, help to underpin research trajectories. In my own experience, these factors demand not only a cautious restraint, by way of the researcher’s own framing of process, but elevated commitments to the principle of ‘do no harm’, the recognition of the positionality between researcher and participants, the acknowledgement and mitigation of bias and action to promote researcher and participant agency. Researchers themselves should acknowledge the limits by which their methodologies are constrained; and how, by modifying methods and observing limits, transparency and accountability are enhanced, participation and subjectivity substantiated, and bias and harm mitigated.</p></abstract>
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<p>esearching questions of peace with justice, within environments that restrain researcher  agency, and which evoke uncertainty, requires the adoption of long-term perspectives and a  good dose  of patience. From the restrictions placed upon the researcher by external institutional structures to the relationships established between researcher and participants during data collection, agency and uncertainty remain factors in post-positivist scientific projects. Critical and contemplative analysis of the data, and importantly of the structures, within which knowledge is acquired as well as a preparedness for processual adjustments over time, help to underpin research trajectories. In my own experience, these factors demand not only a cautious restraint, by way of the researcherâ€™s own framing of process, but elevated commitments to the principle of â€˜do no harmâ€™, the recognition of the positionality between  researcher and participants, the acknowledgement and mitigation of bias and action to  promote researcher and participant agency. Researchers themselves should acknowledge  the limits by which their methodologies are constrained; and how, by modifying methods and  observing limits, transparency and accountability are enhanced, participation and subjectivity  substantiated, and bias and harm mitigated.</p>
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