ABSTRACT
There are 180 names listed in the 1994-5 directory of members of the Collaborative Action Research Network. They come from over twenty countries. In the introduction to the directory I likened these individuals to the canopy of a rain forest, because the full list of those connected to the network over the years-and, in my experience, quite likely to re-emerge and rejoin when they have the need-is very much larger. CARN’s silent partners and labyrinthine inter-connections, like the roots and successive layers of the rain forest, are the source of its strength. We (CARN is very much about ‘we’) are personally linked, either because in many cases we have worked together, met at conferences, or written letters to each other, or because our CARN membership acts as a ‘passport’ guaranteeing our commitment to a shared set of educational values. We all believe in the possibility of improving educational practice through practitioners’ participation in research. So, we meet each other, even for the first time, as friends and trusted colleagues. A spider’s web seems a rather obvious metaphor for a network since a network is made up of many individuals linked by apparently flimsy, almost invisible bonds. It depends for its existence on the individuals who, though attached to many different organizations, reach out lines of communication to each other. The network exists in the personal links, not in any formal organization. Individuals can find a respite in the network from the otherwise continuous need in their professional lives to develop and maintain their roles (values and functionality) in the context of organizational politics. At least to an extent, if individuals have particular needs the network has the flexibility to move to accommodate them-by providing personal support and practical assistance. In other ways the metaphor of a spider’s web is useful in warning against the dangers which, as coordinator of CARN, I have tried to avoid. An educational network exists for its members, not for the coordinator. It is created by the members’ efforts, not by an all-powerful central figure. Its purpose is certainly not to establish a powerbase to entrap or ensnare those who approach from outside.
