ABSTRACT

This chapter explores the challenges and opportunities of conducting research on irregular migration in India and Thailand. It follows the fieldwork processes and stages, starting first with the recruitment of participants, their participation and then the interpretation of interviews. In doing so, this chapter seeks to advance how we understand the complexities inherent in the processes involved in qualitative fieldwork. While the experiences of participants are not the focus of this chapter, by examining the fieldwork experiences of researchers across these two specific projects and the nature of the participant narratives, this chapter explores the fluidity of power and positionality and the implications that this can have for fieldwork and research more broadly. These practical implications are explored through the preconceptions and expectations of researchers and the ethics committees of the university as a way to demonstrate how the local realities shift and shape the research at different stages, in different ways, for different stakeholders.