ABSTRACT
An UNRISD discussion paper defines popular participation as ‘the organized efforts to increase control over resources and movements of those hitherto excluded from such control’.1 For Orlando Fals-Borda, Anisur Rahman and many other PAR theorists,2 the aim of such a participation is to achieve power:
a special kind of power – people’s power – which belongs to the oppressed and exploited classes and groups and their organizations, and the defence of their just interests to enable them to advance towards shared goals of social change within a participatory system.3
