The recently released Who Killed Sir William delivers an engrossing, frank appraisal of a community-university research alliance (CURA) project, the Research Action Alliance on the Consequences of Work Injury (RAACWI) from its origins in 2003 to completion in 2012. The collaborative project, funded by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), brought members of the injured worker and academic communities together to examine how Ontario’s workers compensation system was impacting injured workers’ economic, health and social well-being, in particular for those suffering work-related permanent disability. In guiding the reader through the history and objectives of RAACWI, the authors delve in depth into the structure, process, successes and challenges – providing valuable lessons learned and encouragement for those undertaking similar projects.
The authors are two of the prime movers in initiating RAACWI, social justice advocates Steve Mantis and Marion Endicott. Steve, a longtime injured worker activist (Ontario Network of Injured Worker Groups, Thunder Bay & District Injured Workers Support Group) and former member of the WCB Research Advisory Council (RAC), served as community co-lead for the project together with academic co-lead Emile Tompa of the Institute for Work & Health. Marion , RAACWI Steering Committee member and team lead, brought her extensive experience as a Injured Workers Community Legal Clinic (IWC) caseworker, community educator and researcher and co-chair, Bancroft Institute for Studies in Workers Compensation. Members from the various participating groups also provide their own reflections in hindsight on the project.
What evidence and whose evidence counts as legitimate or objective?
In one of the opening chapters the authors provide background on the scarcity of worker-focused research, touching on academic research culture and funding priorities. Impetus for the project had come from the injured worker community’s longstanding frustration that the Board, in denying claims, dismissed the experiences of the increasing number of workers falling into poverty under legislative and policy changes that were relentlessly moving Ontario from a compensation to an insurance model. RAACWI responded to a need for research evidence that the workers’ compensation board (WCB/WSIB), in its demand for ‘objective’ quantitative evidence, would not be able to ignore. It aimed to build upon positive relationships established between community advocates and academic researchers in earlier participatory projects. Conducted under auspices of the WCB Research Advisory Council and the community-based Bancroft Institute, these studies recognized the value of qualitative evidence and role of injured workers in helping design research questions and assessing how results matched reality. However by 2002 it was clear that there still remained a lack of quality research about injured workers’ long-term outcomes under the workers’ compensation system.
RAACWI project leaders placed a priority on establishing a robust framework with strong governance and organizational structure, the training and knowledge mobilization planning to support a true collaboration of equal partners and enable the move from research to action. The book details how this was put in place based on community-based research principles and the ways in which it was challenged over the course of the project, notwithstanding the successes and goodwill of those involved.
In a continuous mutual learning process, training based on a peer support model and use of role play strengthened relationships among project members, helping academics better understand the issues and barriers injured workers faced dealing with the workers compensation board, while making injured workers familiar with formal research methods and process. The Injured Workers Speakers School (IWSS) proved a key component in building the confidence and public speaking skills that would encourage injured workers to fully participate as equal project partners. Merging communication skills with education on workers compensation developed under the Injured Workers History Project, the IWSS has continued to expand post-RAACWI as a valuable program for community development and organizing.
Sharing knowledge for action
The knowledge mobilization workplan to “share and communicate what has been learned in ways that enable people to use the research results” targeted multiple audiences: the RAACWI community, legislation and policymakers, the public and media. A blueprint integrating participatory learning and building trust, it put the action into ‘action research’, ensuring the law reform needs of injured workers were always kept on the agenda. Research findings were shared a variety of means, from the formal to the popular education techniques frequently adopted by the community: including RAACWI symposia, external conferences, publications, community forums, theatre projects such as Easy Money and skits, the Injured Worker History Project bulletins and video. To effect change, managing the RAACWI-Board connection through regular meetings was essential. As discussed in one such case study, the Blue Sky collaborative approach, in exploring research on stigma faced by injured workers and ways to reduce it, resulted in a framework and action to address the way staff interact with claimants.
Open about where the project did not fully meet objectives, the authors also attribute the RAACWI project’s many significant successes to the following set of conditions: an existing strong community (ONIWG supported by associated groups and legal clinics); a core of senior academic researchers interested in research for social use and who forged genuinely collaborative partnerships with injured workers ; a funder who expected the community to be a full and equal partner; the support of a community-based organization with a depth of resources and experience, such as IWC; attention to process in a carefully constructed framework.
Written more than a decade following the project’s official end, the book provides an evaluation of the long-term impacts for the injured worker community and collaborative research. The legacy of RAACWI is seen in the continuation of its work through new action research initiatives to restore the fairness in Ontario’s workers’ compensation system envisioned in Sir William Meredith’s principles.
- Who Killed Sir William (2024) is available now in e-book and print format from Friesen Press (available also from Indigo and Amazon)