Cooking with Action Research

Our "Cooking with Action Research" Series now includes a bilingual (Spanish/English) volume.

The three volumes are available also as a set... Enjoy!

Extending the spirit of the Handbooks of Action Research and AR+ Cookbooks, our latest collaboration is inspired by wanting the work of Action-oriented Research for Transformations (ART) to become better known, more accessible, more appetizing in this globalizing world.

Cocina Popular shares voices from Puerto Rico, Mexico, Guyana, Brazil, Colombia, The Philippines, as well from the EU and USA as we reach toward a more beautiful world together.

Each chapter is published in Spanish and English!

Action Research Book

Extendiendo el espíritu de los Manuales de Investigación Acción e AR+ Libros para cocinar, nuestra última colaboración está inspirada en querer que el trabajo de Investigación orientado a la acción para las transformaciones (ART) sea más conocido, accesible y apetecible en este mundo globalizado.

Cocina Popular comparte voces de Puerto Rico, México, Guyana, Brasil, Colombia, Filipinas, y algunas de Suecia y EE. UU. Busca crear juntos un mundo más bello.

Cada capítulo estará en español e inglés!


"Este libro, relevante y oportuno, permite entrar en la cocina de los procesos de transformación para disfrutar de sus colores, aromas y sabores. A través de imágenes, sentí viajar por los procesos vividos por los autores. El diálogo que plantea entre voces del Norte y Sur globales, entre el Inglés y el Español, lo convierten en un paso hacia el mutuo entendimiento."

- Miren Larrea Aranguren Ikertzaile.
Investigadora Senior/Senior Researcher
Orkestra - Basque Institute of Competitiveness


The Cookbook, along with the companion Resource Guide, shares from inside the world and work of Action Researchers. 

It shows how this democratizing, people centered, orientation to inquiry & practice is helping to create a more just and sustainable world.

We want to make Action Research consciousness more accessible.

El Cookbook, junto con la Guía de recursos complementaria, comparte desde dentro del mundo y el trabajo de los investigadores de acción. 

Muestra cómo esta orientación democratizadora, centrada en las personas, a la investigación y la práctica está ayudando a crear un mundo más justo y sostenible.

Queremos hacer que la conciencia de Action Research sea más accesible.


"Qué placer disfrutar de este nuevo recurso para y por ARTistas en todas partes. Cocina Popular aborda algunos de los desafíos más difíciles de nuestros tiempos, no enfrentando al Sur Global contra el Norte Global, ni demonizando o glorificando uno u otro (o ambos), sino poniéndolos en contacto, amorosamente y con propósito.

¡Me gusta!"

- Dr Patricia Gayá,
Co-Director of Action Research
and Critical Inquiry in Organisations


Get Your Copies & Join the Conversation!

Please Respect Our Intellectual Property. Do Not Share These Copyrighted Resources Without Permission.

Cocina Cook Book

Cocinando Investigación Acción

Volume 3

Bilingual Publication: English & Spanish

Buy Now! 

(Kindle & E-Reader Versions Coming Soon!)

Action Research Book

Cocinando Investigación Acción & Cooking with Action Research Stories and Resources

3 Volume Set

Volume 1: English
Volume 2: English
Volume 3: Spanish & English

Buy Now!

(Kindle & E-Reader Versions Coming Soon!)

Action Research Book

Cocinando Investigación Acción & Cooking with Action Research Stories and Resources

Volumes 2 & 3

Volume 2: English
Volume 3: Spanish & English

Buy Now!

(Kindle & E-Reader Versions Coming Soon!)

Action Research Books

Cooking with Action Research Stories and Resources

Volumes 1 & 2

Volume 1: English
Volume 2: English


“Cocinando con Investigación Acción no es un libro convencional sobre metodología de investigación, ni un libro de recetas fáciles o un conjunto de recuerdos de expertos en Investigación Acción."

- Danilo R. Streck y Oscar Jara Holliday


Action Research Book Review

"What a joy to discover in one volume such depth of reflection and richness of insights, spanning a colorful variety of sectors and organizational experiences! 


I found the Stories chapters eminently readable and thought-provoking - like a long after supper conversation with kindred spirits who one doesn't get to see often enough, and which leaves one feeling inspired and reinvigorated."

Patricia Gayá, Ph.D.

Director of Policy Bristol, Co-Director of ARCIO and Senior Lecturer in Management at the University of Bristol.

Action Research Book Review

“A much-needed addition to the action research literature with insights that counter the soul-destroying institutional imperatives ever more evident in modern social life.


A testimony to the very human processes, the need for authentic connection, in effective action research.”

Ernie Stringer

Professor Emeritus. Author: Action Research in Education.

Action Research Book Review

“With internationally flavored recipes from The Philippines, Sweden, Turkey, Switzerland, New Zealand and Global Action Networks -- as well as a range of voices from large-scale third-person projects, to probing second-person conversational exchanges, to the revelations of first-person self-study -- this book conveys the true challenges of the actual practice of action research.


Each recipe is unique. Give them a taste! And then create your own recipes!” 

David Coghlan

Emeritus Professor. Author: Doing Action Research in Your Own Organization

Action Research Book Review

“The AR+ “Cookbook” subtly, and through a diversity of topics and cases, ranges across action research approaches to problems that truly matter. It presents processes that enable the stakeholders to create solutions that truly work.


There is striking coherence here in the way Action Research unlocks frozen and counterproductive organizations. Lurking in the background are Aristotle, Vico, James, Pierce, Dewey, Lewin, Trist, Freire, Fals Borda and Foote Whyte and many others.


Action Research is not new. We have long known how to improve human situations and make organizational life fairer and more tolerable. Despite that, these chapters tell us that most of the organizations we deal with are poorly organized and inhumane. The Cookbook shows that this is not how life must be lived. It is only how life gets lived when power and resources are concentrated in the hands of the few and the legitimate stakeholders are excluded.”

Davydd J. Greenwood

Emeritus Professor. Author: Introduction to Action Research

Readers will find engaging accounts of transformation from the worlds of Education, Business, Healthcare, Sustainable development, as well as utopian grounding for future organizing in the overlapping spaces.

In a world primed to need Action Research, much of the published work remains unavailable - book costs too high, so too the walls created by scholarly norms for writing. These books, and the global movement they represent, wants to be more popular, more accessible.

The authors, all advanced Action Researchers, convened as the institutional founders of AR+, came together in 2016 to learn with and from each other across boundaries of all sorts. Working on individual shoe-strings, we decided to tie our shoe strings together! We share the stories of our work to invite others to be inspired, learn some practical ways to enrich practice and join with us.

We dare to hope that the next Cookbooks will include new colleagues and more inter-generational sharing, accomplishing more good together.

Action Research Book Review

"As a Chinese action researcher working in communities in China, I very much share the view of the Cookbook that developing mutuality is critical to the success of good action research. In Chinese society, guanxi (reciprocal relationship) is really the basis on which everything gets done." 

Professor Hok Bun KU, Ph.D.

Associate Editor, Action Research Journal,
Director of China Research and Development Network. Professor. Hong Kong Polytechnic U.
Deputy Director, Peking U- Hong Kong PolyU China Social Work Research Center.

Action Research Book Review

“The Cookbook looks terrific! 

Many congrats Hilary and all who got into the kitchen. And a known sustainable model of energy fuel was used, the continuous energies of we living organisms always 'inquiring for life' together. Many thanks!

Yoland Wadsworth 

Adjunct Professor RMIT University, Australia

Action Research Book Review

“Neophytes and experienced practitioners alike will find challenging ideas, guidelines for practice and inspiration in this new collection of writing on action research. It is exciting to see how this field continues to develop in so many diverse fields of practice and addresses key issues for our times.” 

Peter Reason, Ph.D.

Emeritus Professor.
Co-Editor: Handbook of Action Research

Action Research Book Review

“This book is eclectic and playful. Its diversity in both style and content gives a glimpse into the many Action Research recipes that are possible. I like the focus on the conversational and the relational.


It speaks well to the relationship between first, second and third person action research and to the important balance between planned organisation and improvisation.” 

Professor Danny Burns

Leader, Participation Research Cluster. Institute of Development Studies

Action Research Book Review

“Compliments to the chef and the international kitchen in sharing how the core ingredients of Action Research – participation, action, research, transformation and reflexivity – provide a rich array of ingredients and accounts of practice from different settings.


As it is for all cooks, the challenge now is to create our own recipes from our own mixing of these ingredients and deliver the nourishment of participation and transformation in our universe.” 

Bill Torbert

Emeritus Professor.
Author: Action Inquiry: The Secret of Timely and Transforming Leadership