Negotiating with Gatekeepers: Reflexivity in Exploring Turkish Men's Engagement in Domestic Violence Perpetrators Interventions in the UK

This article explores methodological and ethical challenges and complexities in negotiating access with gatekeepers in research that examines Turkish perpetrators’ engagement in domestic violence interventions in the UK. This research presents the examples and conceptual information about the process of working with gatekeepers based on the sensitive research topic. This paper draws on the first author’s own experiences and the emotional impact of undertaking such sensitive research where community leaders held patriarchal beliefs. It also argues that there are challenges in building trust and rapport with gatekeepers which are related to gender power relations; stigmatisation in the community; ideologies around masculinity and patriarchy. Based on the experience of accessing hard-to-reach participants while undertaking a doctoral study, this paper discusses issues that arise when negotiating with gatekeepers to access study participants. The paper contributes to debates about gatekeepers by discussing the benefits of ethical considerations and of implementing reflexivity and field notes in the gatekeeping process.