Orlando Fals Borda

Orlando Fals Borda (1925-2008) was a Colombian sociologist and political activist credited as a principal founder of participatory action research, a methodology that merges social investigation, popular education and political engagement so that the communities studied participate as co-researchers rather than passive subjects. A founder of Colombia's first sociology faculty at the National University, he combined rigorous historical and ethnographic study of Colombia's Caribbean coast and its agrarian conflicts with direct involvement in peasant and social movements, arguing that authentic social science in the developing world required active commitment rather than detached observation. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/