Conducting survey research while a feminist: Taking intersectional and decolonial approaches

It can be challenging for survey researchers to adopt feminist epistemologies as one might assume that positivist research and feminist research contradict each other, particularly as positivism centres on objectivity and value-free science whereas feminism emphasises subjectivity and human agency. Departing from conventional wisdom, this chapter argues that it is possible to be both a political scientist and a feminist while doing survey research guided by feminist epistemologies, and discusses the shortcomings and challenges in existing quantitative approaches to research. It offers recommendations for how survey research could be feminist, such as taking an intersectional approach to address systematic inequality. The chapter concludes by discussing how feminist epistemologies can contribute to social critiques that address contemporary forms of inequality and injustice by calling for further decolonisation of survey research.