This article explores participatory action research projects co-produced by academic actors and people from civil society in the field of disability. Having described the evolution of participation of civil society as actors in the world of research, the authors shed light upon the process of participation in this kind of action research. They identify why individuals tend to sustain engagement in the research protocol and discuss the conditions that favor sustained progress of the research process right up until it is made public to the social world. The study of the effects of the process leads the authors to observe heterogeneous levels of participation of actors and variations in the scope of transformation brought about by this kind of research. At one extreme, they identify an illusory mode of participation that reveals and maintains unequal social relations between actors in society. At the other extreme, they describe a model of participation of a political nature that carries social transformation with it and widens democracy.