FRRMS MENDELU

2019

Fundamentals of methodology

Lecture 02: Scientific Knowledge

Reader

Created for FRRMS students as a part of a course reading

Includes (for full citations see the course syllabus):

Obligatory reading:

Halperin, Heath, p. 25-52

della Porta, Keating p. 19-39

Suggested reading:

Bryman, p. 19-43

Corbeta 9-29

Part I Epistemology and philosophy of the social sciences

2 How many approaches in the social sciences? An epistemological introduction

Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating

Paradigms in the social sciences

Partisans articulate their positions with passion and intensity, yet the nature of what divides them is hard to pin down. At times we hear of a stand-off between ‘qualitative’ scholars, who make use of archival research, ethnology, textual criticism, and dis- course analysis; and ‘quantitative’ scholars, who deploy mathematics, game theory, and statistics. Scholars in the former tradition supposedly disdain the new, hyper- numerate, approaches to political science as opaque and overly abstract, while scholars of the latter stripe deride the ‘old’ ways of studying politics as impression istic and lacking in rigor. At other times the schism is portrayed as being about the proper aspiration of the discipline – between those who believe that a scientific explanation of political life is possible, that we can derive something akin to physical laws of human behavior, and those who believe it is not . . . at still other times the rivals are portrayed as ‘rational choice theorists,’ whose work is animated by the assumption that individuals are rational maximizers of self-interest (often economics, sometimes not), and those who allow for a richer range of human motivations (Shapiro, Smith and Masoud 2004a: 1). This quotation from the introduction to a recent volume on Problems and Methods in the Study of Politics addresses a core methodological issue for the social sciences in general: how many approaches/methods are available for students in the discipline? And what are the main cleavages along which they are divided? In The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Thomas Kuhn (1962) suggested that mature scientific disciplines rely upon a paradigm that defines what to study (relevance of social phenomena), why to study (formulating explana- tory hypotheses) and how to study (through which methods). In normal times the presence of a paradigm, based upon previous acquisitions in a discipline,

19 20 Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating

allows for the accumulation of knowledge. In times of turbulence, scientific revolutions produce changes of paradigm. An important element of a para- digm is that it is accepted by the whole community of scientists active in a certain discipline. According to Kuhn, in the 1960s the existence of a paradigm in the social sciences was an open question; in the 2000s, it remains so. Some social scientists insist that there is only one approach (and thus one paradigm) in the social sciences. King, Keohane and Verba (1994: 6) synthe- sized the ‘ideal to which any actual quantitative and qualitative research’ should aim in the following definition of ‘scientific research’:

1 The goal is inference. Scientific research is designed to make descriptive or explana- tory inferences on the bases of empirical information about the world . . . 2The procedures are public. Scientific research uses explicit, codified, and public methods to generate and analyse data whose reliability can therefore be assessed . . . 3 The conclusions are uncertain . . . 4 The content is the method. . . . scientific research adheres to a set of rules of infer- ence on which its validity depends.

Not all social scientists, however, share all these assumptions or even believe in the possibility of a common definition of scientific research. Some think that social science is pre-paradigmatic, still in search of a set of unify- ing principles and standards; others believe that it is post-paradigmatic, having shed a set of scientistic assumptions tied to a particular conception of modernity (the post-modern approach). Yet others believe that it is non- paradigmatic, in that there can never be one hegemonic approach and set of standards, but that the social world is to be understood in multiple ways, each of which may be valid for specific purposes; or even that it is multiparadig- matic, with different paradigms either struggling against each other or ignor- ing each other. Some social scientists are specifically concerned with this issue, specializing in the philosophy of social science and the theory of knowledge. Others take the basic issues for granted and concentrate on empirical research. We agree that not all social scientists need to be philosophers, and certainly most social science research would never get off the ground if we had first to resolve the fundamental questions about being and knowing. Nevertheless, some reflection on the foundations of knowledge is necessary as a preliminary to all research. We argue that it is possible to encompass much of the field, not by impos- ing a single truth, but by setting certain standards of argumentation and debate while recognizing that there are differences in approaches and types of 21 How many approaches in the social sciences?

evidence. Although these do not inevitably constitute fundamentally different world-views, they are not necessarily all compatible. Researchers need to be aware of the various approaches, the differences among them, and the extent to which they can be combined. Disputes over approaches are often presented in a rhetorical form based upon a dualist opposition of two main approaches (usually positivistic versus humanist, or quantitative versus qualitative) (Cresswell 1994). Others follow a more nuanced ‘two-plus-one’ approach, with two more extreme positions and a more moderate version of one of them (as in Corbetta 2003). In what- follows, we have constructed some simplified ideal types of rival approaches in order to explore their inherent logic. Such devices are inescapable if we are to understand clearly the main issues at stake, although in practice social science research is more complex and different approaches are mixed in various ways. We do not claim that any social scientists follow precisely these formulations, but many of the issues discussed below provide relevant guidelines for the methodological choices we often have to make in our research.

What can we know and how? Ontologies and epistemologies in the social sciences

Usually, competing approaches in the social sciences are contrasted on (a) their ontological base, related to the existence of a real and objective world; (b) their epistemological base, related to the possibility of knowing this world and the forms this knowledge would take; (c) their methodological base, referring to the technical instruments that are used in order to acquire that knowledge (Corbetta 2003: 12–13). The ontological question is about what we study, that is, the object of inves- tigation. Disputes about the existence of a physical world go back to the ancients. This is not the point at issue here, since few people now bother to dispute the existence of physical objects.1 Rather, the question is how the world fits together and how we make sense of it. The natural sciences are still home to arguments about how we identify natural phenomena, for example whether taxonomies of species really exist in nature or are the product of scientific classification. For nominalists, categories only exist because we arbi- trarily create them. For realists,2 the categories are there to be discovered. Again, we should not overstate this point. There are certain categories that are unchallenged and others that everyone accepts are the product of convention. 22 Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating

Almost everyone accepts a distinction between living forms and inert objects, and most accept a distinction between human beings and other animals. On the other hand, there was an argument in 2006 about the definition of a planet following the discovery of objects in the solar system smaller than Pluto, which had been accepted as a planet for years. This was not an argument about facts (the existence or size of the new body), but a purely nominalist argument about definitions (Kratochwil, ch. 5, uses the same example). Most disputes between nominalists and realists in the natural sciences are at the margins, where conventional categories and labels can be challenged on the grounds that they are misleading or that they reify what should properly be seen as concepts rather than objects. In the social sciences there are much wider differences about the degree to which the world of social phenomena is real and objective, endowed with an autonomous existence outside the human mind and independent of the interpretation given to it by the subject (Corbetta 2003). For some, the only ‘real’ object is the individual person, with all other units being mere artefacts. This is the basis for ‘methodological indi- vidualism’ and for most, but not all, rational choice approaches.3 Most social scientists, however, use larger categories such as class, gender or ethnicity, pro- voking disputes about the extent to which these are real objective distinctions, the product of our own categorization, or just concepts.4 Epistemology is about how we know things. It is a branch of philosophy that addresses the question of the ‘nature, sources and limits of knowledge’ (Klein 2005). Knowledge here is propositional knowledge – distinct from ‘belief’ in that it requires that we give reasons for saying that something is so and can potentially convince others. Again, the question arises also in the natural sci- ences; but they have shared standards of evidence, argument and logic. This is not so in the social sciences, with some social scientists calling for objective evi- dence akin to that of the natural sciences, while others insist that other forms of knowledge are possible. For example, a common device in positive social science is to contrast ‘myth’, as widely shared belief, with ‘reality’, revealed by empirical research; the task of the social scientist is to expose this falsehood and discard what is not empirically verifiable or falsifiable. Many anthropologists, however, would reject this way of proceeding, on the grounds that myths and beliefs are data as valid as any other and that we have no business telling other people (especially in other cultures) that their construction of the world is wrong, as opposed to merely different. Less radically, many social scientists would agree that myths are important factors in themselves and their role in social behaviour is independent of whether they are true or false. Of course, social science itself can be charged with existing on myths, for example the 23 How many approaches in the social sciences?

Table 2.1. How many ontologies and epistemologies in the social sciences?

Positivist Post-positivist Interpretivist Humanistic

Ontological issues Does social Objective; Objective, Objective and Subjective: reality exist? realism critical realism subjective as science of the intrinsically spirit linked

Is reality Yes, and easy Yes, but not Somewhat, but No; focus on knowable? to capture easy to capture not as separate from human human subjectivity subjectivity

Epistemological issues Relationship Dualism: scholar Knowledge is Aims at No objective between the and object are influenced by understanding knowledge is scholar and two separate the scholar; subjective possible his/her object things; inductive deductive knowledge procedures procedures

Forms of Natural laws Probabilistic Contextual Empathetic knowledge (causal) law knowledge knowledge

myth of rationalized institutions that – according to neoinstitutional analysis of organizations – dominates in modern societies (Meyer and Rowan 1983: 27). As in other domains, this modernist myth is challenged by other dis- courses stressing the post-modern character of contemporary societies. Taking these two dimensions together, we can identify four broad approaches (Table 2.1). Again, these should not be taken as hard categories (or fixed labels), but rather as positions on a spectrum from the most positivistic to the most humanistic. The traditional approach in positivism (as represented in the work of Comte, Spencer and, according to some, Durkheim)5 is that social sciences are in many ways similar to other (physical) sciences. The world exists as an objec- tive entity, outside of the mind of the observer, and in principle it is knowable in its entirety. The task of the researcher is to describe and analyse this reality. Positivist approaches share the assumption that, in natural as in social sci- ences, the researcher can be separated from the object of his/her research and therefore observe it in a neutral way and without affecting the observed object. As in the natural sciences, there are systematic rules and regularities govern- ing the object of study, which are also amenable to empirical research. In the 24 Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating

words of Emil Durkheim (1982: 159), ‘Since the law of causality has been verified in other domains of nature and has progressively extended its authority from the physical and chemical world to the biological world, and from the latter to the psychological world, one may justifiably grant that it is likewise true for the social world.’ In neo-positivism and then post-positivism, these assumptions are relaxed. Reality is still considered to be objective (external to human minds), but it is only imperfectly knowable. The positivist trust in causal knowledge is modified by the admission that some phenomena are not governed by causal laws but, at best, by probabilistic ones. This does not represent a sharp break with the natural sciences but follows modern scientific developments (Delanty 1999). If positivism closely resembles the traditional scientific method (or Newtonian physics) in its search for regularities, post-positivism is closer to modern scientific approaches, which accept a degree of uncer- tainty. Critical realist epistemology holds that there is a real material world but that our knowledge of it is often socially conditioned and subject to challenge and reinterpretation.6 There are mechanisms governing human affairs that may be unobserved and unobservable, but these are not therefore to be dis- counted. Again, this is also true in the natural sciences, where theories have often been formulated and applied before the underlying causal mechanisms have been explicated. Similar ideas are present in (social) constructionism (sometimes called con- structivism7). This approach does not, as is sometimes thought, argue that the physical world itself is the product of the imagination of the social scientist; rather, it is he/she who puts order onto it. As Hacking (1999: 33) explains: ‘Social constructionists tend to maintain that classifications are not deter- mined by how the world is but are convenient ways to represent it.’ Theories are not descriptions to be evaluated by their literal correspondence to some discoverable reality, but partial ways of understanding the world, which should be compared with each other for their explanatory power (Kratochwil, ch. 5). The world is not just there to be discovered by empirical research; rather, knowledge is filtered through the theory the researcher adopts. These ontologies and epistemologies shade into the interpretivist approach. Here, objective and subjective meanings are deeply intertwined. This approach also stresses the limits of mechanical laws and emphasizes human volition. Since human beings are ‘meaningful’ actors, scholars must aim at dis- covering the meanings that motivate their actions rather than relying on uni- versal laws external to the actors. Subjective meaning is at the core of this knowledge. It is therefore impossible to understand historical events or social 25 How many approaches in the social sciences?

phenomena without looking at the perceptions individuals have of the world outside. Interpretation in various forms has long characterized the study of history as a world of actors with imperfect knowledge and complex motiva- tions, themselves formed through complex cultural and social influences, but retaining a degree of free will and judgement.8 Historians also recognize that the interpretation is often dependent on the values and concerns of the historian him/herself and that reinterpretation of the past (revisionism) is often stimulated by the political agenda of the present. Such traditional forms of interpretation have been joined by a newer school of interpretivism derived from post-modernist premises (Bevir and Rhodes 2003). This school casts doubts on the epistemological constants of much social science, which it sees as unduly influenced by modernist assump- tions about order, causation and progress (themselves in turn derived from nineteenth-century natural science). Interpretation works at two levels. The world can be understood not as an objective reality, but as a series of inter- pretations that people within society give of their position; the social scientist, in turn, interprets these interpretations. In a further reflexive turn, social scientists’ interpretations feed back to the people through literature and media, influencing them yet again in what Giddens (1976) calls the ‘double hermeneutic’. This is one reason why relationships that may have held in the past might not hold in the future (Hay 2002). The humanistic approaches shift the emphasis further towards the subjec- tive. In this perspective, what distinguishes human science from natural sciences is that human behaviour is always filtered by the subjective under- standings of external reality on the part of the people being studied and the researcher him/herself. Social science is therefore, in the often-quoted definition proposed by Clifford Geertz (1973: 5), ‘Not an experimental science in search of laws but an interpretative science in search of meaning’. In the most radical versions of this approach, reality does not exist beyond the (rel- ative and partial) images the various actors have of it. Knowing the reality is therefore impossible, and scholars should focus on the meaning through empathetic knowledge.

How many methodologies in the social sciences?

The methodological question refers to the instruments and techniques we use to acquire knowledge. At one level, this is independent of the ontological and epistemological questions just discussed, since there are multiple ways of 26 Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating

acquiring each type of knowledge. In practice, they tend to be linked, since positivistic social science lends itself naturally to ‘hard’ methods, seeking unambiguous data, concrete evidence and rules and regularities, while more interpretive approaches require ‘softer’ methods allowing for ambiguity and contingency and recognizing the interplay between the researcher and the object of research (but see below). All these differences are linked with the differing final scope of the research. In the positivist tradition, research aims at singling out causal explanations, on the assumption of a cause–effect relationship between variables (see Héritier, ch. 4). Researchers aim at an explanation that is structural and context-free, allowing generalization and the discovery of universal laws of behaviour. Such laws may be discovered in two ways. The inductive approach, which is associated with pragmatism or behaviourism (Hay 2002), involves deriving generalizations from specific observations in a large number of cases. Positivists in the more scientific tradition, however, would insist that one start with a theory, which then generates hypotheses (an expected state of affairs) which are then subjected to the test of hard facts and only accepted if they survive the ordeal (see Héritier, ch. 4).9 This is the hypothetico-deductive (deductive-empirical) method,10 in which the study of social reality utilizes the conceptual framework, techniques of observation and measurement, instruments of mathematical analysis and procedures of inference of the natural sciences (Corbetta 2003: 13). Since it is rarely possible in the social sci- ences to conduct experiments, large datasets and statistical analyses are used in order to identify and isolate causes and effects in a rigorous manner and arrive at a single explanation. This is not to say that positivists use only quan- titative methods; but where they use other (qualitative) methods, they follow the same logic of inference. The main aim is ‘identifying, assessing and elim- inating rival explanations’ (Collier, Brady and Seawright 2004a: 229). By contrast, interpretive/qualitative research aims at understanding events by discovering the meanings human beings attribute to their behaviour and the external world. The focus is not on discovering laws about causal rela- tionships between variables, but on understanding human nature, including the diversity of societies and cultures. More specifically, following Weber, this type of social science aims at understanding (verstehen) the motivations that lie behind human behaviour, a matter that cannot be reduced to any predefined element but must be placed within a cultural perspective, where culture denotes a web of shared meanings and values (see della Porta, ch. 11, and Keating, ch. 6). Theory is important, but is not always established prior to the research as in the deductive-empirical approach. In the form of 27 How many approaches in the social sciences?

‘grounded theory’, it may be built up in the course of the research, but then be available for further research and the study of other cases. Cases are not broken down into variables but considered as interdependent wholes; gener- alization is achieved by assigning cases to classes and approximating them to ideal types. Context is considered as most important since research on human activity must consider an individual’s situational self-interpretation (Flyvbjerg 2001: 47). Predictability is impossible since human beings change in time and space and, in the words of Bourdieu (1977: 109), ‘practice has a logic, which is not that of logic’. The outcome of the research then takes the form of specific explanations of cases, but also of refined concepts for the analysis of future cases. This type of research, like the positivist approach, seeks explanations for social outcomes but does not expect to derive these from universal rules. Rather, explanation comes from the interpretation of people’s motives for their actions. Ferejohn (2004: 146) clarifies this distinction by contrasting ‘externalist’ and ‘internalist’ explanations:

Externalists explain action by pointing to its causes; internalists explain action by showing it as justified or best from an agent’s perspective. Externalist explanations are positivist and predictive; internalist explanations are normative or hermeneutic. Externalists tend to call themselves political scientists; internalists, political theorists. And, both externalists and internalists agree, if they agree on little else, that they are engaged in different enterprises.

Sometimes this difference is presented as a contrast between quantitative (positivist) and qualitative (interpretive) methods (Creswell 1994; Corbetta 2003). This is a source of considerable confusion, conflating ontology and epistemology on the one hand with methods and methodology on the other. The quantitative method refers to sophisticated data analysis using large numbers; there is certainly a stream in social science that is both positivist and quantitative in approach. Brady, Collier and Seawright (2004) describe a ‘mainstream quantitative method’ as an approach based upon the use of regression analysis and related techniques aiming at measuring causal infer- ence; but note that work in the positivist tradition also makes use of non- quantitative material such as case studies, paired comparisons, interview records and even ethnographic approaches in field research and interpreta- tion. King, Keohane and Verba (1994), leading exponents of the positivist approach, accept that qualitative methods may be used as a supplement to quantitative methods as long as they follow the same logic. The chapters in Brady and Collier (2004) argue that qualitative methods can tackle questions 28 Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating

that quantitative methods cannot encompass, but remain within the same positivist epistemological framework. Even participant observation is often used within ‘theory-driven’ research designs (Lichterman 2002). Laitin (2003) likewise admits to the validity of narrative approaches but only as part of a tri- partite approach in conjunction with statistics and formal modelling. For Laitin, narratives can provide plausibility tests for formal models, mecha- nisms that link dependent and independent variables, and ideas for searching for new specifications of variables that have yet to be modelled. There is, however, another rather different, more specific meaning often given to the term qualitative methods, linked to the interpretive approach derived from ethnography and anthropology and which has now arrived in other areas of the social sciences. As defined by Denzin and Lincoln (2000: 3):

Qualitative research is a situated activity that locates the observer in the world. It con- sists of a set of interpretive practices that make the world visible. These practices trans- form the world. They turn the world into a series of representations, including field notes, interviews, conversations, photographs, recordings and memos to the self. At this level, qualitative research involves an interpretive, naturalistic approach to the world. This means that qualitative researchers study things in their natural settings, attempting to make sense of, or to interpret, phenomena in terms of the meanings people bring to them.

Favoured methods for this are unstructured interviews, focus groups, textual analysis and content analysis (see Bray, ch. 15). However, just as positivists may make use of interviews, case studies and even participant observation, so interpretivists sometimes use quantitative techniques. Sophisticated com- puter software is available for analysis of the content of speech and texts to identify key words, patterns of symbols, codes and references. This shows once again that we should not confuse issues of epistemology with those of methodology or research technique.

From methodology to method

It would therefore be a great simplification to say that there is a distinction between quantitative and qualitative methods corresponding to the distinc- tion between positivist and interpretivist epistemologies. Methods are no more than ways of acquiring data. Questions about methods do, however, come together with epistemology and theory in discussions about method- ology, which refers to the way in which methods are used. Here we face choices 29 How many approaches in the social sciences?

pointing in the direction of more or less formally structured approaches and ‘harder’ or ‘softer’ methods.11 To explore them, we first present a simplified set of choices to be made in research design and in method selection (see also della Porta, ch. 11). The first choice is in the framing of the research question. Positivists will usually start with a hypothesis deductively derived from theory and previous knowledge. Typically, this will postulate some expected state of affairs or causal relationship and be empirically falsifiable. By this we do not mean that it is actually false, merely that the conditions under which it can be rejected are specified. If it is not falsified, then it can be taken as true, not only for the cases in question but for all cases with the same characteristics. Interpretivists (or qualitative researchers in the restricted sense) work more inductively, build up the research question in the course of the research and are prepared to modify the design while the research is in progress. There is thus no clear time distinction between the research design and its implementation, as they are interlinked with continuous feedbacks. Positivists take care to opera- tionalize their concepts and hypotheses in scientific and general terms, while interpretivists let the concepts emerge from the work itself. Another difference refers to the number of cases analysed, as well as the cri- teria for selecting them. Positivists will often choose a large number of cases to achieve the maximum generalizability and capture most sources of varia- tion. Alternatively, they will choose a small number of cases, but rigorously select them in such a way that their differences can be specified precisely. In J. S. Mill’s (1974) classic formulation, two cases should be chosen such that they share only one attribute in common, or so that they differ in only one attribute. In this approach, numbers are not necessarily used, and cases can be few: the logic is, however, the approximation to a statistical type of analysis, with concerns with (statistical) representativity, validity and reliability. Non- quantitative techniques must thus follow the same logical structure and rules for scientific inference (King, Keohane and Verba 1994).12 Interpretivists, on the other hand, will select cases on the basis of their inherent interest (for example, paradigmatic cases), not because they are typical of a category but for what they tell us about complex social processes. Positivists usually employ the language of variables. That is, they are not interested in cases as such, but in the properties of those cases that cause them to differ. Since they are concerned with general or universal laws, they want to know what factors cause which outcomes in social life, for example what is the causal relationship between economic growth and democratization. This requires that they develop an operational definition of economic growth and 30 Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating

of democratization and ways of measuring them. These then become the vari- ables in the analysis, with economic growth as the ‘independent’ or causal variable and democratization as the ‘dependent’ or caused variable. Of course, it is rarely the case that one independent variable will everywhere and always produce the same effects on the dependent variable, but this merely means that more variables need to be added so that, eventually, all variation is accounted for. In the words of Przeworski and Teune (1970), the aim is ulti- mately to ‘eliminate proper names’ – that is, to account for social processes by reference to general rules without talking about individual cases, since these will all be accounted for within the general rules (Corbetta 2003). Context for these social scientists merely consists of variables that have yet to be specified adequately (Laitin 2003). Neo-positivist approaches have relaxed the assumption that knowledge is context-free and that the same relationships among variables will hold every- where and at all times. Instead, there is more emphasis on the particular and the local, and on the way in which factors may combine in different circum- stances. To capture this contextual effect, researchers have increasingly resorted to the idea of institutions as bearers of distinct patterns of incentives and sanctions, and on the way that decisions taken at one time constrain what can be done later. These institutional factors may be expressed in the form of variables, but an important role is played by comparative study of a small number of cases, where the variation is the institutional structure and its his- torical evolution (see Steinmo, ch. 7). Neo-positivists seek to express the effect of context in the form of institutional structures and try to avoid the concept of culture as impossible to operationalize and inimical to general theorizing. Others, however, have moved from institutions into culture, providing a bridge between interpretivist and positivist approaches (see Keating, ch. 6). Interpretive analyses keep a holistic focus, emphasizing cases (which could be an individual, a community or other social collectivity) as complex entities (della Porta, ch. 11) and stressing the importance of context. Concepts are ori- entative and can be improved during the research. The presentation of the data is usually in the form of thick narratives, with excerpts from texts (inter- views, documents and ethnographic notes) presented as illustration. The assumption of mutual influence among the many factors at work in any case discourages any attempt to reason about causes and effects or to generalize. Understanding reality implies ‘immersing ourselves in information about the actors in question, and using both empathy and imagination to construct credible accounts of their senses of identity’ (Smith 2004: 43). In such an enterprise, methods generally labelled as qualitative – such as interpretative 31 How many approaches in the social sciences?

textual analyses, ethnographic fieldwork, biographical studies or participant observation – are key (see Bray, ch. 15). Another difference is in the relationship of the researcher to the research object: how much participation is permissible in the situation to be observed? How much of a stranger should the researcher be? And how sympathetic towards the point of view of the object of his/her research? The positivist sets up a complete separation between the observer and what is observed, taking care not to ‘contaminate’ the research by becoming part of it. S/he will prefer standardized questionnaires and interview schedules, anonymized surveys, rigorous coding of responses and, often, quantitative techniques. The inter- pretivist will tend, on the contrary, to immerse him/herself in the situation to be studied, to empathize with the population and to see things from their per- spective. Anthropologists spend long periods in the field seeking to gain an inside knowledge. The sociology of intervention (as pioneered by Alain Touraine) involves the researchers working with social movements and the activists they study in a common path, with the aim of helping the latter to interpret the situation and engaging in mutual learning. In the most radical understanding, all statements about the external world have such strong sub- jective elements that no shared observation can exist. The acknowledgement of the role of interactions between researchers and the object of the research poses many ethical issues; among others, whom to accept as a sponsor, how much to reveal about the research to the interviewees, how to protect their privacy, how to compensate them for their collaboration, how to keep them informed about the results of the research and how to avoid manipulation. Another critical question that differentiates approaches concerns value- neutrality. In the positivist perspective, the researcher brings no normative, ideological or political perspectives to bear on the research. S/he is merely seeking the unadorned truth. Critics would argue that this often conceals a normative agenda and indeed that the founding assumptions of positivism themselves reflect a value choice.13 Positivists counter that, if this is the case, then all such normative tendencies should be declared in advance. Normative work as such is, according to this perspective, a separate endeavour, which belongs in the field of ethical philosophy. Interpretivists would tend not to make such a sharp distinction between empirical and normative work; taken to its fullest, this approach denies the distinction between facts and values altogether. More moderate versions argue that most language and speech acts have both descriptive and normative elements within them, that concepts themselves usually have some normative content, and that the researcher should be aware of this. Recently, there have been conscious efforts to pull 32 Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating

Table 2.2. How many methodologies in the social sciences?

Positivist Post-positivist Interpretivist Humanistic

Which Empiricist, aiming Mainly empiricist, Relative focus Focus on values, methodology? at knowing the recognizing on meanings, meaning and reality context context purposes

Which Imitating the Based upon Seeking Empathetic method/s? natural method approximations to meaning interactions (experiments, the natural (textual between mathematical method analysis, researchers and models, (experiments, discourse object of statistical statistical analysis, analysis) research analysis) quantitative interviews)

together normative work derived from philosophy with empirical research (see Bauböck, ch. 3). While in one sense new, this also represents a return to the classical era of social thought. Flyvbjerg (2001) has controversially sug- gested that, since the social sciences can never gain the explanatory power of the natural sciences because of the nature of the world, they should return to this earlier age and seek to provide reflexive analysis and discussions of values and interests aimed at praxis, that is, to contribute to the realization of a better society. This in turn has sparked some critical rejoinders (Laitin 2003). Returning to our fourfold classification, and with the caveats already men- tioned, we can summarize some main methodological assumptions (Table 2.2).

How many ways to knowledge?

How exclusive must be our methodological choices? Should we leave space for epistemological anarchism, and trust exchanges with scholars working within the other ‘paradigm’? Even switching between the two? Or is the building of knowledge only possible within one paradigm? Is the combination of approaches/methods useful to overcome the limits of each methodology? Or would it risk undermining the soundness of the empirical results? Three approaches to these issues can be singled out in the social sciences: (a) Paradigmatic, exclusive approach. In the light of Kuhn’s conception of the role of paradigm, some social scientists aim at a paradigmatic science, 33 How many approaches in the social sciences?

where only one paradigm is considered as the right one, combining theory, methods and standards together, usually in an inextricable mixture (Kuhn 1962: 109). Those who see the social sciences as paradigmatic stress the impor- tance of converging on (or imposing) one single way to knowledge. (b) Anarchist, hyper-pluralistic approach. At the other extreme, there is an ‘inclusive’ position that combines scepticism about a ‘true’ knowledge with enthusiasm for experimentation with different paths to knowledge. Those who subscribe to this position to various extents support Feyerabend’s anar- chism and his belief that:

the world we want to explore is a largely unknown entity. We must therefore keep our options open . . . Epistemological prescriptions may look splendid when compared with other epistemological prescriptions . . . but how can we guarantee that they are the best way to discover, not just a few isolated ‘facts’, but also some deep-lying secrets of nature? (Feyerabend 1975: 20).

(c) The search for commensurable knowledge. Between those two extremes, there are positions that admit the differences in the paths to knowledge and deny the existence of a ‘better one’, but still aim at rendering differences com- patible. Within this third perspective – which we tend to follow in this volume – it is important to compare the advantages and disadvantages of each method and methodology but also be aware that not all are compatible. Goals that cannot be maximized at the same time include seeking precise communica- tion as opposed to fertility in the application of concepts, parsimonious expla- nations as opposed to thick descriptions, and generalizability as opposed to simplicity (Collier, Brady and Seawright 2004a: 222). It may therefore be ne- cessary to trade off one advantage against another. This choice will be made on the basis of the fundamental question the researcher is trying to answer – for example, whether he/she is trying to explain a particular case; to gain nomothetic knowledge (discovering general rules); or seeking ways to achieve a better society. It depends on the preferences of the researcher, and on the sorts of data that are available, including reliable statistical data or detailed field data requiring long immersion in the field. The choice of approach is linked to another choice in social science research: whether to start with a theory, a method or a problem. Those aiming at a paradigmatic social science will often start with a theory, seeking to test it with a view to proving, disproving or modifying it and so contributing to universal knowledge. This is often tied to a particular methodology to allow studies to be reproduced and compared. Those interested in a specific 34 Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating

problem, on the other hand, will tend to look for the method and approach that seems to offer more by way of understanding of the case. Exponents of the first approach are accused of studying methods for their own sake and choosing only issues that are amenable to that method – summed up in the old adage that if the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a nail (Green and Shapiro 1994; Shapiro 2004). Those who focus on problems, in contrast, are accused of adding nothing to the writings of his - torians and journalists (Shapiro, Smith and Masoud 2004a). Ways of combining knowledge can be characterized as synthesis, triangu- lation, multiple perspectives and cross-fertilization. Synthesis involves merging elements of different approaches into a single whole and can be done at various levels. Synthesizing different epistemologies is virtually impossible, since they rest on different assumptions about social reality and knowledge. Methodologies may be easier to synthesize since, as we have seen, they are not necessarily tied to specific epistemological assumptions. Techniques and methods are most easily combined since, as we have noted, many of them can be adapted to different research purposes. So comparative history and historical institutionalism have adopted and adapted techniques from comparative politics, history and sociology to gain new insight into processes of change. Triangulation is about using different research methods to complement one another. Again, it is difficult to triangulate distinct epistemologies, easier with methodologies and very common with methods. So positivists can incorpo- rate interviews and textual analysis into their research designs, although using these as hard data rather than in the manner of interpretivists. Case studies are frequently used to complement large-N statistical analyses as ways of opening the ‘black box’ of explanation (see Héritier, ch. 4). Survey research may be complemented by ethnographic work, which explores the way in which ques- tions are understood and the meanings of the responses. Multiple perspectives implies that a situation may have more than one inter- pretation according to how we view it. De Tocqueville (1999) wrote that in his life he had met theorists who believed that events in the world owed everything to general causes, and practical people who imagined that daily events and actions were those that moved the world – he added that both were mistaken. Allison’s (1971) study of the Cuban Missile Crisis examined the same events using different frames to come up with different explanations. It has been said that everyone is born either an Aristotelian or a Platonist (Hacking 1999: 84), yet hardly any social scientist now is a naïve empiricist who believes that the world represents itself to us without interpretation. 35 How many approaches in the social sciences?

Conversely, nobody in mainstream social science denies the existence of the physical world or maintains that reality is entirely subjective and in our minds. This encourages a cross-fertilization in a large middle ground. Concepts often arise in the social sciences by different tracks, derived from slightly different starting points but ending in similar places. For example, the concept of ‘framing’, widely used in policy analysis to indicate the different ways in which people will define and conceptualize a policy issue or problem, can be derived from an anti-positivist and interpretivist position (Fischer 2003) but also from a positivist one. It has been used in social movement research since long before the so-called ‘cultural turn’ by scholars interested in strategic action by collective actors (such as David Snow), but also by others more interested in the micro-dynamics of cognition (such as William Gamson). In all cases, the idea is that situations can be interpreted differently and presented differently to evoke different reactions from the same set of facts. The differences are in exactly how much weight is given to the objective world and how much to its interpretation. The concept of culture, much used by interpretivists, is rejected by positivists and rational choice analysts but then often brought back in as normative institutionalism or shared meanings and understandings that underpin policy communities (see Keating, ch. 6). Context is central to ethnographic and interpretivist approaches, where it is deeply textured and rich, but is also used in neoinstitutionalist analysis and even features in the hardest regression analyses (where difficult whole cases are expressed as dummy variables). New institutionalism has come into the social sciences through several doors: in political science, where it is a response to decontextualized rational choice approaches; in sociology, where it draws on organizational theory; and in economics, where it draws on economic sociol- ogy. The result is a set of concepts that are very similar but, because of their distinct origins and vocabulary, never quite identical. There is also a large crossover in ways of developing and using theory. As mentioned, grounded theory does not start with a deductively produced hypothesis but with experience; nevertheless, it does then go on to build up general theory of wider applicability. It owes a lot to the American pragmatist tradition, with roots in a ‘realist’ ontology, but it has been extended and elab- orated in more interpretivist approaches. Meanwhile, in the United States, that same realist ontology has evolved into varieties of rational choice approaches, based supposedly on the solid foundation of the individual person, but in practice using an ideal-type construct and models derived from deductive reasoning. Indeed, rational choice approaches themselves seem to be compatible both with determinism (on the assumption that preferences are 36 Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating

knowable and outcomes predictable from individual self-maximization) and with free will (in that the individual does choose). A great deal of social science proceeds by going back and forth between theory and cases, using the one to develop and deepen understanding of the other. Sometimes the cross-fertilization is explicitly acknowledged. In a contribu- tion to a volume significantly titled Rethinking Social Inquiry. Diverse Tools, Shared Standards, Collier, Seawright and Munck (2004) stress the importance of good theories and empirical methods, but also appreciate the contribution of interpretive work to concept formation and fine-grained description. Many of the classic works in sociology and political science have taken the form of interpretive case studies from which general theories have been developed by example, replication and extension (Van Langenhove 2007). Examples are Alexis de Tocqueville’s De la démocracie en Amérique and L’ancien régime et la révolution, but also more recent historical sociology in the school of Barrington Moore Jr. Qualitative analysis has also been used to highlight causal effects by focusing on striking cases where the impact is clearest and the detailed mechanisms can be examined. In this way, social scientists can proceed from correlation, where the same causes are associated with the same effects, to explanations of why and how. Influences come not only from within the discipline but also from other areas of science. Newtonian physics, with its search for laws and constants, has been an inspiration for positivist social science, while its opponents have drawn attention to the uncertainties underlying modern physics and the huge epistemological assumptions among which scientists have to choose (such as the existence of one or parallel universes). Evolutionary biology now provides inspiration for historical institutionalists (see Steinmo, ch. 7).14 Rational choice scholars are inspired by neoclassical economists, while institutional economists learn from sociology. History long provided the model and tools for the study of politics in Britain, while law was its basis in many European countries. After a period in which the social sciences insisted on their own specificity, many scholars are now turning back to history, while developments in legal scholarship (including law in context, critical legal theory and consti- tutionalism) are linking back to concerns in political science and sociology. Literature has helped inspire the ‘sociological imagination’ by portraying dra- matic situations that need to be explained and resolved and drawing attention to the conflicts within the individual mind. Cross-fertilization, however, is inhibited by the existence or closing up of research communities, groups of scholars in regular contact and discussion, who may define their common interest by substantive topic, methodology, or 37 How many approaches in the social sciences?

both (Sil 2004). These are reified and perpetuated by processes which them- selves are worthy of sociological analysis, including the existence of journals wedded to particular approaches, the orientation of individual departments or sections, patterns of graduate supervision and discipleship, routinized assessment procedures, and routes to career advancement. When research communities are defined both by substantive topic and by method, barriers may be very high and knowledge remain limited to the problems each method is best fit to tackle, secluded from external stimuli and challenges. On the other hand, when barriers are more fluid, the problem emerges of the commensu- rability of different forms of knowledge, as well as ‘fuzzy’ and ill-defined stan- dards (Ruggie 1998). This makes it all the more important for researchers to know the field and to be able to compare standards and arguments with those from different communities. This is what Sil (2004) suggests under the label of eclecticism, where problems of incommensurability are not absolute and comparisons can be made across fields to the advantage of both empirical knowledge and theoretical innovation. Further problems are caused by the tendency for concepts or expressions to become fashionable and then stretched beyond their original or indeed any useful meaning. In recent years, for example, the use of the word ‘governance’ has exploded. For some scholars, this is a specific phenomenon distinct from government and capable of operationalization, but for others it is used inter- changeably with government. Still others see it as less than government, refer- ring to a specific way of governing through networks, alongside traditional institutional government. Others see it as a broader category of social regula- tion, of which government is a subcategory. Some see it as an alternative to government – that we are moving from a world of government to one of gov- ernance. ‘Construction’ or ‘social construction’ are similarly stretched to cover almost everything (Hacking 1999) as, for a while, was the term ‘invention’. Discourse analysis is sometimes used as a specific methodology, with its own ontology (speech acts themselves) and its own techniques; at other times it is applied to any technique that involves using texts and interviews. Sometimes the blame for all this confusion lies with scholars thinking that they need to get inside the current paradigm in order to make their point; often it is merely a matter of publishers looking for a trendy title. Of course, not everything is methodologically healthy, and the label of eclec- ticism should not be used to justify hybrids that violate, if not rules, at least codes of conduct of what we have presented here as main approaches. Although the triangulation of various methods and methodologies within the same research project often increases reliability and improves our understanding, the 38 Donatella della Porta and Michael Keating

different parts of the enterprise must respect internal coherence. If an ‘eclectic knowledge’ of qualitative and quantitative techniques enriches a researcher’s curriculum, human limits, together with the increasing sophistication of most qualitative and quantitative techniques, impose some specialization. The following chapters offer differing approaches in ontology, epistemology and methodology but also indicate points of commonality and overlap.

NOTES

11 This is either because they accept the material world, or because it is a question that cannot and need not be answered and is therefore futile to debate. 12 This is one of the terms in social science that has a multiplicity of meanings. In international relations it has a rather different meaning from the one given here (see Kratochwil, ch. 5). 13 In fact, even the individualist solution, reducing the ontology to the individual human being, does not answer this question definitively, as one might argue that even the self-regarding rational individual is an artefact of social science methodology and not something that occurs naturally, since the original condition of human beings is the group. This is argued in Adam Ferguson’s (1966) Enlightenment classic, Essay on the History of Civil Society, of 1767. 14 A classic example of this is the case of gender. While nobody denies the existence of sexual differences, there is a big dispute over the category of gender, which includes a lot of other attributes and roles which have been mapped onto sex differences. 15 Van Langenhove (2007) claims that late twentieth-century social scientists have often por- trayed the classical sociologists as more simplistically positivist than they really were. 16 Critical realism has been defined as ‘a philosophical view of science and/or theology which asserts that our knowledge of the world refers to the-way-things-really-are, but in a partial fashion which will necessarily be revised as that knowledge develops’. Christopher Southgate, www.meta-library.net/. 17 For a discussion of the difference, see Hacking (1999: 47–9). He recommends leaving the term ‘constructivism’ to the mathematicians. 18 This taps into a long-standing division in philosophy between determinists and those emphasizing free will. While for St Augustine and John Calvin, determinism was a matter of divine selection, for modern social scientists it is a matter either of genetic programming, social conditioning or a predictable response to institutional incentives. Believers in free will cannot by definition be certain about how another actor will behave, no matter what con- straints they are under. 19 In practice, social scientists often go back and forth between inductive and theory-driven approaches as they seek to frame their projects. 10 This is not to be confused with the pure deductive method, in which conclusions are derived from premises by pure reasoning, with no empirical research involved. Héritier (ch.4) explains the link between induction and deduction in the positivist tradition. 11 These terms are not used in a value-laden way to suggest that one is better than the other. Hard methods correspond to the view that social science can be made to resemble the phys- ical sciences; soft methods to the view that social reality is more elusive. 39 How many approaches in the social sciences?

12 For example, case studies can be accepted either to disconfirm a hypothesis (since it only takes one case to disprove a rule) or as a basis for formulating hypotheses for general testing. They are not valuable in themselves. 13 This is perhaps most obviously so in rational choice analysis, which claims a strictly posi- tivist basis but includes some strong assumptions and tends to lead to highly normative con- clusions. 14 This is not to say that the unity of the natural and social sciences can thereby be restored, as many people insist that the specificity of the latter is that the objects of study are endowed with consciousness and can act on their own volition. Forms of Knowledge: Laws, Explanation, and Interpretation in the Study of the Social World

Chapter Summary

This chapter considers fundamental assumptions that researchers make about how we can know and develop knowledge about the social world, including assumptions about the nature of human behaviour and the methods appropriate to investigating and explaining that behaviour. The core concern is whether and how we can pursue a systematic and rigorous study of social phenomena in the way that scientists pursue study of the natural world. Without considering this issue, it is diffi cult to design or structure an approach to research into political phenomena, and to make any claim with respect to the fi ndings that result from that research. This chapter focuses on three different answers to the question of how to ap- proach the study of social phenomena: those offered by positivism, scientifi c realism, and interpretivism. In exploring the differences among them and their implications for conducting political research, our discussion will engage with a number of ques- tions, including the following: ● What form(s) of knowledge should be the goal of political research? ● Should the social sciences strive to emulate natural science methods, or is understanding social phenomena something essentially different from explanation in the natural sciences? ● Can we study politics scientifi cally? What does it means to be ‘scientifi c? ● What distinguishes science from non-science?

Introduction

Every researcher must confront fundamental questions about the nature of knowledge and how we acquire it. T ese questions are the focus of key debates in political research, and the subject of an ongoing inquiry into scientif c practice, forms of knowledge, and the world of politics. What sort of knowledge can we gain about the social world? Is it the same sort of knowledge that scientists are, able to obtain about the natural world? Or are the forms of knowledge concerning the social world and the natural world necessarily dif erent? If they are dif erent, is it still possible to produce knowledge that is reliable and objective? What counts as legitimate knowledge of the social world? T ese questions 26 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

bear directly on research practice and, consequently, are of primary concern to those who seek to understand political processes and structures. T e answer or answers you accept will determine the sort of research you pursue, the claims you make on the basis of that research, and your assessment of the f ndings of the research produced by others in our f eld. We will consider three dif erent approaches to these questions: positivism, scientif c real- ism, and interpretivism. Each approach dif ers from the others with respect to its ontologi- cal, epistemological, and methodological premises. T ese dif erences are summarized in Box 2.3 in the concluding section of this chapter. T e terms ‘ontology’, ‘epistemology’, and ‘methodology’ relate to fundamental issues concerning research practice and knowledge. Ontology is concerned with ‘what is’: with assumptions about the nature of the social world and the basic elements that make up this world. Questions of ontology relevant to political research include whether the social world is fundamentally dif erent from the natural world; whether it is an objective reality that exists independently of us or is in important respects subjectively created. Episte- mology is concerned with what is knowable, with what we can know about social phe- nomena, and, consequently, what type or form of knowledge we should pursue and treat as legitimate knowledge about the social world. It is only when we have considered these ontological and epistemological questions that we can move to a consideration of meth- odological questions. Methodology is concerned with how we obtain knowledge, with the means and methods that can provide us with legitimate knowledge of the political world. Box 2.1 shows how these key issues concerning knowledge are related. We begin this chapter with a discussion of the development of positivist thought and practice, including classical and logical positivism, Karl Popper’s critique of these, and the role of general laws and causation in social-scientif c explanation. We then focus on two non-positivist positions: scientif c realism and interpretivism. T e three positions dif er from one another in many ways and, in particular, with respect to their view of how the assumptions, logic, and methods of science can be used by scholars to study human behav- iour. However, though each position has developed, in part, through a critique of the oth- ers, each of them produces useful forms of knowledge. Taken together, they have enabled us to broaden the range and type of questions that political research can ef ectively address.

BOX 2.1 Ontology Epistemology Methodology

Ontology Epistemology Methodology

What exists? What sort of knowledge What strategies What is the nature of the of it is possible? How can we use to gain social world? can we know about it? that knowledge? FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 27

Positivism

As a prelude to our discussion of positivism, it would be helpful to get a sense of its role in political research by brief y considering behaviouralism and the ‘behavioural revolution’ in the f eld of politics. Behaviouralism is the term used for the application of positivism and empiricism to political research.1 What has been called the ‘behavioural revolution’ was concerned to pro- mote the systematic search for sound and reliable knowledge about politics based on a posi- tivist approach to knowledge. For behaviouralists, political research involves studying and explaining the observable behaviour of individuals or aggregates of individuals (parties, classes, interest groups, governments, social movements). Behaviouralist research focuses on the question of what political actors do and why they do it. Until the mid-1970s, behaviouralist researchers emphasized an inductivist approach to research which, as we shall see, is associated with classical positivism. An inductive approach to social inquiry is one in which ‘knowledge is arrived at through the gathering of facts that provide the basis for laws’ (Bryman 2004: 11). Although behaviouralist research can employ both quantitative and qualitative data, during the 1950s and 1960s behaviouralist researchers tended to focus on questions that could be answered by gathering and studying data condu- cive to exact measurement, as for instance voting data or data from public-opinion polls and social surveys. T is tendency generated the criticism that, by focusing on phenomena that lent themselves more easily to measurement, the f eld had become preoccupied with tech- nique rather than substance, and was failing to address signif cant problems. T ese concerns triggered a ‘post-behavioural revolution’. Despite its name, this ‘revolu- tion’ was not concerned to displace behaviouralism, but to ‘propel political science in new directions’ (Easton 1969: 1051). Some of these new directions moved the f eld towards a further realization of positivist and behaviouralist goals, such as the trend towards ‘positive political theory’ or rational choice theory. Positive political theory assumes that rational self- interest, ‘as opposed to attitudes, which are the subject of study in much behavioral research’, provides the motivational foundation for behaviour; and that individual self-interested rational action combines to produce collective political outcomes (Amadae and Bueno de Mesquita 1999: 270). But while the post-behaviouralist revolution moved behavioural research forward, it also set in motion trends that moved the f eld in non-positivist direc- tions, and encouraged the emergence of an array of theoretical approaches that represented a self-conscious rejection of behavioural and positivist assumptions. Normative theory, which we will consider in Chapters 3 and 6, witnessed a re-birth, and of en self-consciously as a response to the inf uence of behaviouralist research. In addition, there emerged a set of approaches based on non-positivist assumptions and associated with ‘interpretivism’, including constructivism, feminism, post-modernism, and critical theory. T e behavioural revolution set in motion an important process of discussion and debate within political research about the methods and goals of the f eld. It began a discussion on the desirability and possibility of attaining reliable, empirical, causal knowledge about political life. It promoted more methodologically self-conscious research; and, though much behavioural research originally focused on what might be characterized as a narrow range of questions, it also succeeded in broadening the research domain, as behavioural researchers, seeking insights 28 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

from the theories, research methods, and f ndings of other disciplines, opened the way to greater interdisciplinarity in the f eld. Behaviouralism established an emphasis on research based on empirical observation, testing involving systematic evidence, and falsif able and causal explanation. By emphasizing the importance of research that is capable of replication by others, behaviouralism makes researchers more precise about what they want to know, what explanation they are advancing, and how they intend to demonstrate it. We will gain a better understanding of this revolution, and of both its positivist and non- positivist legacy, as we explore the basic tenets and contours of positivist thought. Positivism began as a movement to establish a sound basis for social-scientif c inquiry. T is is a fundamentally important issue in political research. Political researchers want to be able to of er credible answers to important questions, and they are concerned to ensure that the research practices and methods they employ enable them to do this. Positivism of ers a particular approach to resolving these issues. It maintains that it is possible to arrive at factual, reliable, and objective answers to questions about the social world by employing the methods used in the natural sciences. Depending on your point of view, this position may strike you as highly controversial or as plain common sense. A large number of researchers in our f eld react to positivist thought in one or the other of these two ways. Consequently, it is likely that positivism will continue to occupy a central place in our f eld, both in providing a foundation for research and in stimulating the articulation of alternative methodological positions. T e term ‘positivism’ was invented by the French philosopher Auguste Comte (1798–1857) to describe what he saw as the last of three phases in the development of society and its search for truth. It was Comte’s view that society had passed through a theological stage and then a metaphysical stage; and that now it had entered into a f nal ‘positive’ stage in which the search for truth is characterized by the systematic collection of observed facts. T e term ‘sociology’, which refers to the scientif c study of the social world, was also his invention. Both terms expressed the same belief: that the social world could be explained using similar methods to those used to explain natural phenomena. T is view of social science methodology, in common with the other approaches to be discussed in this chapter, commits us to a number of ontological and epistemological claims. T e nature and implications of these claims and their relationship to a positivist methodol- ogy will become clear as we identify and discuss the basic tenets of positivism. We begin discussion of these tenets by f rst considering the classical positivist tradition, and then focusing on the development of positivist thought through the movement of ‘logical posi- tivism’ and Karl Popper’s critique of logical positivist tenets. In discussing these developments, our purpose is not to provide an intellectual history of positivism: the ideas of classical positiv- ism were not superseded by those advanced by logical positivists; nor were those associated with logical positivism supplanted or displaced by the ideas of Karl Popper. In other words, the devel- opment of positivism over time did not always or usually lead to the wholesale rejection of previous ideas, but rather to an expansion of the array of positions associated with it.

Classical positivism T e f rst tenet of positivism—one implied by our previous discussion—is naturalism. Natu- ralism is the idea that there are no fundamental dif erences between the natural and the social sciences. Note that this idea entails an ontological presupposition about the social world: if FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 29 there is no dif erence between the social and natural sciences, it must be because there is no fundamental dif erence between the social and natural worlds. Both claims provide positivism with a basis for building a larger edif ce of thought concerning the nature and goals of social- scientif c inquiry. As we shall see, positivism maintains that, since the social sciences are no dif erent from the natural sciences, they should have the same structure and logical character- istics as the natural sciences. We’ll return to this notion in a moment when we discuss the third tenet of positivism. But f rst let’s consider a second tenet of positivism: empiricism. Empiricism is a philosophical theory of knowledge which claims that what we know of the world is limited to what can be observed. Knowledge is only that which originates in sensory experience: there is no a priori knowledge, no knowledge of reality that is acquired prior to sense experience. So, an empiricist epistemology commits positivism to the view that social reality can only be known through what is observed and that knowledge of the social world is therefore limited to phenomena that can be observed by the senses. Positivists maintain that social science should be empirical, based on evidence that is visible in the world. Its goal should be to gain knowledge of social reality through concepts which apply to or derive from what is observable and measurable. Additional tenets of positivism provide further elaboration of its position concerning the basis of knowledge and the form it takes. Consider a third tenet of positivism: that the goal of social science is to explain and predict social phenomena by means of laws. T e German logician Carl Gustav Hempel (1905–1997) argued that if the discovery of laws is necessary in the physical or natural sciences, then laws must be necessary also in social science. If the social world is like the natural world, then, like the natural world, it also must be regular, systematic, and law-governed. T ere are regularities in, and ultimately laws of, social and political processes; and we can explain social events and phenomena by means of law-like generalizations that have the same status as natural scientif c laws. T e possibility of discovering laws in the social sciences is one of the key issues on which positivism and its critics divide. As we shall see, there is considerable debate concerning whether social laws exist. Some non-positivist approaches insist that there is a dif erence ‘“in kind” between the subject matter of natural and of social science, which precludes the use of laws in the explanation of human behavior and makes it impossible to establish social laws’ (McIntyre 1994: 131). We will be considering this view later in the chapter. We have said that positivism holds that the social world is regular, systematic, and law- governed, like the natural world; that social phenomena can be explained and predicted by means of laws that have the same status as natural scientif c laws; and that the purpose of social science, therefore, is to discover these laws. But how do we go about discovering laws of social life? Classical positivist thought maintains that laws can be discovered through systematic investigation of observable events and happenings, and by means of inductive reasoning. Induction is a means of reasoning that begins with specif c observations and measures. It moves to an identif cation of patterns and regularities and to the formulation of some tentative hypotheses that can be explored; and it ends by developing some general conclusions or theories. An inductive approach to social inquiry is, as we noted earlier, one in which ‘knowledge is arrived at through the gathering of facts that provide the basis for laws’ (Bryman 2004: 11). We will have more to say about induction and other means of rea- soning (i.e. ‘deduction’ and ‘abduction’) further on in our discussion of the development of positivist thought. 30 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

We are still discussing the third tenet of positivism: the view that explanation of social phenomena should proceed by the discovery of laws. But, for positivism, there is another key element in social science explanation: explanation must not only proceed with reference to law-like generalizations, it must also establish a cause–ef ect relationship between events in the world. Positivism sees the social world as comprising phenomena that are causally related to each other; consequently, to explain a social outcome we are required to show the factors or conditions that combined to bring it about or caused it to be more likely to occur in the circumstances. Virtually all social research is concerned to discover causes. But there are dif erent con- ceptions of causation. T e positivist conception of causation is an empiricist conception which was introduced by the Scottish philosopher, economist, and historian, David Hume (1711–1776). Most of us probably carry in our minds an idea of causation as a relation between two events, the cause and the ef ect, which expresses some type of ‘necessary con- nection’ between them. But Hume pointed out that we cannot directly perceive causal rela- tionships. He points out that ‘when we look about us towards external objects, and consider the operation of causes, we cannot in any instance discover a power, necessary connexion, or quality which binds the ef ect to the cause and renders one an infallible consequence of the other’ (1966: 51). Instead, we observe only the ‘constant conjunction’ of events; we observe only that one thing follows the other. Our experience of observing this ‘constant conjunction’ between events conveys to our minds a necessary relation between these events. So the causal conclusions we reach are based, not on ‘knowledge of causal mechanisms and the generative properties of things’, but only ‘on the observation of how a certain event is followed again and again by a certain other event’ (Ekström 1992: 108). According to this conception, then, causation is constituted by facts about empirical regularities among observable variables. T ere is no underlying power or necessity deriving from the laws of nature. All we can do is observe that one thing follows another with regular- ity; and, because of this observation, we develop a psychological expectation that Y will occur whenever X does. But we cannot know that X is the cause of Y by observing that X is constantly followed by Y. Consequently, in establishing the basis of causal explanations, positivists are concerned with observing empirical regularities rather than in discovering causal mechanisms. T is is a subjective conception of causation: causation as a perceived regular association among variables. An objective conception of causality, one involving causal necessity or causal mechanisms is, according to positivism, metaphysical. T is objec- tive conception of causation features prominently in the critique of classical positivism artic- ulated by logical positivism, a subject to which we will turn next. But before moving on, we need to brief y note a fourth tenet of positivism: that it is possible to make a distinction between facts and values. Positivism maintains that we can gain knowledge of the social world through applica- tion of the scientif c methods used in the natural sciences. According to this fourth tenet of positivism, the pursuit of knowledge through these methods can be value-free or objective, because statements of fact (conf rmed by the senses) can be distinguished from normative statements. Science is concerned with the discovery of facts, whereas values relate to ethics or policy studies. T e argument that it is possible to distinguish between facts and values, and to treat ‘facts’ as independent of the observer and of his or her val- ues, represents a key dif erence between positivists and adherents of alternative approaches. However, we will leave discussion of this issue for the time being, since we FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 31

Theory

Tentative hypothesis

Pattern

Observation

Figure 2.1 Induction Source: Trochim 2006. will be exploring it in some detail in Chapter 3. Instead, we turn to a consideration of the further development of positivist thought as a result of logical positivism and Karl Pop- per’s critique of it.

Empiricism and logic as the basis of truth claims T e ideas of classical positivism were developed by a movement that adopted the name ‘logical positivism’, as well as by the highly inf uential critique of Karl Popper. Logical positivism began in the early twentieth century as a movement within philos- ophy. Inspired by developments in twentieth-century logic and mathematics, its goal was to introduce logical reasoning and mathematics as sources of knowledge in addition to empir- icism. It advanced the idea that social inquiry should combine induction (based on empiri- cism) and deduction (in the form of logic) as methods of reasoning. We have previously discussed induction as a means of discovering laws. Induction, you will recall, is a process of reasoning from particular facts to a general conclusion. As Figure 2.1 shows, in induction we begin with particular observations or cases and then develop generalizations about them. Deduction works the other way around. As Figure 2.2 shows, deduction moves from broader generalizations and theories to specif c observations. We start, not with an observation, but either with a theory that has already been conf rmed or with a logical argument, and then we draw out the meaning or implications this has for explaining some particular case or phenomena. To digress from our discussion of logical positivism for a moment, it should be noted that, in practice, researchers do not use solely one method or the other. Scientif c inquiry typically involves a process of continuous interaction between theory and observation, in which the researcher moves from observation to theory (induction) and from theory back to observa-

BOX 2.2 Induction, Deduction, Retroduction

Induction observation ® theory

Deduction theory ® observation

Retroduction observation «␣theory 32 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

Theory

Hypothesis

Observation

Confirmation

Figure 2.2 Deduction Source: Trochim 2006.

tion (deduction). Box 2.2 illustrates how this process contrasts with and combines induction and deduction. T e compiling of evidence (induction) leads the researcher to theory (deduc- tion); and once a hypothesis is formed, the researcher brings it ‘backward’ for readjustment or redef nition. T e term ‘retroduction’ describes this interaction of induction and deduc- tion in an evolving, dynamic process of discovery and hypothesis formation. We have said that logical positivism introduced the idea that social inquiry should combine both induction and deduction. It also established ‘verif cation’ (of statements or propositions) as the goal of social science research. Verif cation was held to be the main criterion for establishing truth claims and a means of def ning a clear line of division between science and metaphysics. Both of these tenets of logical positivism became the target of a critique by Karl Popper (1902–94), a philosopher of science who also wrote extensively on social and political philosophy. Popper’s critique had a decisive impact on social-scientif c thought. In fact, its inf uence was so great that logical positivism’s most important contribution to social science, it might be argued, is the role it played in having served as the focus of this critique. T is does not diminish its con- tribution: in the quest to establish a sound basis for scientif c inquiry, logical positivism raised important questions about the concepts and practices of science which continue to have rele- vance for social-scientif c inquiry today. Moreover, while Popper was a critic of logical positiv- ism, there are also many af nities between his views and those held by logical positivists. Logical positivists had argued that both inductive and deductive methods of reasoning should be used to acquire knowledge of social phenomena. But Popper argued that induc- tion must be rejected entirely. Moreover, the argument he advanced for rejecting induction also provided grounds for rejecting verif ability as a basis for establishing truth claims. Popper elaborates these arguments in his book, Logik der Forschung, published in 1934, and later published in English under the title T e Logic of Scientif c Discovery (1959). T e book addresses two issues. T e f rst is what David Hume calls ‘the problem of induction’. T e problem is whether experience can provide the basis for gaining general theoretical knowl- edge. Since experience is particular, while knowledge is general or even universal, how do we achieve universal knowledge on the basis of particular experience? How can we reach gen- eral statements of scientif c law on the basis of experiences that are necessarily limited and particular? Popper argues that no matter how many experiences we have of observing some- thing, this does not permit the deduction of a general statement of scientif c knowledge. T e reasoning that leads him to this conclusion begins with David Hume’s argument about the limits of inductive reasoning. Hume argued that since we cannot observe the uni- verse at all times and in all places, but are only able to observe particulars, we are not justif ed in deducing general laws based on inductive evidence. Popper’s now famous story of the FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 33 black swan illustrates what happens when we attempt to formulate laws based on observa- tion. T e story is that, once upon a time, Europeans thought that all swans were white because, having found nothing but white swans for thousands of years, Europeans concluded on the basis of their experience that all swans were white. But one day Europeans went to New Zealand (as Popper had), and there they found black swans. What this story tells us is that no matter how many observations conf rm a theory, it only takes one counter-observation to falsify it: only one black swan is needed to repudiate the theory that all swans are white. And since it only takes a single unforeseen or seemingly improbable event to invalidate a gener- alization based on empirical observation, then empirical observation alone cannot generate ‘laws’. Popper therefore concludes that, rather than endeavouring to discover laws through induction, what scientists should be doing is testing theory deductively. Popper’s critique of induction leads him to reject another tenet of logical positivism: the notion that scientists should seek to verify hypotheses. Popper argues that, since a single exception to the rule destroys inductively generated theory, then conclusive verif cation of a hypothesis is not possible. So Popper proposes that we reverse the logical positivist assump- tion about verif ability: he argues that rather than continually attempting to prove a theory, scientists should attempt to disprove it. Since we cannot verify a hypothesis , our aim should be to falsify it. We should formulate propositions in such a way as to enable them to be refuted. By doing this, it will be possible for us to show a theory to be wrong; and we can then introduce a new theory which better explains the phenomena. T is, Popper argues, is how we achieve progress in science. T e notion of falsif ability is the basis of Popper’s argument concerning the second issue he addresses in T e Logic of Scientif c Discovery: the problem of demarcation. T is refers to the problem of determining how to dif erentiate science from non-science. It is a key problem in the philosophy of science and the subject of ongoing debate. For Popper, it is falsif ability —and not verif ability, as logical positivists argued—that def nes the boundary between science and pseudo-science or metaphysics. Anything non-falsif able is outside science. Consider religions and ideologies in this regard. Religions and ideologies are logically consistent statements which provide a guide for understanding the world. But they cannot be proved false: potentially disconf rming or anomalous facts do not prove them false, but are incorporated within them. A scientif c theory, however, must state what evidence would disconf rm it or prove it to be false. If you cannot think of anything that might disconf rm a theory, then it is not a theory at all but a set of self-verifying statements—an ideology. To sum up: in rejecting induction, Popper was rejecting the idea that observation pro- vides the basis for the formulation of scientif c theories. T eories cannot be derived from observation (induction), because at any time a single observation can disconf rm the theory. Popper concludes that social inquiry must proceed deductively, through a process in which observations are not the basis of theories, but are derived from and used to ‘test’, or falsify, them. According to Popper’s notion of falsif ability, we endeavour to falsify hypotheses. We reject those which are falsif ed and we continue to test those that are not until they become so thoroughly tested that we can consider them to be ‘conf rmed’, though it remains possible that some day someone may falsify or signif cantly modify them. Two objections have been made to this formulation. T e f rst objection is to the distinc- tion which Popper seems to make between facts and theories. Popper seems to assume that the observations or facts that we pursue as a means of testing theories can be established 34 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

independently of the theory that they are meant to test. We consider the debate concerning this issue in some detail in Chapter 3. A second objection is that Popper’s notion of falsif a- bilty is at odds with how scientists actually go about developing and testing theories. Do researchers seek to disprove or falsify their own theories? Do they discard their theories when they are confronted with disconf rming evidence? We will consider T omas Kuhn’s and Imre Lakatos’ answers to these questions, and the further evolution of Popper’s falsif ca- tionist position that developed as a response to them, in Chapter 3. Here, however, we have still to consider a further question: how do we use deductive reason- ing to discover laws of social life as a basis for explanation? Previously we have discussed the classical positivist approach to explanation: inductive reasoning based on systematic investiga- tion of observable events and happenings. As we have seen, logical positivists maintain that both induction, based on empiricism, and deduction in the form of logic could be used to discover laws. Popper argues that we can establish laws of social life as a basis for explanation only through deduction. But, what is the process through which deduction operates as a means of explaining social phenomena? For the answer to this question, we turn, again, to Carl Gustav Hempel. Hempel maintains that explanation in the social and natural sciences is the same, not only because both involve the search for and discovery of law-like generalizations, but because the social and natural worlds are subject to laws in the same way (see Hempel 1994). T e logic and function of laws, what Hempel calls ‘general laws’, are the same. In both the natural and social sciences, individual events can be subsumed within hypotheses about general laws of nature: what this means is that to explain some fact is to cite some law or laws and other conditions from which the fact can be deduced. Hempel formalizes this def nition of explanation in his deductive-nomological model. A deductive-nomological explanation is deductive because the phenomenon to be explained (explanandum) is logically deducible from that which does the explaining (the explanans); and it is nomological because the explanans includes at least one law (‘nomos’ is the Greek word for law). According to this model, then, something is explained when it is shown to be a member of a more general class of things, when it is deduced from a general law or set of laws. A full explanation of an event requires that we give an account of how a phe- nomenon follows deductively from a well-conf rmed general law. For instance, ‘To explain fully why an actor votes (a “fact”) we must do more than just isolate the particular cause of this particular event (for example, the intensity of the voter’s concern about unemployment). We must subsume this act of participation under a “law” that explains why, under certain condi- tions, the voter had to vote: “persons with intense preferences for candidates or issues”, every- thing else being equal, will become “active in politics”’ (Milbrath 1965: 53; quoted in Schwartz 1984: 1123). Given the general law, the particular case in question was to be expected. But, how do we conf rm a regularity or generalization that what we take to be a ‘law’ is, in fact a law? A regularity might be true, accurate, or supported by evidence; but it might be only ‘accidentally true’: true only as a result of circumstance or coincidence. Explaining how to distinguish law-like generalizations from those that are ‘accidental’ is one of the central problems in the philosophy of science. However, in general, we can say that a law expresses a necessary connection between properties, while an accidental generalization does not. If a necessary connection exists between its properties, then we should be able to test a law by its ability to predict events. If we predict something on the basis of a law and f nd that the prediction was true, then the law can be said to be conf rmed. FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 35

T is is what Carl Hempel proposes that we do in his hypothetico-deductive model of conf rmation. We conf rm that the generalization is a law (rather than an accidental gener- alization) by treating it as a hypothesis and then we test the hypothesis by deducing from the hypothesis a suf cient number of explicit predictions of further phenomena that should be observable as a consequence of the hypothesis. Observations that run contrary to those predicted are taken as a conclusive falsif cation of the hypothesis; observations which are in agreement with those predicted are taken as corroborating the hypothesis. It is then suppos- edly possible to compare the explanatory value of competing hypotheses by looking to see how well they are sustained by their predictions. An example of what is regarded as a law or, at least, a law-like generalization in our f eld is Duverger’s Law. T e sociologist, Maurice Duverger, proposed that the plurality rule for selecting the winner of elections favours the two-party system. Duverger of ers two theoretical explanations for why a plurality rule election system tends to favour a two-party system. T e f rst is the ‘mechanical ef ect’ of under-representing losing parties; and the sec ond is a ‘psychological factor’: voters don’t want to waste their votes on losers (Riker 1982: 761). William Riker explains: ‘when the def nition of winning forces candi- dates to maximize votes in order to win (as in plurality systems), they have strong motives to create a two-party system; but when the def nition of winning does not require them to maximize votes (as in runof and proportional systems), then this motive for two par- ties is absent’ (Riker 1982: 755).2 To sum up: the deductive-nomological model holds that an observed phenomenon is explained if it can be deduced from a law-like generalization. T e hypothetico-deductive model conf rms that a generalization is a law by treating the generalization as a hypothe- sis, and testing it by its deductive consequences. To explain some fact is to cite a law or laws plus other relevant conditions from which the explanandum may be deduced (the deductive-nomological model of explanation). To conf rm a hypothesis is to deduce some observed phenomenon from the hypothesis plus other relevant known conditions (the hypothetico-deductive model of conf rmation). We have traced the development of positivist thought through a consideration of the basic tenets of classical and logical positivism and the arguments advanced by Karl Popper. We turn now to approaches that emerged as a challenge to positivist thought and research.

Challenges to positivist approaches within the social sciences

T ere are a number of approaches to social inquiry that challenge the positivist position and that articulate a fundamentally dif erent basis for inquiry. Here, we focus on two alternative positions—those represented by scientif c realism and interpretivism.

Scientifi c realism Scientif c realism is concerned to elaborate a non-positivist version of science, one that its adherents claim is more scientif c than positivism. T eir message, as Ruth Lane puts it (Lane 1996: 373), is that ‘we don’t have to be positivists to be scientif c!’ 36 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

Scientif c realism appears to be similar to positivism in some ways because it accepts a number of assumptions of positivism that other non-positivist approaches reject. For instance, scientif c realism assumes, like positivism, that the social and natural worlds are essentially similar, and that the social and natural sciences are therefore fundamentally sim- ilar, as well. T ese assumptions are based on another shared assumption: realism. Realism holds that the world exists independently of our knowledge of it, that reality has an inde- pendent existence (it exists independently of human beings and their perceptions), and that it impacts directly upon the human mind without any ref ection on the part of the human knower. We can therefore gain objective knowledge of the world because our knowledge of it is directly determined by an objective reality within the world. So, positivism and scientif c realism share some key assumptions. However, there is a key dif erence between the two approaches—and it is an important one! Let’s recap for a moment before stating this dif erence. Both approaches maintain that the subject matter of scientif c research and scientif c theory exists independently of our knowledge of it, that we can there- fore gain objective knowledge of it, and can treat ‘facts’ as independent of the observer and of his or her values. Now, where the two approaches dif er is that, while positivists maintain that reality consists of only that which we can directly observe, for scientif c realists, reality consists of observable elements as well as observable ones. You will recall that positivists assume that statements not based on observable data are metaphysical. Scientif c realists break decisively with this assumption. T ey assume that there are knowable, mind-independent facts, objects, or properties that cannot be directly observed but which are, nonetheless, real. T ey argue that unobservable elements of social life, such as structural relations between social phenomena, are crucial to an understanding and explanation of what goes on in the world. T ey point out that the central role of unob- servable elements in shaping outcomes is one of the features that makes the social world similar to the natural world; that this ontological conception of the social world is not met- aphysical, but more scientif c, and more closely aligned with the tenets of the natural sci- ences, than the positivist conception. Consequently, for scientif c realists, the goal of scientif c research is to describe and explain both observable and unobservable aspects of the world. But how do we know these unobservable elements exist? According to scientif c realism, we know they exist because we can observe their consequences: unobservable elements of social life can be treated as ‘real’ if they produce observable ef ects. To posit the existence of unobservable entities to explain observable outcomes is consistent with well-established scientif c prac- tice. We treat gravity and subatomic particles as real because, even though we cannot see them, we can see their ef ects. Similarly, there are many elements in social and political life that are not directly observable—social structures, capitalism, society—but they have observable ef ects; and because their ef ects are observable, researchers in our f eld treat them as real. Given these assumptions, it follows that, for scientif c realists, scientif c knowledge does not take the form solely of empirical regularities, and scientif c research cannot be solely concerned with the goal of formulating law-like generalizations based on observations. To state this dif erently, if scientif c realists reject the notion that only entities of which we have direct sensory experience are ‘real’, then they cannot depend on an epistemology that places emphasis on direct observation for pursuing knowledge of the social world. FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 37

It follows that scientif c realists also cannot accept the empiricist (Humean) conception of causality that positivists employ. Recall that positivists treat causation as constituted by facts about empirical regularities among observable variables, and seek to establish causal rela- tionships by observing these regularities rather than by discovering causal mechanisms. T ey treat the notion that causal mechanisms produce outcomes in social life as metaphysi- cal, since we are unable to have knowledge of causal mechanisms through direct observation only. But scientif c realists assume that unobservable elements are part of reality and are knowable, and so they treat causal mechanisms and causal powers as ‘real’, as a legitimate object of scientif c investigation, and as fundamental to explanations of social outcomes. For scientif c realists, explaining social outcomes entails providing an account of the causal mechanism that brought about a given outcome; and with developing empirically justif ed theories and hypotheses about causal mechanisms. A causal mechanism can be def ned as ‘a series of events governed by lawlike regularities that lead from the explanans to the explanandum’ (Little 1991: 15); or ‘the pathway or proc- ess by which an ef ect is produced or a purpose is accomplished’ (Gerring 2007: 178). Charles Tilly identif es three sorts of mechanism. Environmental mechanisms are ‘externally gener- ated inf uences on conditions af ecting social life’; cognitive mechanisms ‘operate through alterations of individual and collective perception’; and relational mechanisms ‘alter connec- tions among people, groups, and interpersonal networks’ (2001: 24). Michael Ross def nes an environmental mechanism—the nature of a government’s resource base—to explain the apparent link between oil exports and authoritarian rule. He calls this mechanism a ‘rentier ef ect’: ‘when governments derive suf cient revenues from the sale of oil, they are likely to tax their populations less heavily or not at all, and the public in turn will be less likely to demand accountability from—and representation in—their government’ (2001: 332). Explanations of a variety of political outcomes might link them to the ef ect of increases or decreases in the government’s resource base (see e.g. Chapter 6). Cognitive mechanisms have been identif ed to explain ethnic conf ict as, for instance, changing conceptions of racial, ethnic, gender, religious, or class dif erences (e.g. Hof mann 2006). Relational mechan isms, such as governmental absorption and destruction of previously autonomous patron–client networks, or bureaucratic containment of previously autonomous military forces, have been held to ef ect ‘the likelihood of civil war, the level of domestic violence, and even the prospect that a given state will engage in international war’ (Tilly 2001: 38). Robert Gilpin (1981) has argued that there is a tendency for a disjuncture to arise between the costs and benef ts of hegemony, and that, when it does, the hegemonic state begins to decline. Gilpin identif es a number of mechanisms that cause this disjuncture. One is the ‘law of the increasing costs of war’: military techniques tend to rise in cost, and the increasing cost of war produces a f scal crisis within the hegemonic state. Another is the ‘law of expanding state expenditures’: private and public consumption grows faster than the GNP as a society becomes more af uent (the rich indulge increasingly in lavish consumption; the poor begin to clamour for welfare). T ose who emphasize the importance of mechanisms in causation have dif erent views about the nature or types of social mechanisms that operate to produce social outcomes. T ese are linked to dif erent assumptions about what we should treat as the basic unit of analysis in social inquiry. So, for instance, those who treat individuals as the basic unit of social analysis favour agent-based models, or individual-level mechanisms to explain 38 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

o u t c o m e s . T is is characteristic of rational choice approaches, which assume that the instrumental rationality of individuals is the causal mechanism that produces social out- comes. Structural models, on the other hand, attempt to demonstrate that there are struc- tural or institutional mechanisms that cause social outcomes. In Chapter 4 we will be exploring the dif erences between the individualist and collectivist (or holist) ontologies on which these dif erent models are based. We will also discuss how what Peter Hedström and Richard Swedberg (1998) call ‘social mechanisms’ produce outcomes through macro– micro interactions and linkages. We have been discussing the assumptions of scientif c realism with regard to basic ques- tions concerning the nature of the social world, forms of knowledge, and the goals of social science. We have said that, for scientif c realists, the goal of scientif c research is to describe and explain both observable and unobservable aspects of the world. It still remains to say how scientif c realists establish that claims regarding unobservable social phenomena are true. Scientif c realists argue that knowledge of unobservable elements of social life can be obtained through the development of theoretical constructs. But how can we know whether our theories about unobservable elements of social life are true? T e answer is that we can accept as true the theory or hypothesis which, from among those that have been advanced to explain a phenomenon, of ers the best explanation. T e ‘best’ explanation or hypothesis is the one that, based on various ‘rules of method’, explains a fact better than other available hypotheses. For instance, it may be ‘best’ because it has been tested and not refuted, while the others have not; because it accounts for more, or better meets the standard of explanation we accept for other phenomena. ‘If a theory is certif ed by such rules of method, a scientist is rationally justif ed in accepting the theory’ (Sankey 2008: 28). Scientif c realism maintains that we can accept that a theory is true if there is rational justif cation for accepting it to be true; and it is rational to accept as true the best available explanation of any fact. T is position is summed up in the phrase ‘Inference to the Best Explanation’. Scientif c realists maintain that inference from some data to the ‘best explanation’ justif es our accept- ance of a hypothesis as true. By inference we mean the reasoning involved in the process of drawing conclusions based on facts or logical premises; and, according to scientif c realists, the kind of inference that justif es our accepting a hypothesis as true emerges from a type of reasoning called ‘abduction’. Contemporary philosophers use ‘inference to the best explana- tion’ and ‘abduction’ interchangeably. Abductive reasoning is prior to and distinct from induction and deduction. Abduction starts with a hunch that a set of seemingly unrelated facts are connected in some way. T e hunch or hypothesis can then be af rmed by induction or deduction. Abduction may be used to explain singular events rather than, as in inductive reasoning, to form generaliza- tions on the basis of a large number of token instances; and, unlike induction, it can employ both observables and unobservables to explain events. Abductive reasoning requires that we choose from among competing explanations the best available explanation: the one that best explains a particular event or phenomenon given all the available evidence. T e abduction is provisional: new evidence may later undermine it. But it is reasonable for us to believe it if it is the best explanation we have. We may later f nd out that the explanation is wrong and then it will no longer be reasonable for us to believe it; but it remains the case that it was not wrong or unreasonable for us to have believed it prior to our f nding out that it was wrong. When a FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 39 detective infers that a murder was committed by a suspect, he does so because this hypoth- esis provides the best explanation for the murder; and it is the ‘best’ explanation because it f ts better with the forensic evidence, and/or provides a better account of motive and oppor- tunity. Later information may reveal this explanation to be false; but this does not make it unreasonable for the detective to have made the original inference. We now have introduced some of the key terms of reference in a continuing debate about the scientif c status of unobservable elements of social life. Because political researchers continually refer to unobservables such as ‘society’ and ‘structures of power’ to explain polit- ical events and processes, we will be returning to this debate in later chapters. But, before moving on from discussion of scientif c realism to a consideration of other non-positivist approaches, it is worth noting a related position that has emerged within the f eld of politics: critical realism. We have said that scientif c realism, like positivism, assumes that there exists a reality separate from our description of it. Critical realism represents a move away from this posi- tion. As we have seen, scientif c realism is committed to identifying the unobservable struc- tures that work to generate observable outcomes. T is, as Roy Bhaskar points out, is critical in that it opens up the possibility or our being able to change our world (1998: 2). But critical realism also rejects the view, accepted by scientif c realists and associated with what adher- ents of critical realism call ‘naïve realism’, that the external world is as it is perceived. Instead, it holds that perception is a function of the human mind, and that we can therefore only acquire knowledge of the external world by critically ref ecting on perception. While some political researchers see the terms ‘scientif c realism’ and ‘critical realism’ as synonymous (see e.g. Brown 2007: 409), this would seem to be a position that moves us further in the direction of the interpretivist approaches that we will be discussing next. Some examples of how a critical realist position informs political research are in Chapter 13, where we discuss critical discourse analysis, a type of textual analysis inspired by, and to a large degree consist- ent with, a critical realist philosophy of science. We have been discussing scientif c realism, an approach to social inquiry that provides an alternative to positivism. As we have seen, its main dif erence with positivism is that it does not place emphasis on direct observation in pursuing knowledge of the world; rather, it assumes that reality consists of both observable and unobservable elements. We have also seen that there are some respects in which scientif c realism and positivism are more similar than dissimilar. For instance, both agree that the world exists independently of our knowledge of it. T is assumption has important implications for what we treat as legitimate knowledge and how we conduct research. We turn now to a set of approaches that break decisively with this assumption, and promote ontological and epistemological positions that stand in diametric opposition to those of positivism.

Interpretivism Interpretivism maintains that the social world is fundamentally dif erent from the world of natural phenomena, and so we cannot understand it by employing the methods used to explain the natural world. It argues that it is impossible for us to gain knowledge of the social world by searching for objective regularities of behaviour that can be summed up in social- scientif c laws analogous to the laws of physics, because the social world does not exist 40 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

independently of our interpretation of it. T e social world is what we experience it to be: it is subjectively created. T e task of social science, then, is fundamentally dif erent from that of natural science, because the objects of the social sciences are dif erent from those found in the natural world. Social phenomena are socially or discursively constructed; so we cannot explain and predict social phenomena by means of laws. T e primary goal of social science must be to achieve an understanding of human behaviour through an interpretation of the meanings, beliefs, and ideas that give people reasons for acting. Let’s consider the implications of this view for how we conduct political research. Recall our earlier discussion about behaviouralism. Behaviouralist research is positivist and empiricist. Its concern is with the question of what political actors do and why they do it. It seeks to discover the causes of behavioural outcomes by understanding the motivations of political actors. It uses public-opinion polls and social surveys to learn about the beliefs, attitudes, and values that motivate behaviour; or rational choice theory to explain how indi- vidual self-interested rational action motivates behaviour. However if, as interpretivists contend, people act on the basis of the meanings they attach to their own and to others’ actions, then understanding human behaviour requires an understanding of these mean- ings. Consequently, social science must be concerned, not with discovering causes of social outcomes, but with piecing together an interpretation of the meanings of a social outcome or production. Intepretivists seek to understand human behaviour through interpretation and inter- pretive theory. T ese are forms of social science ‘that emphasize understanding the meaning that social behaviour has for actors’ (Gibbons 2006: 563). T ese forms include a multiplicity of approaches, most notably hermeneutics, cultural anthropology, verstehen social theory, critical theory, and post-structuralism. In what follows, we will focus on hermeneutics as a means of highlighting the di f erences between interpretivist and posi- tivist approaches. We will then consider how approaches based on interpretivist and positivist assumptions analyse a specif c area of political inquiry. ‘Hermeneutics’ originally referred to a method used to interpret theological and legal texts. In fact, ‘the literal English translation of the German word “hermeneutics” is interpre- tation’ (Gibbons 2006: 563). Today, ‘hermeneutics’ refers to theories and methods that are used in the interpretation of texts of all kinds. T ese texts include not just written docu- ments, but any object or practice that can be treated as a text and which can, therefore, be the subject of interpretation. But can human beings and their actions be treated as a text and the subject of hermeneutical interpretation? Interpretivists argue that they can. Hermeneutics can be used to study behavioural outcomes because, if behaviour is a product of the mean- ings and intentions employed by social actors, then the social scientist endeavouring to understand that behaviour is involved in an interpretive exercise not unlike that engaged in by the translator of a text. T e philosopher Charles Taylor elaborates this argument in an inf uential essay entitled ‘Interpretation and the Sciences of Man’ (1994). Taylor explains that any f eld of study can be the object of hermeneutics if it meets two requirements. First, it must contain an object or a f eld of objects that is a text, or a ‘text-analogue’. Second, this text must be ‘confused, incomplete, cloudy’ or ‘seemingly contradictory’; that is, it must be in some way ‘unclear’. When these criteria are met, hermeneutical interpretation can be used ‘to bring to light an underlying coherence or sense’ with respect to the objects def ned by the f eld of study and, FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 41 in this way, enable us to understand them (Taylor 1994: 181). Does the study of politics meet these criteria? Yes. We can treat the behaviour we are concerned to understand—the actions of a government, or the behaviour of members of a group towards one another—as ‘texts’; and, since the motives and goals of this behaviour are of en unclear or at odds with the pro- nouncements of the political actors involved, we can use interpretative methods in order to make sense of this behaviour. Interpretivists argue that it is necessary not only to employ a hermeneutical approach, but also to reject empiricist scientif c methods for studying human behaviour. Empiricist methods treat social reality as consisting only of what Charles Taylor calls ‘brute data’. By ‘brute data’, Taylor means ‘data whose validity cannot be questioned by of ering another interpretation or reading, data whose credibility cannot be founded or undermined by fur- ther reasoning’ (Taylor 1994: 184). T ese data capture political behaviour involving actions that have an identif able physical end state. When actors raise their hands at a meeting at the appropriate time we can give this action a ‘brute data’ description and say that the actors are ‘voting for the motion’. However, the action may have meanings for the actors that are not captured by the ‘brute data description’ of it. It may be the case that when an actor votes for a motion, she is also expressing loyalty to her party or defending the value of free speech (Taylor 1994: 190). But a ‘behavioural’ (or positive, or empiricist) political science deals only with brute data and their logical consequences, and avoids addressing the meaning of political behaviour. As Taylor points out, brute data captures more than behaviour that has an identif able end state: it also captures the subjective reality of individuals’ beliefs, attitudes, and values ‘as attested by their responses to certain forms of words, or in some cases, their overt non- verbal behaviour’ (1994: 198–9). But while these data capture subjective meanings, there are non-subjective (intersubjective and common) meanings constitutive of social reality that they cannot capture such as, for instance, inter-subjective meanings and common meanings. Inter-subjective meanings are meanings that do not exist only in the minds of agents but are rooted in and constitutive of social relations and practices such as paying taxes and voting. Common meanings involve recognition or consciousness of shared beliefs, aspirations, goals, values, and a common reference point for public life of a society. Common meanings are the basis of community, in that they are expressed by collective aspirations, actions, and feelings (1994: 197). Taylor argues that we need to study these non-subjective (inter subjective and common) meanings in order to comprehend politi- cal issues such as social cohesion, stability, disorder, and legitimacy. Moreover, they are crucial for ‘a science of comparative politics’: without them, we ‘interpret all other socie- ties in the categories of our own’ (1994: 200), rendering invisible important dif erences among societies and making comparison impossible. To stay with this point for a moment longer, analyses based on positivist epistemological assumptions, like those of ered by rational choice theory, depend on an abstract description of human agency, one that pays little attention to dif erences across social, cultural, and his- torical settings. Rational choice theory seeks to explain social phenomena as the outcome of purposive rationality, and of material and structural factors exercising causal inf uence on individuals. Its concern is to show how a given outcome is the result of purposive choices by individuals within a given set of material and structural circumstances. As Daniel Little puts it: ‘Agents like these in structures like those, produce outcomes like these’ (Little 2009). But 42 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

interpretive approaches see individuals as unique, and human activities, actions, and social formations as unique historical expressions of human meaning and intention. Consequently, they are concerned, not with abstract descriptions of human agents, but with detailed interpretive work on specif c cultures. T ese dif erences between positivist and interpretive approaches can be illustrated by reference to a key area of research in our f eld: political participation. Positivist studies typi- cally equate political participation with voting. However, interpretivists would argue that a particular voter may ‘not understand voting as participation at all, in contrast, say, to party activism. (It is neither practically nor logically impossible that an actor could say, “No, I do not participate in politics, but I do vote”)’ (Schwartz 1984: 1118). But positivists tend to treat participatory acts as ‘brute facts’, as having an ‘objective’ ontological status: as existing ‘in some sense “in the world” separate from the theoretical stance of the observer or of the par- ticipant’ (Schwartz 1984: 1119). Joel Schwartz points out that there is no objective point of view from which to describe and understand participation, that participation ‘is a “subjective” phenomenon much like “justice” and “virtue”’ (Schwartz 1984: 1119). Consequently, ‘any successful attempt to describe and explain participatory acts must begin, not by imposing the observer’s theoreti- cal framework onto the data, but rather with a sensitivity to the frameworks of the partici- pants themselves’ (Schwartz 1984: 1120). While positivist studies typically equate political participation with voter turnout, participation involves a variety of political acts. By impos- ing their own concept of ‘participation’, researchers are prevented ‘from seeing the plural forms that participation in fact takes in the world. Whether acts (of an American voter or demonstrator, a French revolutionary, a Muslim revolutionary, a Solidarity member, and so on) count as acts of participation depends on those actors’ subjective understanding of what they are doing’ (Schwartz 1984: 1117). In sum, interpretivism maintains that all social action is framed by a meaningful social world. To understand, explain, or predict patterns of human behaviour, we must f rst under- stand the meanings concrete agents attribute to their environment (social and natural); the values and goals they possess; the choices they perceive; and the way they interpret other individuals’ social action. Social science is, therefore, fundamentally dif erent from natural science, and it is the importance of meaning that distinguishes social science from natural science. Humans act because of what things mean, so an understanding of human behaviour requires that we develop an understanding of meanings and intentions employed by social actors. Many researchers have pointed to the tendency to cast positivism and interpretivism approaches as ‘two grand traditions in social science epistemology’ and to exaggerate the dif erences between them (Pollins 2007: 93). Positivism and interpretivism have dif erent ontological and epistemological commitments, but they don’t necessarily represent oppos- ing or competing traditions. Researchers working in both traditions generally follow the same methodological conventions, and so can understand what those working within the other tradition are doing. Researchers depend upon dif erent assumptions, and may be interested in and test dif erent questions. But while they may ‘be tackling dif erent kinds of questions’, ‘practical investigation of these questions of en leads them to similar methodo- logical tasks’ (Finnemore and Sikkink 2001: 395). Ted Hopf argues that there is, in fact, ‘a FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 43 certain methodological unity’ between the two traditions. T e methodological conven- tions they share include the following:

a. clear dif erentiation of premises from conclusions; b. acknowledgement that sampling strategies matter; c. recognition that some standards of validation must be established for the sources of evidence used; d. dif erentiation of causes from correlations; e. recognition that the spectre of spuriousness haunts all correlations; f. acceptance of deductive logic; g. belief in the need for the contestability of f ndings (2007: 56).

T ese shared methodological conventions may, in fact, be seen as ref ecting a common research practice founded in the hypothetico-deductive method. As Brian Pollins puts it: some researchers ‘assess whether the information they have gathered f ts with the interpreta- tion they have posited’, and others ‘consider the f t of competing interpretations with the facts they have gathered’, but ‘in either case they are practicing the hypothetico-deductive method’ (Pollins 2007: 100). In fact, according to Dagf nn Føllesdal, the hermeneutic method that we discussed in our consideration of interpretivism, above, ‘is actually the hypothetico-deductive method’ applied to materials that are ‘meaningful’, i.e. material that expresses an actor’s beliefs and values' (1994: 233). Interpretation-hypotheses can be judged by deducing consequences from them and confronting them with data, such as, for instance, a given text and related works bearing on it. So interpretivists and positivists do not necessarily use dif erent approaches to gathering relevant evidence. However, they do dif er in their conception of what constitutes explana- tion (recall our discussion, above, about political participation). T ey also dif er in their understanding of evidence. The differences between positivist and interpretivist conceptions of both explana- tion and evidence might be described by defining a distinction between ‘external’ and ‘internal’ explanation and evidence. External explanations are associated with positiv- ist research: they tend to work via correlations or deductions on the basis of ascribed reasons, and so need not concern themselves with actors’ understandings of the world. Interpretive explanations, on the other hand, are ‘internal’ in the sense of their being concerned with the world of meanings inhabited by the actor (Hampsher-Monk and Hindmoor 2009: 48). The distinction can be applied to different types of evidence, as well: ‘external evidence’ consists of empirical evidence about the behaviour, and the effects of the behaviour, of particular actors; while ‘internal’ or interpretive evidence consists of evidence about the beliefs of actors whose actions comprise the phenomena to be explained. To highlight these distinctions, let’s compare the analysis of ered by a specif c positivist approach (rational choice theory) and a specif c interpretivist approach (constructivism) with respect to a particular area of political inquiry: the eruption of ethnic conf ict within the former Yugoslavia. 44 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

The analysis of ethnic confl ict: a positivist (rational choice) and interpretivist (constructivist) approach A number of rational choice and constructivist explanations have been of ered for why eth- nic conf icts erupted in Yugoslavia in the 1990s. Both types of explanation have been con- cerned to of er an alternative to the cultural, ‘ancient hatreds’ explanation for the war between the Serbs and Croats. As many people have noted, the vast majority of Serbs and Croats lived together peacefully until the spring of 1991, when Croatia declared its inde- pendence. T ere is no evidence to suggest the existence of deep and widespread hatred in relations among Serbs and Croats during the sixty-year history of Yugoslavia. Moreover, even if evidence could be found for the persistence of ‘ancient hatreds’, they still cannot explain a key ‘puzzle’: why relations among communities that had been living together peacefully became polarized so quickly, before f nally dissolving into savage violence. Rational choice theory is the study of strategic political interactions, of how people (agents or players) determine strategies in dif erent situations. It explains outcomes as the result of rational choices made by individuals within a given set of material and structural circum- stances. It shows that, given a particular set of circumstances, the strategic interactions of agents will produce predictable, law-like outcomes. Much of the analysis of strategic political interactions focuses on how individual actors make decisions in game-like situations. A ‘game’ is any situation in which a f xed set of agents or players, with a f xed set of strategies available to them, compete against one another, and receive a payof as a result of the strate- gies they and their fellow actors choose. T e assumption is that all players know all possible outcomes and have preferences regarding these possible outcomes based on the amount of value or utility they derive from each of them. All players behave rationally; and they make rational decisions about what strategy to pursue based on a calculation of the costs and ben- ef ts of dif erent strategies for achieving their preferred outcome. In a series of articles (1994, 1995, 1998), James Fearon used rational-choice assumptions as a basis for exploring the causes and conditions of ethnic conf ict and war. In order to explain the ‘puzzle’ of the rapid polarization of Serbs and Croats in Croatia in 1991, James Fearon develops a game-theoretic model: a model of how groups of people interact when confronted with a situation of uncertainty, based on assumptions of game theory. Fearon points out that, just months before the eruption of war between Serbs and Croats in Croatia, journalists had reported that ‘most people seemed to have had no use for or interest in the exclusivist arguments pushed by the minority of extremists’ (1998: 114). ‘With the exception of a relatively small number of extremists . . . Serbs and Croats in the mixed population areas recognised that war would be costly and viewed it as unnecessary.’ But in spring 1991, ‘Serbs and Croats who had resisted the extremists appeals f nally opted for division and war’ (Fearon 1998: 115). Fearon argued that, following the collapse of the Soviet Union, ethnic conf ict erupted in Yugoslavia as a result of a ‘commitment problem’. T e problem arises when ‘two political communities f nd themselves without a third party that can guarantee agreements between them’ (1995: 2). If, in a new state, ethnic minorities don’t believe that the state can guarantee that the ethnic majorities will not infringe on their rights, they will prefer to f ght for succes- sion while the state is still weak. T is, he argues, helps to explain the rapid polarization of ethnic groups in Croatia following the declaration of Croatian independence in June 1991. FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 45

Explanation consistent with the hypothetico-deductive model here consists of (1) a set of initial determining conditions (circumstances pertaining at particular times and places); and (2) a general law or laws which connect these conditions to the type of events to be explained (‘hypotheses’ which are capable of being conf rmed or disconf rmed by suitable empirical f ndings). First, Fearon specif es the set of initial conditions. T e commitment problem, Fearon tells us, arises whenever three conditions hold: (1) the groups interact in anarchy, without a third party able to guarantee and enforce agreements between them; (2) one of the groups anticipates that its ability to secede or otherwise withdraw from joint arrangements will decline in the near future; and (3) for this group, f ghting in the present is preferable to the worst political outcome it could face if it chooses continued interaction (1995: 10). Second, on the basis of a game-theoretic model he develops of the commitment problem, Fearon generates hypotheses about what makes ethnic war more or less likely. T e key mechanisms include (1) the expected change in size in the relative military power between groups that would result from formation of a new state; (2) the relative size of the ethnic minority; (3) whether majority and minority groups’ costs for f ghting are low; and (4) whether institutions can be created that give minority groups political power that is at least proportional to their numbers. Fearon then applies the model to the war in Croatia in 1991–2. When Croatia declared its independence from Yugoslavia, minority Serbs living in Croatia faced the prospect of being in a state with no credible guarantees on their political status, or economic and even physical security. ‘If the commitment problem model does capture something of what was going on in Croatia, then we might expect to f nd evidence of Croatian leaders trying to work out guarantees with Serb leaders’ (1998: 119). T is, he f nds, occurs on numerous occasions. Croatian President Tudjman met with the leader of the Serbs in Croatia, Jovan Raskovic, ‘to discuss the issue of commitment to guarantees on the Serbs’ status and “cultural autonomy”’ (1998: 119). But despite Tudjman’s ef orts to construct a credible set of guarantees for the Serb minority, his ef orts to solve the commitment problem were ultimately unsuccessful. With the ‘prospect of entering the new state of Croatia with no credible guarantees on their political status, or economic or even physical security’, the prospect of a war then appeared better to the Serbs than the prospect of f ghting later, by which time the Croatian state would have grown stronger (Fearon 1998: 116). T e evidence, then, consists in showing that there is a ‘f t’ between the deductions of the theory and the observed behavioural outcomes; that the outcome is consistent with the theoretical predictions. Fearon also endeavours to demonstrate that his explanation of ers a b e t t e r ‘ f t’ with the facts than other explanations do. Finally, he argues that the basic com- mitment problem that he describes ‘appears either to lurk or to have caused interethnic violence’ in other cases, as well: in Azerbaijan, Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine, Estonia, Zimba- bwe, South Africa, and Northern Ireland (1995: 21). Let’s consider how an interpretivist approach, constructivism, explains the rapid ethnic polarization that occurred in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s. Constructivism is an approach that has had an important inf uence on political inquiry. Consistent with interpretivist assumptions, constructivism maintains that reality does not exist as something independent of us and is not, therefore, merely discovered by us: it is socially, and actively, constructed. Constructivists assume that social phenomena are social constructs in the sense that their shape and form is imbued with social values, norms, and assumptions, rather 46 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

than being the product of purely individual thought or meaning. We live in ‘a world of our mak- ing’, as Nicolas Onuf (1989) has put it. Actors are not totally free to choose their circumstances, but make choices in the process of interacting with others and, as a result, bring historically, culturally, and politically distinct ‘realities’ into being. In this respect, the world of politics is a social construction rather than something that exists independently of human meaning and action. States and other social institutions take specif c historical, cultural, and political forms that are a product of human interaction in the social world. In contrast with positivist approaches which emphasize a single objective reality, the idea of social construction suggests dif erence across context. It is not only the material environment, but also the cultural and institutional environment that provides incentives and disincentives for behaviour. Society is more than just the site of strategic interaction to pursue pre-def ned interests in a rational, utility-maximizing manner. It is a constitutive realm, an environment that forms and inf uences the identities and interests of actors and makes them who they are. Moreover, social interaction also inf uences the identity of actors. T e properties of actors are not intrinsic to them: they are socially contingent, they depend on social interaction: bargain- ing/negotiating, arguing, communicating in general. Both the identities and interests of actors are constituted (formed, inf uenced) through interaction and by the institutionalized norms, values, and ideas of society. Since the interests and identities of actors are not given—but result from social interaction—they cannot be abstracted from the social conditions which produce them; and they are subject to change as a result of political processes. Consistent with these assumptions, constructivism, like rational-choice approaches, rejects explanations of nationalist and ethnic phenomena as the outcome of essential cultural identities. But, unlike rational-choice approaches, it sees nationalist and ethnic conf ict as a phenomenon that has assumed a variety of forms across space and time; and it emphasizes the role of identities that are multiple and f uid and politically malleable: inf uenced by sur- rounding structures and ‘constructed’ for political purposes. Murat Somer (2002, 2001) addresses the same ‘puzzle’ as Fearon: the rapid ethnic polari- zation that occurred in Yugoslavia in the 1990s. Somer emphasizes the signif cance of public discourses in forming individuals’ ethnic identities, and in suppressing and reviving domi- nant perceptions of ethnic identities. He argues that ethnic conf ict is a result of processes of ethnic identity construction in the public arena that construct a divisive image of identities. Public ethnic activities and expressions are immediately observed and they immediately af ect the decisions of others. Ethnic polarization changes the dominant images of ethnic categories in society through cascades of individual reactions. A cascading process changes behaviour and attitudes and, once begun, is very dif cult to stop. In Yugoslavia, ethnic polarization in public discourses was engineered by ethnic entrepreneurs who constructed and promoted a divisive image of ethnic identities as mutually exclusive and incompatible with belonging to the same nation. T is triggered a ‘cascade process’, which resulted in the creation of a critical mass of opinion around a new image of ethnic identities. People who secretly held this divisive view, as well as people who now felt compelled to support it, jumped on the bandwagon. Hence, the divi- sive image became the norm, and it became ‘inappropriate, even blasphemous, to defend interethnic mixing and brotherhood’ (Somer 2001: 128). Somer draws a distinction between public and private ethnic polarization and highlights the way people publicly ‘falsify’ their private beliefs. During the communist era, state policies FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 47 had ‘aimed at eradicating the public expression of the divisive image of ethnic relations in the country; but they had insuf ciently encouraged its elimination in private’. Consequently, the public discourse in Yugoslavia had exerted pressure for ‘downward falsif cation’ to discour- age people from openly expressing their ethnic prejudices. T is ‘downward preference falsi- f cation concealed, to most observers, the private importance of the divisive image’; consequently, ‘even analysts who had a fair idea about the private signif cance of the divisive image were surprised by the severity of polarization’ in the 1990s (2001: 136). During the 1990s, ‘the dominant public discourse emphasizing unity and brotherhood’ turned into one that emphasized ‘radical ethnonationalism’ (2001: 136). But this ‘public polarization far exceeded private polarization’ (2001: 143). Consequently, there was widespread ‘upward ethnic preference falsi f cation’, the exaggeration of public support for the divisive image, as the new nationalist regime exerted pressure for people—including liberal and moderately tolerant individuals—to think and act in an ethnically intolerant manner. Somer uses survey research which indicates decreases in self-identif cation with the overarching Yugoslav identity between 1981 and 1991. T e respondents were anonymous, so these surveys were able to capture changes in people’s private preferences. During the 1980s there was a striking upsurge in ‘the public expression of the divisive image’ (Somer 2001: 143). But, ‘in 1989, when public polarization had reached an advanced state, anony- mous surveys continued to reveal that interethnic tolerance levels were high by global standards’. So, ‘while the public discourse was becoming increasingly more divisive and less tolerant of interethnic dif erences, private attitudes remained quite tolerant of interethnic dif erences’. In fact, ‘the highest levels of tolerance were found in Bosnia, the site of the most violent crimes’ (Somer 2001:144). ‘Desertion and call-up evasion were very common during the civil war when public support for the divisive image was at its peak’ (Somer 2001: 144). Let’s sum up by comparing the two approaches to understanding ethnic polarization in Yugoslavia. Both highlight the signif cance of social and political institutions in forming individuals’ ethnic identities. But Fearon, like other rational-choice theorists, tends to stress the structural and constraining features of institutions. Somer, on the other hand, empha- sizes their social and cognitive aspects. Both are constructivist in the sense that they see changes in an actor’s identity constructions as likely to occur in moments of crisis and dilemma. But Fearon, consistent with rational choice approaches, emphasizes the role of strategic calculation in identity construction, while Somer emphasizes cognitive features, such as norms of behaviour and inter-subjective understandings (though these don’t neces- sarily operate to the exclusion of the calculative element stressed in the rational choice explanations of ered by Fearon and others). Let’s consider how the two analyses illustrate the distinction between ‘internal’ and ‘exter- nal’ explanation and evidence that we previously discussed. T e analyses that Fearon and Somer of er are consistent with the assumptions, respectively, of rational choice and con- structivist approaches regarding actors’ interests: rational-choice theories assume that agents act on the basis of f xed interests and preferences; constructivists assume that interests can only develop from the image an actor holds of himself and of others, that identities are the source of interests (and, therefore, the basis of action) (e.g. Wendt 1994; Ringmar 1996). Fearon models external ‘behaviour’, and then seeks evidence by way of deductive f t with that model. Empirical evidence consists of statements and activities of Croatian leaders 48 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

that indicate a concern for providing the Serb minority with a commitment to guarantee their status and cultural autonomy. But there is no direct evidence of the existence of a commitment problem among the Serb population, of strategic behaviour on the part of individuals or groups, or of the relationship between belief and action. Direct evidence concerning whether the individual or group choices which led to ethnic polarization were made for the reasons stated in his model might be impractical or impossible to obtain. Instead, the ‘test’ of the model involves (1) deducing the factors that, in the given circum- stances, might be expected to lead groups to resort to violence; and (2) observing the out- comes. Where we observe that circumstances favour the behaviours that the model tells us are most likely to occur, we can infer that there is a line of cause and ef ect that relates those circumstances and the outcome. Somer identif es a mechanism, the ‘cascade’ process, which links popular beliefs, public political discourse, and relations across groups. He then combines survey data with detailed examination of the historical events to provide evidence of the changing nature of public and private views and suggest the relationship between them. Both analyses have implications for politics and policy: which of the explanations for ethnic conf ict we choose to favour has implications for how people relate to each other and how governments act. T e choice of which set of assumptions will provide the best starting point for your own research on a specif c political issue or problem is one which you will need to carefully consider.

Conclusions

This chapter has begun our consideration of some fundamental ontological, epistemological, and methodological problems posed by social inquiry. These problems mostly branch out from one central question: are the methods of the social sciences essentially the same as, or essentially different from, those of the natural sciences? We have reviewed the basic tenets of three different answers to this question: positivism, scientifi c realism, and interpretivism. How these answers differ is presented in Box 2.3. All of these defi ne a position with respect to how we study and conduct research in the social sciences. As Box 2.3 shows, all are based on fundamentally different assumptions about how we can know and develop knowledge about the social world; and all of them remain important perspectives for contemporary social research. The question of whether and how we can pursue a systematic and rigorous study of social phenomena in the way that scientists pursue study of the natural world and, more generally, philosophical presuppositions about ‘reality’ implicit in social science research, bears on how we design or structure an approach to research into political phenomena, and the claims we can make with respect to the fi ndings that result from that research. At the heart of the debate among these perspectives is the question of what sort of knowledge we can gain about social phenomena. This question is also central to the controversy that we take up in Chapter 3, which is the debate about whether the knowledge produced through the study of the social world is or can be ‘objective’; and in Chapter 4, where we consider the question of what is the ‘social’. Reality— is constantly being defi ned for us—by political scientists, by historians, by politicians in their speeches, by media analysts in their news reports. The ability to identify the underlying structure of assumptions or the implicit theory which shapes a given account of reality, whether presented by scholars, politicians, or journalists, allows us to become more active analysts of contemporary politics, rather than depending on the analysis of others. FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE 49

BOX 2.3 Positivism, Scientifi c Realism, and Interpretivism Compared

Positivism Scientifi c realism Interpretivism

Ontology: What No different from the No different from Fundamentally different is the nature of natural world: an objec- the natural world: an from the natural world. the social world? tive reality that exists objective reality that Reality is not mind- independently of our exists independently of independent: it is knowledge of it our knowledge of it (a subjectively created. (a ‘naturalist’ ontology). ‘naturalist’ ontology).

Epistemology: Scientifi c knowledge of Scientifi c knowledge is Scientifi c knowledge What sort of the social world is limited not limited to what can be can be gained through knowledge of the to what can be observed. observed but also includes interpreting the meanings social world is We can explain and theoretical entities (unob- which give people reasons possible? predict social phenomena servable elements of social for acting. We can, in this by discovering empirical life). We can explain and way, understand human regularities, formulating predict social phenomena behaviour; but we cannot law-like generalizations, based on theories about explain or predict it on and establishing causal these entities and certify the basis of law-like relationships. the truth of these theories generalizations and by employing various establishing the existence rules of method. of causal relationships.

Causality: what A refl ection of the way A refl ection of reality; We cannot seek do we mean by we think about the world; established by discovering causes, but only uncover ‘causes’? established by discovering unobservable underlying meanings that provide the observable regularities. generative mechanisms. reasons for action.

Methodology: Through direct Through direct observa- Interpretive theory and How can we gain observation. tion and logic applied textual strategies. The knowledge of the to both observable and social world is like a text social world? unobservable structures. and has to be interpreted to discover hidden meanings and subtexts.

Questions

● What is involved in providing an explanation of social phenomena? How is explanation distinct from and related to interpretation? ● What place does the concept of ‘law’ have in social-scientifi c explanation? ● What does ‘causality’ mean? How, according to different conceptions of causality, do we establish that something causes something else? ● How is describing, interpreting, and explaining human action different from describing, interpreting, and explaining non-human events? ● Should the primary goal of social science be to provide law-like explanations, capable of supporting predictions? Or are law-like explanations impossible, or unnecessary, within social science? 50 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

Guide to Further Reading

March, D. and P. Furlong (2002), ‘A Skin not a Sweater: Ontology and Epistemology in Political Science’, in D. Marsh and G. Stoker (eds), Theory and Methods in Political Science, 2nd edition (Basingstoke: Palgrave), 17–41. The authors discuss positivism, interpretivism, constructivism, and also realism, as different approaches to ontology and epistemology in political science, and illustrate their differences with case studies.

Martin, M. and L. C. McIntyre (eds) (1994), Readings in the Philosophy of Social Science (New York: MIT Press). This volume brings together a collection of important texts on the disputed role of general laws in social-scientifi c explanation (Part II), and on interpretation and meaning (Part III).

Gibbons, M. T. (2006), Hermeneutics, Political Inquiry, and Practical Reason: An Evolving Challenge to Political Science’. American Political Science Review 100: 4 (November), 563–71.

Lane, R. (1996), ‘Positivism, Scientifi c Realism and Political Science’. Journal of Theoretical Politics 8 (3): 361–82. This article explores the implications of scientifi c realist principles for political science, political research, and political theory, providing examples of a scientifi c realist approach in studies utilizing a variety of theoretical approaches, including rational choice, new institutionalism, and comparative politics.

Little, D. (1991), Varieties of Social Explanation: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Social Science (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press), chapter 2 (‘Causal Analysis’), pp. 13–38.

Russo, F. (2009), Causality and Causal Modelling in the Social Sciences (New York: Springer). This book offers an overview of debates, and it provides a valuable analysis of reasoning about causation by looking at the causal arguments advanced in specifi c social science studies.

Sankey, H. (2008), Scientifi c Realism and the Rationality of Science (Aldershot: Ashgate), chapter 1. This chapter provides a clear exposition of the doctrines of scientifi c realism, which distinguishes between core and optional doctrines; and the principal arguments that have been advanced for scientifi c realism.

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Fearon, D. James (1994), ‘Ethnic War as a Hopf, T. (2007), ‘The Limits of Interpreting Evidence’, Commitment Problem’, paper presented at the in R. N. Lelbow and M. I. Lichbach (eds), Theory annual meeting of the American Political Science and Evidence in Comparative Politics and Association, New York, http://www.stanford. International Relations (Basingstoke: Palgrave/ edu/~jfearon/papers/ethcprob.pdf. Macmillan), 55–84. ———(1995), ‘Rationalist Explanations for War’, Hume, D. (1966), Enquiries Concerning the Human International Organization 49(3): 379–414. Understanding (Oxford: Clarendon Press). ———(1998). ‘Commitment Problems and the Lane, R. (1996), ‘Positivism, Scientifi c Realism and Spread of Ethnic Confl ict’, in David Lake and Political Science’, Journal of Theoretical Politics Donald Rothchild (eds), The International Spread 8(3): 361–82. of Ethnic Confl ict (Princeton, NJ: Princeton Little, D. (1991), Varieties of Social Explanation: An University Press), 107–26. Introduction to the Philosophy of Social Science Finnemore, M. and K. Sikkink (2001), ‘Taking (Boulder, CO: Westview Press). Stock: The Constructivist Research Program ———(2009), ‘McIntyre and Taylor on the Human in International Relations and Comparative Sciences’. 16 July. http://understandingsociety. Politics’, Annual Review of Political Science 4: blogspot.com/2009/07/macintyre-and-taylor- 391–416. on-human-sciences.html. Føllesdal, D. (1994), ‘Hermeneutics and the May, T (2003), Social Research: Issues, Methods Hypothetico-Deductive Method’, in Michael And Process, 3rd edition (Buckingham: Open Martin and Lee C. McIntyre (eds), Readings in University Press). the Philosophy of Social Science (Cambridge, MA: McIntyre, L. C. (1994), ‘Complexity and Social MIT Press). Scientifi c Laws’, in Michael Martin and Lee C. Gerring, J. (2007), ‘Review Article: The Mechanismic McIntyre (eds), Readings in the Philosophy of Worldview: Thinking Inside the Box’. British Social Science (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press), Journal of Political Science 38: 161–79. 131–44. Gibbons, M. T. (2006), ‘Hermeneutics, Political Onuf, N. (1989), World of Our Making: Rules and Inquiry, and Practical Reason: An Evolving Rule in Social Theory and International Relations Challenge to Political Science’, American Political (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press). Science Review 100: 4 (November), 563–71. Pollins, B. (2007), ‘Beyond Logical Positivism: Gilpin, R. (1981), War and Change in World Politics Reframing King, Keohane, and Verba’, in R. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). N. Lelbow and M. I. Lichbach (eds), Theory Grix, J. (2002), The Foundations of Research and Evidence in Comparative Politics and (Basingstoke: Palgrave/Macmillan). International Relations (Basingstoke: Palgrave/ Macmillan), 87–106. Hampsher-Monk, I. and A. Hindmoor (2009), ‘Rational Choice and Interpretive Evidence: Popper, Karl, (1959), The Logic of Scientifi c Discovery Caught between a Rock and a Hard Place?’ (London: Hutchinson of London). Political Studies 58(1): 47–65. Riker, W. H. (1982), ‘The Two-Party System and Hedström, P.and R. Swedborg, eds (1998), Duverger’s Law: An Essay on the History of Social Mechanisms: An Analysis Approach to Political Science’, American Political Science Social Theory. (Cambridge : Cambridge Review 76 (December): 753–66. University Press). Ringmar, E. (1996), Identity, Interest and Action Hempel, C. G. (1994), ‘The Function of General (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). Laws in History’, in Michael Martin and Lee Ross, M. (2001), ‘Does Oil Hinder Democracy?’ C. McIntyre (eds), Readings in the Philosophy World Politics 53: 325–61. of Social Science (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press), Sankey, N. (2008), Scientifi c Realism and the 43–54. Rationality of Science (Aldershot : Ashgate). Hoffmann, M. J. (2006), ‘Social (De)Construction: Schwartz, J. D. (1984), ‘Participation and The Failure of a Multinational State’, in Jennifer Multisubjective Understanding: An Interpretivist Anne Sterling-Folker (ed.), Making Sense of Approach to the Study of Political Participation’, International Relations Theory (Boulder, CO: Journal of Politics 46: 1117–41. Lynne Reiner), 123–38. 52 PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE

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Endnotes

1. Note the difference between the terms ‘behaviourism’ and behaviouralism’: ‘behaviourism’ is a school of psychology which studies observable behaviour, rather than ‘unobservable’ behaviour such as mental processes and intentions, and emphasizes experimentation and causal analysis. ‘Behaviouralism’ is the term adopted by political scientists. The key tenet of behaviouralism is that only observable behaviour may be studied. 2. In recent years some researchers have modifi ed Duverger’s Law by suggesting that ‘it is the number of parties that can explain the choice of electoral systems, rather than the other way round’ (Colomer 2005: 1; see also Benoit 2007). Social research strategies 19

Chapter guide

The chief aim of this chapter is to show that a variety of considerations enter into the process of doing social research. The distinction that is commonly drawn among writers on and practitioners of social research between quantitative research and qualitative research is explored in relation to these considerations. This chapter explores: • the nature of the relationship between theory and research, in particular whether theory guides research (known as a deductive approach) or whether theory is an outcome of research (known as an inductive approach); • epistemological issues—that is, ones to do with what is regarded as appropriate knowledge about the social world; one of the most crucial aspects is the question of whether or not a natural science model of the research process is suitable for the study of the social world; • ontological issues—that is, ones to do with whether the social world is regarded as something external to social actors or as something that people are in the process of fashioning; • the ways in which these issues relate to the widely used distinction in the social sciences between two types of research strategy: quantitative and qualitative research; there is also a preliminary discussion, which will be followed up in Chapter 27, that suggests that, while quantitative and qualitative research represent different approaches to social research, we should be wary of driving a wedge between them; • the ways in which values and practical issues also impinge on the social research process.

Introduction

This book is about social research. It attempts to equip with the ways in which social scientists envision the con- people who have some knowledge of the social sciences nection between different viewpoints about the nature of with an appreciation of how social research should be social reality and how it should be examined. However, it conducted and what it entails. The latter project involves is possible to overstate this point. While methods are not situating social research in the context of sociology, neutral, they are not entirely suffused with intellectual which in turn means attending to the question of its role inclinations either. Secondly, there is the question of in the overall enterprise of the discipline. It would be how research methods and practice connect with the much easier to ‘cut to the chase’ and explore the nature of wider social scientifi c enterprise. Research data are methods of social research and provide advice on how invariably collected in relation to something. The ‘some- best to choose between and implement them. After all, thing’ may be a burning social problem or, more usually, many people might expect a book with the title of the a theory. present one to be concerned mainly with the ways in This is not to suggest that research is entirely dictated which the different methods in the social researcher’s by theoretical concerns. One sometimes fi nds simple arsenal can be employed. ‘fact-fi nding’ exercises published. Fenton et al. (1998) But the practice of social research does not exist in a conducted a quantitative content analysis of social re- bubble, hermetically sealed off from the social sciences search reported in the British mass media. They exam- and the various intellectual allegiances that their practi- ined national and regional newspapers, television and tioners hold. Two points are of particular relevance here. radio, and also magazines. They admit that one of First, methods of social research are closely tied to dif- the main reasons for conducting the research was to ferent visions of how social reality should be studied. establish the amount and types of research that are Methods are not simply neutral tools: they are linked represented. Sometimes, such exercises are motivated by

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a concern about a pressing social problem. McKeganey the research on the effects of redundancy was not and Barnard (1996) conducted qualitative research planned. Yet another stimulus for research can arise out involving observation and interviews with prostitutes and of personal experiences. Lofl and and Lofl and (1995) their clients in Glasgow. One factor that seems to have note that many research publications emerge out of the prompted this research was the concern about the role researcher’s personal biography, such as Zukin’s (1982) of prostitutes in spreading HIV infection (McKeganey interest in loft living arising out of her living in a loft in and Barnard 1996: 3). Another scenario occurs when New York City. Another example is O’Reilly’s (2000) in- research is done on a topic when a specifi c opportunity vestigation of British expatriates living on the Costa del arises. The interest of Westergaard et al. (1989) in the Sol in Spain, which stemmed from her and her partner’s effects of redundancy seems to have been profoundly dream of moving to the area themselves, which in fact motivated by the opportunity that arose when a Sheffi eld they eventually did. Certainly, my own interest in Disney steel company, which was close to their institutional base theme parks can be traced back to a visit to Disney World at the University of Sheffi eld, made a large number of in Florida in 1991 (Bryman 1995, 1999), while my inter- people redundant. The fi rm’s management approached est in the representation of social science research in the the authors a year after the redundancies to conduct mass media (Fenton et al. 1998) can almost certainly be research on what had happened to the individuals attributed to a diffi cult encounter with the press reported who had been made redundant. The authors conducted in Haslam and Bryman (1994). social survey research using a structured interview By and large, however, research data achieve signifi - approach on most of those made redundant. Of course, the cance in sociology when viewed in relation to theoretical authors were infl uenced by theories about and previous concerns. This raises the issue of the nature of the rela- research on unemployment, but the specifi c impetus for tionship between theory and research.

Student experience Personal experience as a basis for research interests

For her research, Isabella Robbins was interested in the ways in which mothers frame decisions regarding vaccinations for their children. This topic had a particular signifi cance for her. She writes:

As the mother of three children I have encountered some tough decisions regarding responsibility towards my children. Reading sociology, as a mature student, gave me the tools to help understand my world and to contextualize some of the dilemmas I had faced. In particular, I had experienced a diffi cult decision regarding the vaccination status of my children.

To read more about Isabella’s research experiences, go to the Online Resource Centre that accompanies this book at: www.oxfordtextbooks.co.uk/orc/brymansrm4e/

Theory and research

Characterizing the nature of the link between theory and Theory is important to the social researcher because it research is by no means a straightforward matter. There provides a backcloth and rationale for the research that is are several issues at stake here, but two stand out in par- being conducted. It also provides a framework within ticular. First, there is the question of what form of theory which social phenomena can be understood and the one is talking about. Secondly, there is the matter of research fi ndings can be interpreted. whether data are collected to test or to build theories.

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What type of theory? that the researcher would fi nd it diffi cult to make the necessary links with the real world. There is a paradox The term ‘theory’ is used in a variety of different ways, here, of course. Even highly abstract ideas, such as but its most common meaning is as an explanation of Parsons’s notions of ‘pattern variables’ and ‘functional observed regularities—for example, why sufferers of requisites’, must have some connection with an external schizophrenia are more likely to come from working- reality, in that they are likely to have been generated out class than middle-class backgrounds, or why work alien- of Parsons’s reading of research or his refl ections upon ation varies by technology. But such theories tend not that reality or others’ writings on it. However, the level of to be the stuff of courses in sociological theory, which abstractness of the theorizing is so great as to make it dif- typically focus much more on theories with a higher fi cult for them to be deployed in research. For research level of abstraction. Examples of such theories include purposes, then, Merton argues that grand theories are of structural-functionalism, symbolic interactionism, crit- limited use in connection with social research, although, ical theory, poststructuralism, structuration theory, and as the example in Research in focus 2.1 suggests, an so on. What we see here is a distinction between theories abstract concept like social capital (Bourdieu 1984) can of the former type, which are often called theories of the have some pay-off in research terms. Instead, middle- middle range (Merton 1967), and grand theories, which range theories are ‘intermediate to general theories of operate at a more abstract and general level. According social systems which are too remote from particular to Merton, grand theories offer few indications to re- classes of social behavior, organization and change to searchers as to how they might guide or infl uence the account for what is observed and to those detailed orderly collection of empirical evidence. So, if someone wanted descriptions of particulars that are not generalized at all’ to test a theory or to draw an inference from it that could (Merton 1967: 39). be tested, the level of abstractness is likely to be so great

Research in focus 2.1 Grand theory and social research

Butler and Robson (2001) used Bourdieu’s concept of social capital as a means of understanding gentrifi cation of areas of London. While the term ‘social capital’ has acquired an everyday usage, Butler and Robson follow Bourdieu’s theoretical use of it, which draws attention to the social connectedness and the interpersonal resources that those with social capital can draw on to pursue their goals. While the term has attracted the interest of social policy researchers and others concerned with social exclusion, its use in relation to the middle class has been less prominent, according to Butler and Robson. Bourdieu’s treatment implies that those with social capital cultivate signifi cant social connections and then draw upon those connections as resources for their goals. Butler and Robson conducted semi-structured interviews with ‘gentrifi ers’ in each of three inner London areas. Responding to a tendency to view gentrifi cation in rather unitary terms, the authors selected the three areas to examine what they refer to as the ‘variability’ of the process. To that end, the areas were selected to refl ect variation in two factors: the length of time over which gentrifi cation had been occurring and the middle-class groupings to which each of the areas appealed. The selection of areas in terms of these criteria was aided by census data. Of the three areas, Telegraph Hill was the strongest in terms of social capital. According to the authors, this is revealed in ‘its higher levels of voluntary co-operation and sense of geographically focused unity’ (Butler and Robson 2001: 2159). It is the recourse to these networks of sociality that accounts for the successful gentrifi cation of Telegraph Hill. Battersea, one of the other two areas, entails a contrasting impetus for gentrifi cation in Bourdieu’s terms. Here, economic capital was more signifi cant for gentrifi cation than the social capital that was important in Telegraph Hill. The role of economic capital in Battersea can be seen in the ‘competitive access to an increasingly desirable and expensive stock of housing and an exclusive circuit of schooling centred on private provision’ (Butler and Robson 2001: 2159). In the former, it is sociality that provides the motor for gentrifi cation, whereas in Battersea gentrifi cation is driven by market forces and is only partially infl uenced by patterns of social connectedness. This study is an interesting example of the way in which a relatively high-level theoretical notion—social capital and its kindred concept of economic capital—associated with a social theorist can be employed to illuminate research questions concerning the dynamics of modern urban living.

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By and large, then, it is not grand theory that typically (see Research in focus 2.2). They vary somewhat in their guides social research. Middle-range theories are much range of application. For example, labelling theory repre- more likely to be the focus of empirical enquiry. In fact, sents a middle-range theory in the sociology of deviance. Merton formulated the idea as a means of bridging what Its exponents sought to understand deviance in terms of he saw as a growing gulf between theory (in the sense of the causes and effects of the societal reaction to devi- grand theory) and empirical fi ndings. This is not to say ation. It was held to be applicable to a variety of different that there were no middle-range theories before he forms of deviance, including crime and mental illness. By wrote: there defi nitely were, but what Merton did was contrast, Cloward and Ohlin’s (1960) differential associ- to seek to clarify what is meant by ‘theory’ when social ation theory was formulated specifi cally in connection scientists write about the relationship between theory with juvenile delinquency, and in subsequent years this and research. tended to be its focus. Middle-range theories, then, fall Middle-range theories, unlike grand ones, operate in a somewhere between grand theories and empirical fi nd- limited domain, whether it is juvenile delinquency, racial ings. They represent attempts to understand and explain prejudice, educational attainment, or the labour process a limited aspect of social life.

Research in focus 2.2 Labour process theory: a middle-range theory

In the sociology of work, labour process theory can be regarded as a middle-range theory. The publication of Labor and Monopoly Capital (Braverman 1974) inaugurated a stream of thinking and research around the idea of the labour process and in particular on the degree to which there has been an inexorable trend towards increasing control over the manual worker and the deskilling of manual labour. A conference volume of much of this work was published as Labour Process Theory (Knights and Willmott 1990). P. Thompson (1989) describes the theory as having four elements: the principle that the labour process entails the extraction of surplus value; the need for capitalist enterprises constantly to transform production processes; the quest for control over labour; and the essential confl ict between capital and labour. Labour process theory has been the focus of considerable empirical research (e.g. Knights et al. 1985).

Even the grand/middle-range distinction does not en- aspect of a topic; certain ideas may not previously have tirely clarify the issues involved in asking the deceptively been tested a great deal; the researcher may feel that simple question of ‘what is theory?’ This is because the existing approaches being used for research on a topic term ‘theory’ is frequently used in a manner that means are defi cient, and so provides an alternative approach; little more than the background literature in an area of and so on. social enquiry. To a certain extent, this point can be taken Social scientists are sometimes prone to being somewhat to apply to fact-fi nding exercises such as those referred to dismissive of research that has no obvious connections above. The analysis of the representation of social with theory—in either the grand or the middle-range research in the media by Fenton et al. (1998) was under- senses of the term. Such research is often dismissed as taken against a background of similar analyses in the naive empiricism (see Key concept 2.1). It would be harsh, USA and of studies of the representation of natural sci- not to say inaccurate, to brand as naive empiricism the ence research in the media in several different countries. numerous studies in which the publications-as-theory In many cases, the relevant background literature relat- strategy is employed, simply because their authors have ing to a topic fuels the focus of an article or book and not been preoccupied with theory. Such research is con- thereby acts as the equivalent of a theory, as with the ditioned by and directed towards research questions that research referred to in Research in focus 2.3. The litera- arise out of an interrogation of the literature. The data ture in a certain domain acts as the spur to an enquiry. collection and analysis are subsequently geared to the The literature acts as an impetus in a number of ways: the illumination or resolution of the research issue or problem researcher may seek to resolve an inconsistency between that has been identifi ed at the outset. The literature acts different fi ndings or between different interpretations of as a proxy for theory. In many instances, theory is latent fi ndings; the researcher may have spotted a neglected or implicit in the literature.

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Research in focus 2.3 Background literature as theory: emotional labour and hairstylists

One component of R. S. Cohen’s (2010) mixed methods study of hairstylists’ relationships with their clients was a postal questionnaire survey of all salons and barbers’ shops in a northern city in England. Of the 328 enterprises contacted, 40 per cent replied to the questionnaire. The goal of the research was to examine how far the giving of emotional favours was affected by the nature of the relationship with the client in terms of whether the worker was an owner or a paid employee. Her survey data show that owners are more likely to stay late for clients and to try to fi nd a space for them between clients who have been booked in. Hochschild’s (1983) book, in which she fi rst coined the term ‘emotional labour’, and the many studies that have taken up this concept form the starting point of Cohen’s research. The signifi cance of this work is evident from Cohen’s two opening sentences:

Since Hochschild (1983) fi rst suggested that interactive service workers carry out emotional labour in the course of their work, this proposition has become widely accepted. However the relationship of emotional labour, and client–worker social interactions more generally, to the structural relations of employment has received surprisingly little attention . . . (R. S. Cohen 2010: 197)

Thus, the literature on emotional labour forms the background to the study and the main impetus for the interpretation of the fi ndings, some of which are gleaned from qualitative data deriving from semi-structured interviews with some owners and employees. For the latter, interactions with clients are much more likely to take the form of what Hochschild (1983) called ‘surface acting’, a superfi cial form of emotional labour and emotional engagement with the client.

Key concept 2.1 What is empiricism?

The term ‘empiricism’ is used in a number of different ways, but two stand out. First, it is used to denote a general approach to the study of reality that suggests that only knowledge gained through experience and the senses is acceptable. In other words, this position means that ideas must be subjected to the rigours of testing before they can be considered knowledge. The second meaning of the term is related to this and refers to a belief that the accumulation of ‘facts’ is a legitimate goal in its own right. It is this second meaning that is sometimes referred to as ‘naive empiricism’.

Indeed, research that appears to have the character- reporting other investigations of prostitutes in a number istics of the fact-fi nding exercise should not be prematurely of different countries. They also illuminate their fi ndings dismissed as naive empiricism either. McKeganey and by drawing on ideas that are very much part of the soci- Barnard’s (1996) research on prostitutes and their clients ologist’s conceptual tool kit. One example is Goffman’s is a case in point. On the face of it, even if one strips away (1963) notion of ‘stigma’ and the way in which the stig- the concern with HIV infection, the research could be matized individual seeks to manage a spoiled identity; construed as naive empiricism and perhaps of a rather another is Hochschild’s (1983) concept of ‘emotional prurient kind. However, this again would be a harsh labour’, a term she coined to denote the way in which air- and probably inaccurate judgement. For example, the line fl ight attendants need to express positive emotions authors relate their research fi ndings to the literature as part of the requirements for their jobs. In doing so,

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they contrive a demeanour of friendliness when deal- ing with passengers, some of whom may be extremely Figure 2.1 diffi cult (see also Research in focus 2.3). It is not possible to tell from McKeganey and Barnard’s The process of deduction (1996) report whether the concepts of stigma and emo- tional labour infl uenced their data collection. However, raising this question invites consideration of another 1. Theory question: in so far as any piece of research is linked to theory, what was the role of that theory? Up to this point, I have tended to write as though theory is something that guides and infl uences the collection and analysis 2. Hypothesis of data. In other words, research is done in order to answer questions posed by theoretical considerations. But an alternative position is to view theory as something that occurs after the collection and analysis of some or 3. Data collection all of the data associated with a project. We begin to see here the signifi cance of a second factor in consider- ing the relationship between theory and research— 4. Findings whether we are referring to deductive or inductive theory.

Deductive and inductive theory 5. Hypotheses confirmed or rejected

Deductive theory represents the commonest view of the nature of the relationship between theory and social research. The researcher, on the basis of what is known 6. Revision of theory about in a particular domain and of theoretical consider- ations in relation to that domain, deduces a hypothesis (or hypotheses) that must then be subjected to empirical scrutiny. Embedded within the hypothesis will be con- cepts that will need to be translated into researchable entities. The social scientist must both skillfully deduce a hypothesis and then translate it into operational terms. This means that the social scientist needs to specify how research fi ndings associated with a certain domain of data can be collected in relation to the concepts that enquiry. This can be seen in the case of the fi nal refl ec- make up the hypothesis. tions of Butler and Robson’s (2001—see Research in This view of the role of theory in relation to research is focus 2.1) study of gentrifi cation in three areas of London very much the kind of role that Merton had in mind in when they write: connection with middle-range theory, which, he argued, ‘is principally used in sociology to guide empirical Each of the three groups has played on its strengths, inquiry’ (Merton 1967: 39). Theory and the hypothesis where it has them. Gentrifi cation, given this, cannot in deduced from it come fi rst and drive the process of gath- any sense be considered to be a unitary phenomenon, ering data (see Research in focus 2.4 for an example of a but needs to be examined in each case according to its deductive approach to the relationship between theory own logic and outcomes. The concept of social capital, and data). The sequence can be depicted as one in which when used as an integrated part of an extended the steps outlined in Figure 2.1 take place. conceptual framework for the apprehension of all forms The last step involves a movement that is in the oppo- of middle-class capital relations, can thus play an site direction from deduction—it involves induction, as important part in discriminating between differing the researcher infers the implications of his or her fi nd- types of social phenomena. (Butler and Robson ings for the theory that prompted the whole exercise. 2001: 2160) The fi ndings are fed back into the stock of theory and the

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In these fi nal refl ections they show how their fi ndings process appears very linear—one step follows the other and the interpretations of those fi ndings can be fed back in a clear, logical sequence. However, there are many into both the stock of knowledge concerning gentrifi ca- instances where this is not the case: a researcher’s view tion in cities and, in the third of the three sentences, the of the theory or literature may have changed as a result concept of social capital and its uses. of the analysis of the collected data; new theoretical However, while this element of inductiveness un- ideas or fi ndings may be published by others before the doubtedly exists in the approach outlined, it is typically researcher has generated his or her fi ndings; or, the relev- deemed to be predominantly deductive in orientation. ance of a set of data for a theory may become apparent Moreover, it is important to bear in mind that, when this after the data have been collected. deductive approach, which is usually associated with This may all seem rather surprising and confusing. quantitative research, is put into operation, it often does There is a certain logic to the idea of developing theories not follow the sequence outlined in its pure form. As pre- and then testing them. In everyday contexts, we com- viously noted, ‘theory’ may be little more than the litera- monly think of theories as things that are quite illumin- ture on a certain topic in the form of the accumulated ating but that need to be tested before they can be knowledge gleaned from books and articles. Also, even considered valid or useful. In point of fact, however, when theory or theories can be discerned, explicit hypo- while the process of deduction outlined in Figure 2.1 theses are not always deduced from them in the way that does undoubtedly occur, it is better considered as a Kelley and De Graaf (1997) did in Research in focus 2.4. general orientation to the link between theory and A further point to bear in mind is that the deductive research. As a general orientation, its broad contours may

Research in focus 2.4 A deductive study

Kelley and De Graaf (1997) show that a number of studies have examined the factors that have an impact upon individuals’ religious beliefs, such as parents, schools, and friends, but they also argue that there are good grounds for thinking that the nation into which one is born will be an important cross-cultural factor. These refl ections constitute what they refer to as the ‘theory’ that guided their research and from which the following hypothesis was derived: ‘People born into religious nations will, in proportion to the orthodoxy of their fellow-citizens, acquire more orthodox beliefs than otherwise similar people born into secular nations’ (Kelley and De Graaf 1997: 641). There are two central concepts in this hypothesis that would need to be measured: national religiosity (whether it is religious or secular) and individual religious orthodoxy. The authors hypothesized further that the religious orientation of the individual’s family (whether devout or secular) would affect the nature of the relationship between national religiosity and religious orthodoxy.

To test the hypotheses, a secondary analysis of data deriving from survey research based on large samples from fi fteen nations was conducted. UK readers will be interested to know that the British and Northern Irish (and Irish Republic) data were derived from the British Social Attitudes survey for 1991 (Jowell et al. 1992). Religious orthodoxy was measured by four survey questions concerned with religious belief. The questions asked about (1) whether the person believed in God, (2) his or her past beliefs about God, (3) how close the individual felt to God, and (4) whether he or she felt that God cares about everyone. To measure national religiosity, the fi fteen nations were classifi ed into one of fi ve categories ascending from secular to religious. The classifi cation was undertaken according to ‘an unweighted average of parental church attendance . . . and religious belief in the nation as a whole’ (Kelley and De Graaf 1997: 647). Family religious orientation was measured on a scale of fi ve levels of parental church attendance. The hypotheses were broadly confi rmed and the authors conclude that the ‘religious environment of a nation has a major impact on the beliefs of its citizens’ (Kelley and De Graaf 1997: 654). Some of the implications of the fi ndings for theories about international differences in religiosity are then outlined.

This study demonstrates the process whereby hypotheses are deduced from existing theory and these then guide the process of data collection so that they can be tested.

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frequently be discernible in social research, but it is also FigureFigure 22.2.2 the case that we often fi nd departures from it. However, in some research no attempt is made to follow the sequence Deductive and inductive approaches to outlined in Figure 2.1. Some researchers prefer an ap- the relationship between theory and proach to the relationship between theory and research research that is primarily inductive. With an inductive stance, theory is the outcome of research. In other words, the Deductive approach process of induction involves drawing generalizable inferences out of observations. Figure 2.2 attempts to cap- Theory ture the essence of the difference between inductivism and deductivism. However, just as deduction entails an element of induction, the inductive process is likely to entail a modi- Observations/Findings cum of deduction. Once the phase of theoretical refl ection on a set of data has been carried out, the researcher may want to collect further data in order to establish the con- Inductive approach ditions in which a theory will and will not hold. Such a Observations/Findings general strategy is often called iterative: it involves a weaving back and forth between data and theory. It is particularly evident in grounded theory, which will be examined in Chapter 24, but in the meantime the basic Theory point is to note that induction represents an alternative strategy for linking theory and research, although it contains a deductive element too.

Research in focus 2.5 An inductive study

Charmaz (1991, 1997) has been concerned to examine a number of aspects of the experiences of people with chronic illness. One phase of her research entailed the examination specifi cally of men with such a condition. In one of her reports (Charmaz 1997), she discusses the results of her research into twenty men suffering from chronic illness. The bulk of her data derives from semi-structured interviews. In order to bring out the distinctiveness of men’s responses, she compared the fi ndings relating to men with a parallel study of women with chronic illness. She argues that a key component of men’s responses is that of a strategy of preserving self. Although the experience of chronic illness invariably necessitates a change of lifestyle that itself occasions a change in personal identity, the men sought to preserve their sense of self by drawing on ‘essential qualities, attributes, and identities of [the] past self’ (Charmaz 1997: 49). By contrast, women were less reliant in their strategies of preserving self on the recapturing of past identities. She relates her theoretical refl ections of her data to her male respondents’ notions of masculine identity. Her emphasis on the idea of preserving self allows her to assess the factors that lie behind whether a man with chronic illness will ‘reconstruct a positive identity or sink into depression’ (Charmaz 1997: 57). If they were unable to have access to actions that would allow their sense of past self to be extended into the future (for example, through work), the probability of their sinking into depression was enhanced.

In this study, the inductive nature of the relationship between theory and research can be seen in the way that Charmaz’s theoretical ideas (such as the notion of ‘preserving self’) derive from her data rather than being formed before she had collected her data.

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However, as with ‘theory’ in connection with the many supposedly inductive studies, which generate inter- deductive approach to the relationship between theory esting and illuminating fi ndings but whose theoretical and research, we have to be cautious about the use of the signifi cance is not entirely clear. They provide insightful term in the context of the inductive strategy too. While empirical generalizations, but little theory. Secondly, in some researchers undoubtedly develop theories, equally much the same way that the deductive strategy is associ- it is necessary to be aware that very often what one ated with a quantitative research approach, an inductive ends up with can be little more than empirical gen- strategy of linking data and theory is typically associated eralizations of the kind Merton (1967) wrote about. with a qualitative research approach. It is not a coinci- Research in focus 2.5 is an example of research that can dence that Charmaz’s (1997) research referred to in be classifi ed as inductive in the sense that it develops a Research in focus 2.5 is based on in-depth, semi-structured theory out of interview data deriving from men suffering interviews that produced qualitative data in the form of from chronic illness concerning what determines suc- respondents’ detailed answers to her questions. However, cessful coping mechanisms for males affl icted with such as will be shown below, this characterization of the in- a condition. In fact, the analytic strategy adopted by the ductive strategy as associated with qualitative research is author (Charmaz 1997) was grounded theory, and it not entirely straightforward: not only does much qualita- is certainly the case that many of the most prominent tive research not generate theory, but also theory is often examples of inductive research derive from this tradition used at the very least as a background to qualitative (see the other chapters in Strauss and Corbin 1997b, investigations. from which Charmaz’s example was taken). It is useful to think of the relationship between theory Charmaz’s (1997) research is an interesting illustra- and research in terms of deductive and inductive strat- tion of an inductive approach. Two points are particu- egies. However, as the previous discussion has implied, larly worth noting about it. First, as previously noted, the issues are not as clear-cut as they are sometimes it uses a grounded theory approach to the analysis of presented. To a large extent, deductive and inductive data and to the generation of theory. This approach, strategies are possibly better thought of as tendencies which was fi rst outlined by Glaser and Strauss (1967), is rather than as a hard-and-fast distinction. But these are often regarded as especially strong in terms of generating not the only issues that impinge on the conduct of social theories out of data. This contrasts with the nature of research.

Epistemological considerations

An epistemological issue concerns the question of what is describes a philosophical position that can be discerned (or should be) regarded as acceptable knowledge in a in research—though there are still disagreements about discipline. A particularly central issue in this context is what it comprises; for others, it is a pejorative term used the question of whether the social world can and should to describe crude and often superfi cial data collection. be studied according to the same principles, procedures, It is possible to see in the fi ve principles in Key con- and ethos as the natural sciences. The position that cept 2.2 a link with some of the points that have already affi rms the importance of imitating the natural sciences been raised about the relationship between theory and is invariably associated with an epistemological position research. For example, positivism entails elements of known as positivism (see Key concept 2.2). both a deductive approach (principle 2) and an inductive strategy (principle 3). Also, a fairly sharp distinction is A natural science epistemology: drawn between theory and research. The role of research positivism is to test theories and to provide material for the develop- ment of laws. But either of these connections between The doctrine of positivism is extremely diffi cult to pin theory and research carries with it the implication that it down and therefore to outline in a precise manner, be- is possible to collect observations in a manner that is not cause it is used in a number of different ways by authors. infl uenced by pre-existing theories. Moreover, theoret- For some writers, it is a descriptive category—one that ical terms that are not directly amenable to observation

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Key concept 2.2 What is positivism?

Positivism is an epistemological position that advocates the application of the methods of the natural sciences to the study of social reality and beyond. But the term stretches beyond this principle, though the constituent elements vary between authors. However, positivism is also taken to entail the following principles:

1. Only phenomena and hence knowledge confi rmed by the senses can genuinely be warranted as knowledge (the principle of phenomenalism). 2. The purpose of theory is to generate hypotheses that can be tested and that will thereby allow explanations of laws to be assessed (the principle of deductivism). 3. Knowledge is arrived at through the gathering of facts that provide the basis for laws (the principle of inductivism). 4. Science must (and presumably can) be conducted in a way that is value free (that is, objective). 5. There is a clear distinction between scientifi c statements and normative statements and a belief that the former are the true domain of the scientist. This last principle is implied by the fi rst because the truth or otherwise of normative statements cannot be confi rmed by the senses.

are not considered genuinely scientifi c; they must be sus- other accounts of scientifi c practice (such as critical ceptible to the rigours of observation. All this carries realism—see Key concept 2.3). with it the implication of greater epistemological status being given to observation than to theory. Interpretivism It should be noted that it is a mistake to treat positivism as synonymous with science and the scientifi c. In fact, Interpretivism is a term given to a contrasting epistem- philosophers of science and of the social sciences differ ology to positivism (see Key concept 2.4). The term quite sharply over how best to characterize scientifi c subsumes the views of writers who have been critical of practice, and since the early 1960s there has been a drift the application of the scientifi c model to the study of the away from viewing it in positivist terms. Thus, when social world and who have been infl uenced by different writers complain about the limitations of positivism, it is intellectual traditions, which are outlined below. They not entirely clear whether they mean the philosophical share a view that the subject matter of the social sciences term or a scientifi c approach more generally. Realism (in —people and their institutions—is fundamentally differ- particular, critical realism), for example, is another philo- ent from that of the natural sciences. The study of the sophical position that purports to provide an account of social world therefore requires a different logic of re- the nature of scientifi c practice (see Key concept 2.3). search procedure, one that refl ects the distinctiveness of The crux of the epistemological considerations that humans as against the natural order. Von Wright (1971) form the central thrust of this section is the rejection by has depicted the epistemological clash as being between some writers and traditions of the application of the positivism and hermeneutics (a term that is drawn from canons of the natural sciences to the study of social reality. theology and that, when imported into the social sci- A diffi culty here is that it is not easy to disentangle the ences, is concerned with the theory and method of the natural science model from positivism as the butt of their interpretation of human action). This clash refl ects a divi- criticisms. In other words, it is not always clear whether sion between an emphasis on the explanation of human they are inveighing against the application of a general behaviour that is the chief ingredient of the positivist natural scientifi c approach or of positivism in particular. approach to the social sciences and the understanding There is a long-standing debate about the appropriate- of human behaviour. The latter is concerned with the ness of the natural science model for the study of society, empathic understanding of human action rather than with but, since the account that is offered of that model tends the forces that are deemed to act on it. This contrast to have largely positivist overtones, it would seem that refl ects long-standing debates that precede the emergence it is positivism that is the focus of attention rather than of the modern social sciences but fi nd their expression in

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Key concept 2.3 What is realism?

Realism shares two features with positivism: a belief that the natural and the social sciences can and should apply the same kinds of approach to the collection of data and to explanation, and a commitment to the view that there is an external reality to which scientists direct their attention (in other words, there is a reality that is separate from our descriptions of it). There are two major forms of realism: • Empirical realism simply asserts that, through the use of appropriate methods, reality can be understood. This version of realism is sometimes referred to as naive realism to refl ect the fact that it is often assumed by realists that there is a perfect (or at least very close) correspondence between reality and the term used to describe it. As such, it ‘fails to recognise that there are enduring structures and generative mechanisms underlying and producing observable phenomena and events’ and is therefore ‘superfi cial’ (Bhaskar 1989: 2). This is perhaps the most common meaning of the term. When writers employ the term ‘realism’ in a general way, it is invariably this meaning to which they are referring. • Critical realism is a specifi c form of realism whose manifesto is to recognize the reality of the natural order and the events and discourses of the social world and holds that ‘we will only be able to understand—and so change—the social world if we identify the structures at work that generate those events and discourses. . . . These structures are not spontaneously apparent in the observable pattern of events; they can only be identifi ed through the practical and theoretical work of the social sciences’ (Bhaskar 1989: 2).

Critical realism implies two things. First, it implies that, whereas positivists take the view that the scientist’s conceptualization of reality actually directly refl ects that reality, realists argue that the scientist’s conceptualization is simply a way of knowing that reality. As Bhaskar (1975: 250) has put it: ‘Science, then, is the systematic attempt to express in thought the structures and ways of acting of things that exist and act independently of thought.’ Critical realists acknowledge and accept that the categories they employ to understand reality are likely to be provisional. Thus, unlike naive realists, critical realists recognize that there is a distinction between the objects that are the focus of their enquiries and the terms they use to describe, account for, and understand them. Secondly, by implication, critical realists unlike positivists are perfectly content to admit into their explanations theoretical terms that are not directly amenable to observation. As a result, hypothetical entities that account for regularities in the natural or social orders (the ‘generative mechanisms’ to which Bhaskar refers) are perfectly admissible for realists, but not for positivists. Generative mechanisms entail the entities and processes that are constitutive of the phenomenon of interest. For critical realists, it is acceptable that generative mechanisms are not directly observable, since they can be admitted into theoretical accounts on the grounds that their effects are observable. Also crucial to a critical realist understanding is the identifi cation of the context that interacts with the generative mechanism to produce an observed regularity in the social world. An appreciation of context is crucial to critical realist explanations because it serves to shed light on the conditions that promote or impede the operation of the causal mechanism. What makes critical realism critical is that the identifi cation of generative mechanisms offers the prospect of introducing changes that can transform the status quo. A further point to note about critical realism is that the form of reasoning involved in the identifi cation of generative causal mechanisms is neither inductive nor deductive. It is referred to by Blaikie (2004) as retroductive reasoning, which entails making an inference about the causal mechanism that lies behind and is responsible for regularities that are observed in the social world. Research in focus 26.1 provides an example of research using a critical realist approach. This example can be read profi tably at this stage even though it is in a much later chapter.

such notions as the advocacy by Max Weber (1864–1920) interpretive understanding of social action in order to of an approach referred to in his native German as arrive at a causal explanation of its course and effects’. Verstehen (which means understanding). Weber (1947: Weber’s defi nition seems to embrace both explanation 88) described sociology as a ‘science which attempts the and understanding here, but the crucial point is that the

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Key concept 2.4 What is interpretivism?

Interpretivism is a term that usually denotes an alternative to the positivist orthodoxy that has held sway for decades. It is predicated upon the view that a strategy is required that respects the differences between people and the objects of the natural sciences and therefore requires the social scientist to grasp the subjective meaning of social action. Its intellectual heritage includes: Weber’s notion of Verstehen; the hermeneutic– phenomenological tradition; and symbolic interactionism.

task of ‘causal explanation’ is undertaken with reference Two points are particularly noteworthy in this quotation. to the ‘interpretive understanding of social action’ rather First, it asserts that there is a fundamental difference than to external forces that have no meaning for those between the subject matter of the natural sciences and involved in that social action. the social sciences and that an epistemology is required One of the main intellectual traditions that has been that will refl ect and capitalize upon that difference. The responsible for the anti-positivist position has been fundamental difference resides in the fact that social phenomenology, a philosophy that is concerned with reality has a meaning for human beings and therefore the question of how individuals make sense of the world human action is meaningful—that is, it has a meaning for around them and how in particular the philosopher them and they act on the basis of the meanings that they should bracket out preconceptions in his or her grasp of attribute to their acts and to the acts of others. This leads that world. The initial application of phenomenological to the second point—namely, that it is the job of the ideas to the social sciences is attributed to the work of social scientist to gain access to people’s ‘common-sense Alfred Schutz (1899–1959), whose work did not come to thinking’ and hence to interpret their actions and their the notice of most English-speaking social scientists until social world from their point of view. It is this particular the translation from German of his major writings in the feature that social scientists claiming allegiance to phe- 1960s, some twenty or more years after they had been nomenology have typically emphasized. In the words of written. His work was profoundly infl uenced by Weber’s the authors of a research methods text whose approach is concept of Verstehen, as well as by phenomenological described as phenomenological: ‘The phenomenologist philosophers, like Husserl. Schutz’s position is well cap- views human behavior . . . as a product of how people tured in the following passage, which has been quoted on interpret the world. . . . In order to grasp the meanings of numerous occasions: a person’s behavior, the phenomenologist attempts to see things from that person’s point of view’ (Bogdan and Taylor 1975: 13–14; emphasis in original). In this exposition of Verstehen and phenomenology, it The world of nature as explored by the natural scientist has been necessary to skate over some complex issues. In does not ‘mean’ anything to molecules, atoms and electrons. But the observational fi eld of the social particular, Weber’s examination of Verstehen is far more scientist—social reality—has a specifi c meaning and complex than the above commentary suggests, because relevance structure for the beings living, acting, and the empathetic understanding that seems to be implied thinking within it. By a series of common-sense above was not the way in which he applied it (Bauman constructs they have pre-selected and pre-interpreted 1978), while the question of what is and is not a genu- this world which they experience as the reality of their inely phenomenological approach to the social sciences daily lives. It is these thought objects of theirs which is a matter of some dispute (Heap and Roth 1973). How- determine their behaviour by motivating it. The thought ever, the similarity in the writings of the hermeneutic– objects constructed by the social scientist, in order to phenomenological tradition and of the Verstehen approach, grasp this social reality, have to be founded upon the with their emphasis upon social action as being meaning- thought objects constructed by the common-sense ful to actors and therefore needing to be interpreted from thinking of men [and women!], living their daily life their point of view, coupled with the rejection of positiv- within the social world. (Schutz 1962: 59) ism, contributed to a stream of thought often referred to as interpretivism (e.g. J. A. Hughes 1990).

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Verstehen and the hermeneutic–phenomenological phenomenological tradition, but there is no concrete tradition do not exhaust the intellectual infl uences on evidence of this. There are other intellectual currents interpretivism. The theoretical tradition in sociology that have affi nities with the interpretative stance, such known as symbolic interactionism has also been regarded as the working-through of the ramifi cations of the works by many writers as a further infl uence. Again, the case of the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein (Winch 1958), is not clear-cut. The implications for empirical research but the hermeneutic–phenomenological, Verstehen, and of the ideas of the founders of symbolic interactionism, symbolic interactionist traditions can be considered in particular George Herbert Mead (1863–1931), whose major infl uences. discussion of the way in which our notion of self emerges Taking an interpretative stance can mean that the through an appreciation of how others see us, have been researcher may come up with surprising fi ndings, or at hotly debated. There was a school of research, known least fi ndings that appear surprising if a largely external as the Iowa school, that drew heavily on Mead’s con- stance is taken—that is, a position from outside the par- cepts and ideas, but proceeded in a direction that most ticular social context being studied. Research in focus 2.6 people would prefer to depict as largely positivist in tone provides an interesting example of this possibility. (Meltzer et al. 1975). Moreover, some writers have Of course, as the example in Research in focus 2.6 argued that Mead’s approach is far more consistent suggests, when the social scientist adopts an interpreta- with a natural science approach than has typically been tive stance, he or she is not simply laying bare how recognized (McPhail and Rexroat 1979). However, the members of a social group interpret the world around general tendency has been to view symbolic inter- them. The social scientist will almost certainly be aiming actionism as occupying similar intellectual space to to place the interpretations that have been elicited into a the hermeneutic–phenomenological tradition and so as social scientifi c frame. There is a double interpretation broadly interpretative in approach. This tendency is going on: the researcher is providing an interpretation largely the product of the writings of Herbert Blumer, a of others’ interpretations. Indeed, there is a third level of student of Mead’s who acted as his mentor’s spokesman interpretation going on, because the researcher’s inter- and interpreter, and his followers (Hammersley 1989; pretations have to be further interpreted in terms of the R. Collins 1994). Not only did Blumer coin the term concepts, theories, and literature of a discipline. Thus, symbolic interaction; he also provided a gloss on Mead’s taking the example in Research in focus 2.6, Foster’s writings that has decidedly interpretative overtones. (1995) suggestion that Riverside is not perceived as a Symbolic interactionists argue that interaction takes high crime area by residents is her interpretation of her place in such a way that the individual is continually subjects’ interpretations. She then had the additional interpreting the symbolic meaning of his or her environ- job of placing her interesting fi ndings into a social scien- ment (which includes the actions of others) and acts on tifi c frame, which she accomplished by relating them to the basis of this imputed meaning. In research terms, existing concepts and discussions in criminology of such according to Blumer (1962: 188), ‘the position of symbolic things as informal social control, neighbourhood watch interaction requires the student to catch the process of schemes, and the role of housing as a possible cause of interpretation through which [actors] construct their criminal activity. actions’, a statement that brings out clearly his views of The aim of this section has been to outline how epi- the research implications of symbolic interactionism and stemological considerations—especially those relating of Mead’s thought. to the question of whether a natural science approach, It should be appreciated that the parallelism and in particular a positivist one, can supply legitimate between symbolic interactionism and the hermeneutic– knowledge of the social world—are related to research phenomenological tradition should not be exaggerated. practice. There is a link with the earlier section in that a The two are united in their antipathy for positivism deductive approach to the relationship between theory and have in common an interpretative stance. However, and research is typically associated with a positivist posi- symbolic interactionism is, at least in the hands of tion. Key concept 2.2 does try to suggest that inductivism Blumer and the many writers and researchers who have is also a feature of positivism (third principle), but, in the followed in his wake, a type of social theory that has dis- working-through of its implementation in the practice of tinctive epistemological implications; the hermeneutic– social research, it is the deductive element (second prin- phenomenological tradition, by contrast, is best thought ciple) that tends to be emphasized. Similarly, the third of as a general epistemological approach in its own right. level of interpretation that a researcher engaged in inter- Blumer may have been infl uenced by the hermeneutic– pretative research must bring into operation is very much

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Research in focus 2.6 Interpretivism in practice

Foster (1995) conducted ethnographic research using participant observation and semi-structured interviews in a housing estate in East London, referred to as Riverside. The estate had a high level of crime, as indicated by offi cial statistics on crime. However, she found that residents did not perceive the estate to be a high crime area. This perception could be attributed to a number of factors, but a particularly important reason was the existence of ‘informal social control’. People expected a certain level of crime, but felt fairly secure because informal social control allowed levels of crime to be contained. Informal social control comprised a number of different aspects. One aspect was that neighbours often looked out for each other. In the words of one of Foster’s interviewees: ‘If I hear a bang or shouting I go out. If there’s aggravation I come in and ring the police. I don’t stand for it.’ Another aspect of informal social control was that people often felt secure because they knew each other. Another respondent said: ‘I don’t feel nervous . . . because people do generally know each other. We keep an eye on each other’s properties . . . I feel quite safe because you know your neighbours and you know they’re there . . . they look out for you’ (Foster 1995: 575).

part of the kind of inductive strategy described in the correspondence. Thus, particular epistemological prin- previous section. However, while such interconnections ciples and research practices do not necessarily go hand between epistemological issues and research practice in hand in a neat unambiguous manner. This point will exist, it is important not to overstate them, since they be made again on several occasions and will be a special represent tendencies rather than defi nitive points of focus of Chapter 26.

Ontological considerations

Questions of social ontology are concerned with the labour. There is a hierarchy. It has a mission statement. nature of social entities. The central point of orientation And so on. The degree to which these features exist from here is the question of whether social entities can and organization to organization is variable, but in thinking should be considered objective entities that have a reality in these terms we are tending to the view that an organ- external to social actors, or whether they can and should ization has a reality that is external to the individuals who be considered social constructions built up from the per- inhabit it. Moreover, the organization represents a social ceptions and actions of social actors. These positions are order in that it exerts pressure on individuals to conform frequently referred to respectively as objectivism and to the requirements of the organization. People learn constructionism. Their differences can be illustrated by and apply the rules and regulations. They follow the reference to two of the most common and central terms standardized procedures. They do the jobs to which they in social science—organization and culture. are appointed. People tell them what to do and they tell others what to do. They learn and apply the values in the Objectivism mission statement. If they do not do these things, they may be reprimanded or even fi red. The organization is Objectivism is an ontological position that implies that therefore a constraining force that acts on and inhibits social phenomena confront us as external facts that are its members. beyond our reach or infl uence (see Key concept 2.5). The same can be said of culture. Cultures and subcul- We can discuss organization or an organization as a tures can be viewed as repositories of widely shared tangible object. It has rules and regulations. It adopts values and customs into which people are socialized so standardized procedures for getting things done. People that they can function as good citizens or as full partici- are appointed to different jobs within a division of pants. Cultures and subcultures constrain us because we

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Key concept 2.5 What is objectivism?

Objectivism is an ontological position that asserts that social phenomena and their meanings have an existence that is independent of social actors. It implies that social phenomena and the categories that we use in everyday discourse have an existence that is independent or separate from actors.

internalize their beliefs and values. In the case of both ried out research in a psychiatric hospital and proposed organization and culture, the social entity in question that it was best conceptualized as a ‘negotiated order’. comes across as something external to the actor and as Instead of taking the view that order in organizations is a having an almost tangible reality of its own. It has the pre-existing characteristic, they argue that it is worked characteristics of an object and hence of having an objec- at. Rules were far less extensive and less rigorously im- tive reality. To a very large extent, these are the ‘classic’ posed than might be supposed from the classic account ways of conceptualizing organization and culture. of organization. Indeed, Strauss et al. (1973: 308) prefer to refer to them as ‘much less like commands, and much Constructionism more like general understandings’. Precisely because relatively little of the spheres of action of doctors, nurses, However, we can consider an alternative ontological and other personnel was prescribed, the social order of position—constructionism (Key concept 2.6). This posi- the hospital was an outcome of agreed-upon patterns of tion challenges the suggestion that categories such as action that were themselves the products of negotiations organization and culture are pre-given and therefore between the different parties involved. The social order confront social actors as external realities that they have is in a constant state of change because the hospital is ‘a no role in fashioning. place where numerous agreements are continually being Let us take organization fi rst. Strauss et al. (1973), terminated or forgotten, but also as continually being drawing on insights from symbolic interactionism, car- established, renewed, reviewed, revoked, revised. . . . In

Key concept 2.6 What is constructionism?

Constructionism is an ontological position (often also referred to as constructivism) that asserts that social phenomena and their meanings are continually being accomplished by social actors. It implies that social phenomena and categories are not only produced through social interaction but that they are in a constant state of revision. In recent years, the term has also come to include the notion that researchers’ own accounts of the social world are constructions. In other words, the researcher always presents a specifi c version of social reality, rather than one that can be regarded as defi nitive. Knowledge is viewed as indeterminate, a position redolent of postmodernism (see Key concept 17.1, which further examines this viewpoint). This sense of constructionism is usually allied to the ontological version of the term. In other words, these are linked meanings. Both meanings are antithetical to objectivism (see Key concept 2.5), but the second meaning is also antithetical to realism (see Key concept 2.3). The fi rst meaning might be thought of usefully as constructionism in relation to the social world; the second as constructionism in relation to the nature of knowledge of the social world (and indeed the natural world).

Increasingly, the notion of constructionism in relation to the nature of knowledge of the social world is being incorporated into notions of constructionism, but in this book I will be using the term in relation to the fi rst meaning, whereby constructionism is presented as an ontological position in relating to social objects and categories—that is, one that views them as socially constructed.

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any pragmatic sense, this is the hospital at the moment: like ‘masculinity’ might be treated as a social construc- this is its social order’ (Strauss et al. 1973: 316–17). The tion. This notion implies that, rather than being treated authors argue that a preoccupation with the formal prop- as a distinct inert entity, masculinity is construed as erties of organizations (rules, organizational charts, regu- something whose meaning is built up during interaction. lations, roles) tends to neglect the degree to which order That meaning is likely to be a highly ephemeral one, in in organizations has to be accomplished in everyday that it will vary by both time and place. This kind of interaction, though this is not to say that the formal stance frequently displays a concern with the language properties have no element of constraint on individual that is employed to present categories in particular ways. action. It suggests that the social world and its categories are not Much the same kind of point can be made about the external to us, but are built up and constituted in and idea of culture. Instead of seeing culture as an external through interaction. This tendency can be seen particu- reality that acts on and constrains people, it can be larly in discourse analysis, which is examined in Chap- taken to be an emergent reality in a continuous state of ter 22. As Potter (1996: 98) observes: ‘The world . . . is construction and reconstruction. Becker (1982: 521), constituted in one way or another as people talk it, for example, has suggested that ‘people create culture write it and argue it.’ This sense of constructionism is continuously. . . . No set of cultural understandings . . . highly antithetical to realism (see Key concept 2.3). provides a perfectly applicable solution to any problem Constructionism frequently results in an interest in the people have to solve in the course of their day, and they representation of social phenomena. Research in focus therefore must remake those solutions, adapt their under- 2.7 provides an illustration of this idea in relation to standings to the new situation in the light of what is the representation of the breast cancer epidemic in different about it.’ Like Strauss et al., Becker recognizes the USA. that the constructionist position cannot be pushed to the Constructionism is also frequently used as a term that extreme: it is necessary to appreciate that culture has a refl ects the indeterminacy of our knowledge of the social reality that ‘persists and antedates the participation of world (see Key concept 2.6 and the idea of construction- particular people’ and shapes their perspectives, but it is ism in relation to the nature of knowledge of the social not an inert objective reality that possesses only a sense world). However, in this book, I will be using the term in of constraint: it acts as a point of reference but is always connection with the notion that social phenomena and in the process of being formed. categories are social constructions. Neither the work of Strauss et al. nor that of Becker pushes the constructionist argument to the extreme. Relationship to social research Each admits to the pre-existence of their objects of inter- est (organization and culture respectively). However, in Questions of social ontology cannot be divorced from each case we see an intellectual predilection for stressing issues concerning the conduct of social research. Onto- the active role of individuals in the social construction of logical assumptions and commitments will feed into the social reality. Not all writers adopting a constructionist ways in which research questions are formulated and position are similarly prepared to acknowledge the exis- research is carried out. If a research question is for- tence or at least importance of an objective reality. Walsh mulated in such a way as to suggest that organizations (1972: 19), for example, has written that ‘we cannot take and cultures are objective social entities that act on indi- for granted, as the natural scientist does, the availability viduals, the researcher is likely to emphasize the formal of a preconstituted world of phenomena for investiga- properties of organizations or the beliefs and values of tion’ and must instead ‘examine the processes by which members of the culture. Alternatively, if the researcher the social world is constructed’. Constructionism essen- formulates a research question so that the tenuousness tially invites the researcher to consider the ways in which of organization and culture as objective categories is social reality is an ongoing accomplishment of social stressed, it is likely that an emphasis will be placed on actors rather than something external to them and that the active involvement of people in reality construction. totally constrains them. In either case, it might be supposed that different Constructionism also suggests that the categories that approaches to the design of research and the collection people employ in helping them to understand the natural of data will be required. Later in the book, Research in and social world are in fact social products. The categories focus 20.8 provides an illustration of a study with a do not have built-in essences; instead, their meaning is strong commitment to a constructionist ontology and its constructed in and through interaction. Thus, a category implications for the research process.

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Research in focus 2.7 Constructionism in action

Lantz and Booth (1998) have shown that breast cancer can be treated as a social construction. They note that US data show a rise in the incidence of the disease since the early 1980s, which has led to the depiction of the trend as an epidemic. The authors examined a variety of popular magazines using qualitative content analysis (see Key concept 13.1 for a brief description of this m ethod). They note that many of the articles draw attention to the lifestyles of modern women, such as delaying fi rst births, diet and alcohol consumption, and having careers. The authors argue that the articles

ascribe blame to individual behaviors by listing a wide array of individual risk factors (many of which are not behaviors of ‘traditional’ women), and then offering prudent prescriptions for prevention. Women are portrayed as victims of an insidious disease, but also as victims of their own behaviors, many of which are related to the control of their own fertility. . . . These articles suggest that nontraditional women experience pathological repercussions within their bodies and, in turn, may be responsible for our current epidemic of breast cancer. (Lantz and Booth 1998: 915–16)

This article suggests that, as a social category, the breast cancer epidemic is being represented in popular magazines in a particular way—one that blames the victims and the lifestyles of modern women in particular. This is in spite of the fact that fewer than 20 per cent of cases of breast cancer are in women under the age of 50. Lantz and Booth’s study is fairly representative of a constructionist ontology in suggesting that the epidemic is not simply being construed as a social fact but is being ascribed a particular meaning (one that blames the victims of the disease). In this way, the representation of the disease in popular magazines forms an important element in its social construction.

Research strategy: quantitative and qualitative research

Many writers on methodological issues fi nd it helpful that there is a predisposition among researchers along to distinguish between quantitative research and quali- these lines, but many writers have suggested that the tative research. The status of the distinction is ambigu- differences are deeper than the superfi cial issue of the ous, because it is almost simultaneously regarded by presence or absence of quantifi cation. For many writers, some writers as a fundamental contrast and by others as quantitative and qualitative research differ with respect no longer useful or even simply as ‘false’ (Layder 1993: to their epistemological foundations and in other re- 110). However, there is little evidence to suggest that spects too. Indeed, if we take the areas that have been the use of the distinction is abating and even consider- the focus of the previous three sections—the connection able evidence of its continued, even growing, cur- between theory and research, epistemological consider- rency. The quantitative/qualitative distinction will be ations, and ontological considerations—quantitative and employed a great deal in this book, because it repres- qualitative research can be taken to form two distinctive ents a useful means of classifying different methods clusters of research strategy. By a research strategy, of social research and because it is a helpful umbrella I simply mean a general orientation to the conduct of for a range of issues concerned with the practice of social research. Table 2.1 outlines the differences between social research. quantitative and qualitative research in terms of the On the face of it, there would seem to be little to the three areas. quantitative/qualitative distinction other than the fact Thus, quantitative research can be construed as a that quantitative researchers employ measurement and research strategy that emphasizes quantifi cation in the qualitative researchers do not. It is certainly the case collection and analysis of data and that

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Table 2.1 Fundamental differences between quantitative and qualitative research strategies Quantitative Qualitative

Principal orientation to the role Deductive; testing of theory Inductive; generation of theory of theory in relation to research Epistemological orientation Natural science model, in particular positivism Interpretivism Ontological orientation Objectivism Constructionism

• entails a deductive approach to the relationship not as straightforward as Table 2.1 and the previous between theory and research, in which the accent is paragraph imply. While it is useful to contrast the two placed on the testing of theories; research strategies, it is necessary to be careful about • has incorporated the practices and norms of the natural hammering a wedge between them. It may seem per- scientifi c model and of positivism in particular; and verse to introduce a basic set of distinctions and then suggest that they are problematic. A recurring theme of embodies a view of social reality as an external, objec- • this book is that discussing the nature of social research tive reality. is just as complex as conducting research in the real By contrast, qualitative research can be construed as a world. You may discover general tendencies, but they research strategy that usually emphasizes words rather are precisely that—tendencies. In reality, the picture than quantifi cation in the collection and analysis of data becomes more complicated the more you delve. and that For example, it is common to describe qualitative research as concerned with the generation rather than • predominantly emphasizes an inductive approach the testing of theories. However, there are examples of to the relationship between theory and research, in studies in which qualitative research has been employed which the emphasis is placed on the generation of to test rather than to generate theories. For example, theories; Adler and Adler (1985) were concerned to explore the • has rejected the practices and norms of the natural sci- issue of whether participation in athletics in higher edu- entifi c model and of positivism in particular in prefer- cation in the USA is associated with higher or lower levels ence for an emphasis on the ways in which individuals of academic achievement, an issue on which the existing interpret their social world; and literature was inconsistent. This is an illustration of the use of the existing literature on a topic being employed as embodies a view of social reality as a constantly shift- • a kind of proxy for theory. The fi rst author was a partici- ing emergent property of individuals’ creation. pant observer for four years of a basketball programme There is, in fact, considerably more to the quantitative/ in a university, and both authors carried out ‘intensive, qualitative distinction than this contrast. In Chapters 7 taped interviews’ with players. The authors’ fi ndings do and 17 the nature of quantitative and then qualitative lead them to conclude that athletic participation is likely research respectively will be outlined in much greater to result in lower academic achievement. This occurs detail, while in Chapters 26 and 27 the contrasting because the programme participants gradually drift features will be further explored. In particular, a number from idealistic goals about their academic careers, and of distinguishing features fl ow from the commitment of a variety of factors lead them to become increasingly the quantitative research strategy to a positivist epistem- detached from academic work. For example, one student ology and from the rejection of that epistemology by is quoted as saying: ‘If I was a student like most other practitioners of the qualitative research strategy. In other students I could do well, but when you play the calibre words, the three contrasts in Table 2.1 are basic, though of ball we do, you just can’t be an above-average student. fundamental, ones. What I strive for now is just to be an average student. . . . However, the interconnections between the differ- You just can’t fi nd the time to do all the reading’ (Adler ent features of quantitative and qualitative research are and Adler 1985: 247). This study shows how, although

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qualitative research is typically associated with generat- ing to understand how those made redundant responded ing theories, it can also be employed for testing them. to the experience in terms of such things as their job- Moreover, it is striking that, although the Adler and search methods, their inclination to fi nd jobs, and their Adler study is broadly interpretivist in epistemological political attitudes. As such, it has interpretivist overtones orientation, with its emphasis on how college athletes in spite of being an exercise in quantitative research. view their social situation, the fi ndings have objectivist, The point that is being made in this section is that rather than constructionist, overtones. For example, when quantitative and qualitative research represent different the authors describe the students’ academic performance research strategies and that each carries with it striking as ‘determined less by demographic characteristics and differences in terms of the role of theory, epistemological high school experiences than by the structure of their issues, and ontological concerns. However, the distinc- college experiences’ (Adler and Adler 1985: 249), they tion is not a hard-and-fast one: studies that have the are positing a social world that is ‘out there’ and that has broad characteristics of one research strategy may have a formal, objective quality. It is an example of qualitative a characteristic of the other. I will say more about the research in the sense that there is no quantifi cation or common features in quantitative and qualitative research very little of it, but it does not have all the other features in Chap ter 26. Not only this, but many writers argue outlined in Table 2.1. Similarly, the previously mentioned that the two can be combined within an overall research study by Westergaard et al. (1989) of the effects of project, and Chapter 27 examines precisely this possibil- redundancy was a quantitative study in the sense of ity. In Chapter 27, I will examine what is increasingly being concerned to measure a wide variety of concepts, referred to as mixed methods research. This term is but exhibited little evidence of a concern to test theor- widely used nowadays to refer to research that combines ies of unemployment or of a stressful life event like methods associated with both quantitative and qualita- redundancy. Instead, its conclusions revolve around seek- tive research.

Research in focus 2.8 Mixed methods research—an example

In 2001, Britain was profoundly affected by the Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD), which had a big impact on people’s movements. Poortinga et al. (2004) were interested in how far the public trusted the information the government was supplying and how it perceived the risks associated with the disease. Such issues were of interest in part because the researchers felt that the ways in which the public responds to a crisis was an important topic, but also because the issues connect with the infl uence in recent years of the notion of the ‘risk society’ (Beck 1992), which has attracted a good deal of sociological attention. At the height of the disease during 2–5 April 2001, the researchers conducted a survey by administering a self-completion questionnaire (see Chapter 10) to samples in two contrasting areas: Bude in Cornwall and Norwich in Norfolk. These two areas were chosen because they were very differently affected by FMD. The questionnaire covered the following areas: level of agreement with statements about the outbreak of the disease (for example, ‘My main concerns about FMD are to do with the possible impacts on human health’); perceptions of who was to blame; level of agreement with statements about the government’s handling of FMD; degrees of trust in various sources of information about the disease; and personal information, such as any connection with the farming or tourist industries. In addition, a qualitative research method—focus groups (see Chapter 21)—was employed. In May and June 2001, these groups were convened and members of the groups were asked about the same kinds of issues covered in the questionnaire. Focus group participants were chosen from among those who had indicated in their questionnaire replies that they were willing to be involved in a focus group discussion. Three focus group discussions took place. While the questionnaire data were able to demonstrate the variation in such things as trust in various information sources, the focus groups revealed ‘valuable additional information, especially on the reasons, rationalizations and arguments behind people’s understanding of the FMD issue’ (Poortinga et al. 2004: 86). As a result, the researchers were able to arrive at a more complete account of the FMD crisis than could have been obtained by either a quantitative or a qualitative research approach alone. This and other possible advantages of mixed methods research will be explored further in Chapter 27.

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Research in focus 2.9 Mixed methods research—an example

This second example of mixed methods research is probably one of the biggest studies in the UK using the approach—the Cultural Capital and Social Exclusion (CCSE) project. Like the research referred to in Research in Focus 2.1, the CCSE project was profoundly infl uenced by Bourdieu and in particular by his infl uential research on cultural capital and its role in the reproduction of social divisions (Bourdieu 1984). While the CCSE project was inspired by Bourdieu’s research, at the same time the researchers had some reservations about the methodological approach taken, the theoretical approach, and its relevance beyond the period in which the research was conducted and its milieu (France). The research was designed around three research questions:

• ‘What is the nature of cultural capital in Britain? What kinds of social exclusion are generated by the differential distribution of cultural capital across class positions?’ • ‘What are the relationships between economic capital, social capital and cultural capital, in particular how is cultural capital related to other forms of capital?’ • ‘What role does cultural capital play in relation to existing patterns of social exclusion? How can a closer knowledge of this assist in developing cultural policies designed to offset the effects of social exclusion?’ (www.open.ac.uk/socialsciences/cultural-capital-and-social-exclusion/research-questions.php, emphasis removed (accessed 13 August 2010))

Each of these three research questions was broken down into several subquestions. In order to address these research questions, the authors employed three main research methods:

1. Twenty-fi ve focus groups, with each group being made up of a distinctive group of members, for example, Pakistani middle class, supervisors, self-employed. 2. A structured interview survey of a large representative sample of 1,781 respondents within the UK. 3. Semi-structured interviews with 44 individuals from 30 households. The interviewees were sampled from the survey on the basis of socio-demographic and cultural capital characteristics. The interviewers also took notes about the households. In addition, 11 interviews were conducted with ‘elite’ individuals, because it was felt that these were not suffi ciently present in the sample.

Thus, the CCSE project comprised two qualitative research methods (focus groups and semi-structured interviewing) and one quantitative method (a structured interview survey). The mixed methods aspect of this research fulfi lled several roles for the researchers. For example, although the focus groups yielded fi ndings that could be linked to the survey ones, they were also used to inform the design of the survey questions. There will be further reference to the utility of the mixed methods approach in Chapter 27, while the components of the CCSE project will be referred to in the interim chapters.

Sources: Silva and Wright (2008); Bennett et al. (2009); Silva et al. (2009); www.open.ac.uk/socialsciences/cultural- capital-and-social-exclusion/project-summary.php (accessed 13 August 2010).

In Research in focus 2.8 and 2.9, I present examples of quantitative and qualitative research. By contrasting the mixed methods studies. I am presenting them here partly two approaches, it is easy to see them as incompatible. to provide some early insights into the possibility of As the examples in Research in focus 2.8 and 2.9 show, doing mixed methods research, but also to show how they can be fruitfully combined within a single project. a wedge need not and should not be driven between This point will be amplifi ed throughout Chapter 27.

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Infl uences on the conduct of social research

We are beginning to get a picture now that social re- • formulation of research design and data-collection search is infl uenced by a variety of factors. Figure 2.3 techniques; summarizes the infl uences that have been examined so • implementation of data collection; far, but has added two more—the impact of values and of • analysis of data; practical considerations. • interpretation of data; • conclusions. Values There are, therefore, numerous points at which bias and Values refl ect either the personal beliefs or the feelings the intrusion of values can occur. Values can materialize of a researcher. On the face of it, we would expect that at any point during the course of research. The researcher social scientists should be value free and objective in may develop an affection or sympathy, which was not their research. After all, one might want to argue that necessarily present at the outset of an investigation, for research that simply refl ected the personal biases of its the people being studied. It is quite common, for example, practitioners could not be considered valid and scien- for researchers working within a qualitative research tifi c because it was bound up with the subjectivities strategy, and in particular when they use participant of its practitioners. Such a view is held with less and observation or very intensive interviewing, to develop less frequency among social scientists nowadays. Émile a close affi nity with the people whom they study to the Durkheim (1858–1917) wrote that one of the corollaries extent that they fi nd it diffi cult to disentangle their stance of his injunction to treat social facts as things was that all as social scientists from their subjects’ perspective. This ‘preconceptions must be eradicated’ (Durkheim 1938: possibility may be exacerbated by the tendency that 31). Since values are a form of preconception, his exhor- Becker (1967) identifi ed for sociologists in particular to tation was at least implicitly to do with suppressing them be very sympathetic to underdog groups. Equally, social when conducting research. His position is unlikely to be scientists may be repelled by the people they study. The regarded as credible nowadays, because there is a grow- social anthropologist Colin Turnbull (1973) reports the ing recognition that it is not feasible to keep the values results of his research into an African tribe known as the that a researcher holds totally in check. These can Ik. Turnbull was appalled by what he witnessed: a love- intrude at any or all of a number of points in the process less (and for him unlovable) tribe that left its young and of social research: very old to die. While Turnbull was able to point to the • choice of research area; conditions that had led to this state of affairs, he was very • formulation of research question; honest in his disgust for what he witnessed, particularly during the period of his initial sojourn among the tribe. • choice of method; However, that very disgust is a product of Western values about the family, and it is likely, as he acknowledged, that these will have infl uenced his perception of what Figugur e 2.3 he witnessed. Infl uences on social research Another position in relation to the whole question of values and bias is to recognize and acknowledge that research cannot be value free but to ensure that there is Theory Practical considerations Epistemology no untrammelled incursion of values in the research pro- cess and to be self-refl ective and so exhibit refl exivity (see Key concept 17.5) about the part played by such Social research factors. As Turnbull (1973: 13) put it at the beginning of his book on the Ik: ‘the reader is entitled to know some- thing of the aims, expectations, hopes and attitudes that Values Ontology the writer brought to the fi eld with him, for these will surely infl uence not only how he sees things but even

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what he sees.’ Researchers are increasingly prepared to Still another approach is to argue for consciously forewarn readers of their biases and assumptions and value-laden research. This is a position taken by some how these may have infl uenced the subsequent fi ndings. feminist writers who have argued that only research on There has been a growth since the mid-1970s of collec- women that is intended for women will be consistent tions of inside reports of what doing a piece of research with the wider political needs of women. Mies (1993: was really like, as against the generalities presented in 68) has argued that in feminist research the ‘postulate of social research methods textbooks (like this one!). These value free research, of neutrality and indifference towards collections frequently function as ‘confessions’, an ele- the research objects, has to be replaced by conscious par- ment of which is often the writer’s preparedness to be tiality, which is achieved through partial identifi cation open about his or her personal biases. with the research objects’ (emphases in original).

Student experience The infl uence of feminism on research questions

Sarah Hanson is very clear about the infl uence of feminism on her research and on her research questions in particular. My research project focused on the representation of women through the front covers of fi ve women’s magazines, combining the application of feminist theory with the decoding practices of content analysis. Throughout the project I wanted to understand the nature of women’s magazines, the infl uences they have on women’s sense of self and identity and the role the magazines play. I asked: do women’s magazines support or destroy women’s identity and do they encourage self-respect or self-scrutiny? I wanted to combine theory with fact, focusing on the meanings behind the presentation of images and text. Similarly, for her research on non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and sex workers in Thailand, Erin Sanders wrote that she ‘employed a feminist methodology—and as such attempted to engage with my research participants, particularly the sex workers, as a “friend” rather than as a “researcher”’. She also writes: I chose to use a feminist methodology because I wanted to eliminate the power imbalance in the research relationship. As there are a number of power issues with a ‘White’, ‘Western’ woman interviewing ‘Non-White’, ‘Non-Western’ sex workers, I had hoped a feminist methodology . . . would help redress some of the power issues. To read more about Sarah and Erin’s research experiences, go to the Online Resource Centre that accompanies this book at: www.oxfordtextbooks.co.uk/orc/brymansrm4e/

The signifi cance of feminism in relation to values goes tive research among feminists. Not only was qualitative further than this, however. In particular, several feminist research seen as more consistent with the values of fem- social researchers around the early 1980s proposed that inism; it was seen as more adaptable to those values. the principles and practices associated with quantitative Thus, feminist qualitative research came to be associated research were incompatible with feminist research on with an approach in which the investigator eschewed women. For writers like Oakley (1981), quantitative a value-neutral approach and engaged with the people research was bound up with male values of control that being studied as people and not simply as respondents to can be seen in the general orientation of the research research instruments. The stance of feminism in relation strategy—control of the research subject/respondent to both quantitative and qualitative approaches demon- and control of the research context and situation. strates the ways in which values have implications for the Moreover, the research process was seen as one-way process of social investigation. In more recent years, traffi c, in which researchers extract information from there has been a softening of the attitudes of feminists the people being studied and give little, or more usually towards quantitative research. Several writers have nothing, in return. For many feminists, such a strategy acknowledged a viable and acceptable role for quanti- bordered on exploitation and was incompatible with tative research, particularly when it is employed in feminism’s values of sisterhood and non-hierarchical conjunction with qualitative research (Jayaratne and relationships between women. The antipathy towards Stewart 1991; Oakley 1998). This issue will be picked up quantitative research resulted in a preference for qualita- in Chapters 17, 26, and 27.

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There are, then, different positions that can be taken from which to draw leads. A more exploratory stance up in relation to values and value freedom. Far fewer may be preferable, and, in this connection, qualitative writers overtly subscribe to the position that the prin- research may serve the researcher’s needs better, since it ciple of objectivity can be put into practice than in the is typically associated with the generation rather than past. Quantitative researchers sometimes seem to be the testing of theory (see Table 2.1) and with a rela- writing in a way that suggests an aura of objectivity tively unstructured approach to the research process (see (Mies 1993), but we simply do not know how far they Chapter 17). Another dimension may have to do with the subscribe to such a position. There is a greater awareness nature of the topic and of the people being investigated. today of the limits to objectivity, so that some of the For example, if the researcher needs to engage with indi- highly confi dent, not to say naive, pronouncements on viduals or groups involved in illicit activities, such as the subject, like Durkheim’s, have fallen into disfavour. gang violence (Patrick 1973), drug dealing (P. A. Adler A further way in which values are relevant to the con- 1985), or the murky underworld of organs-trading duct of social research is through adherence to ethical (Scheper-Hughes 2004), it is unlikely that a social survey principles or standards. This issue will be followed up would gain the confi dence of the subjects involved or in Chapter 6. achieve the necessary rapport. In fact, the idea of con- ducting survey research in such contexts or on such Practical considerations respondents looks rather ridiculous. It is not surprising, therefore, that researchers in these areas have tended to Nor should we neglect the importance and signifi cance use a qualitative strategy where there is an opportunity of practical issues in decisions about how social research to gain the confi dence of the subjects of the investiga- should be carried out. There are a number of different tion or even in some cases not reveal their identity as dimensions to this issue. For one thing, choices of re- researchers, albeit with ethical dilemmas of the kind dis- search strategy, design, or method have to be dovetailed cussed in Chapter 6. By contrast, it does not seem likely with the specifi c research question being investigated. If that the hypothesis in the research described in Research we are interested in teasing out the relative importance in focus 2.4 could have been tested with a qualitative of a number of different causes of a social phenomenon, method like participant observation. it is quite likely that a quantitative strategy will fi t our While practical considerations may seem rather mun- needs, because, as will be shown in Chapter 7, the assess- dane and uninteresting compared with the lofty realm ment of cause is one of its keynotes. Alternatively, if we inhabited by the philosophical debates surrounding such are interested in the world views of members of a certain discussions about epistemology and ontology, they are social group, a qualitative research strategy that is sensi- important ones. All social research is a coming-together tive to how participants interpret their social world may of the ideal and the feasible. Because of this, there will be be the direction to choose. If a researcher is interested in many circumstances in which the nature of the topic or of a topic on which no or virtually no research has been the subjects of an investigation and the constraints on done in the past, the quantitative strategy may be diffi - a researcher loom large in decisions about how best to cult to employ, because there is little prior literature proceed.

Student experience A practical consideration in the choice of research method One of the factors that infl uenced Rebecca Barnes’s choice of the semi-structured interview for her study of violence in women’s same-sex intimate relationships was that she felt that the topic is a highly sensitive area and that she therefore needed to be able to observe her interviewees’ emotional responses. I felt that, given the sensitivity of the research topic, semi-structured, in-depth interviews would be most appropriate. This gave me the opportunity to elicit women’s accounts of abuse in a setting where I was able to observe their emotional responses to the interview and endeavour to minimize any distress or other negative feelings that might result from participating in the research. To read more about Rebecca’s research experiences, go to the Online Resource Centre that accompanies this book at: www.oxfordtextbooks.co.uk/orc/brymansrm4e/

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Key points

● Quantitative and qualitative research constitute different approaches to social investigation and carry with them important epistemological and ontological considerations. ● Theory can be depicted as something that precedes research (as in quantitative research) or as something that emerges out of it (as in qualitative research). ● Epistemological considerations loom large in considerations of research strategy. To a large extent, these revolve around the desirability of employing a natural science model (and in particular positivism) versus interpretivism. ● Ontological considerations, concerning objectivism versus constructionism, also constitute important dimensions of the quantitative/qualitative contrast. ● Values may impinge on the research process at different times. ● Practical considerations in decisions about research methods are also important factors. ● Feminist researchers have tended to prefer a qualitative approach, though there is some evidence of a change of viewpoint in this regard.

Questions for review

Theory and research ● If you had to conduct some social research now, what would the topic be and what factors would have infl uenced your choice? How important was addressing theory in your consideration? ● Outline, using examples of your own, the difference between grand and middle-range theory. ● What are the differences between inductive and deductive theory and why is the distinction important?

Epistemological considerations ● What is meant by each of the following terms: positivism; realism; and interpretivism? Why is it important to understand each of them? ● What are the implications of epistemological considerations for research practice?

Ontological considerations ● What are the main differences between epistemological and ontological considerations? ● What is meant by objectivism and constructionism? ● Which theoretical ideas have been particularly instrumental in the growth of interest in qualitative research?

Research strategy: quantitative and qualitative research ● Outline the main differences between quantitative and qualitative research in terms of: the relationship between theory and data; epistemological considerations; and ontological considerations. ● To what extent is quantitative research solely concerned with testing theories and qualitative research with generating theories?

Infl uences on the conduct of social research ● What are some of the main infl uences on social research?

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Online Resource Centre www.oxfordtextbooks.co.uk/orc/brymansrm4e/

Visit the Online Resource Centre that accompanies this book to enrich your understanding of social research strategies. Consult web links, test yourself using multiple choice questions, and gain further guidance and inspiration from the Student Researcher’s Toolkit.

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1 Paradigms of Social Research

1. Kuhn and the paradigms of sciences 9 2. Three basic questions 11 3. Positivism 13 4. Neopositivism and postpositivism 17 5. Interpretivism 20 6. A final note: radicalization, criticism and new tendencies 25

This chapter illustrates the philosophical method. It seems useful therefore briefly to bases of the two basic approaches to social review the meaning given to the concept of research which gave rise to the families of the paradigm by the scholar who, in the quantitative and qualitative techniques. We 1960s, brought it once again to the attention of will begin with the concept of paradigm – that philosophers and sociologists of science. is, the perspective that inspires and directs a We are referring to Thomas Kuhn and his given science. Then we shall examine the his- celebrated essay The Structure of Scientific torical roots and the guiding principles of the Revolutions (1962). positivist and the interpretive paradigms. The Reflecting on the historical development of chapter ends with a few reflections concern- the sciences, Kuhn refuted the traditional ing currents trends in social research. understanding of the sciences as a cumulative and linear progression of new acquisitions. According to the traditional conception, single 1. KUHN AND THE PARADIGMS inventions and discoveries would be added to OF SCIENCES the previous body of knowledge in the same manner as bricks are placed one on top of another in the construction of a building. The notion of ‘paradigm’ has ancient origins According to Kuhn, however, while this is the in the history of philosophical thought. It was process of science in ‘normal’ times, there are utilized both by Plato (to mean ‘model’) and also ‘revolutionary’ moments, in which the by Aristotle (to mean ‘example’). In the social continuity with the past is broken and a new sciences its use has been inflated and con- construction is begun, just as – to take up the fused by multiple and different meanings: building metaphor again – from time to time, these range from a synonym for theory to an old brick building is blown up to make room an internal subdivision of a theory, from a for a structurally different one, for example a system of ideas of a pre-scientific nature to skyscraper made of glass and aluminium. a school of thought, from an exemplary Kuhn illustrates his argument with a rich research procedure to the equivalent of collection of examples from the natural 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 10

10 Social Research

sciences (especially from physics). For and it is this aspect of his theorising, rather instance, he cites the development of optical than his analysis of the developmental process physics, which is currently interpreted in in science, that interests us here. quantum terms; according to this view, light Without a paradigm a science lacks orienta- is made up of photons, which display some of tions and criteria of choice: all problems, all the features of waves and some of the proper- methods, all techniques are equally legiti- ties of particles. Kuhn points out that, before mate. By contrast, the paradigm constitutes a quantum theory was developed by Planck, guide: ‘Paradigms’ – recalls Kuhn – ‘provide Einstein and others, light was believed to be scientists not only with a map but also with a transversal wave movement. This latter some of the directions essential for map- theory was developed at the beginning of making. In learning a paradigm the scientist the nineteenth century. Still earlier, in the acquires theory, methods, and standards seventeenth century, the dominant view was together, usually in an inextricable mixture’ that of Newtonian optics, according to which (1962: 109). light was made up of material corpuscles. Kuhn defines normal science as those phases The shift from one theoretical perspective in a scientific discipline during which a given to another is so pervasive and has such radi- paradigm, amply agreed to by the scientific cal consequences for the discipline concerned community, predominates. During this phase, that Kuhn does not hesitate to use the term as long as the operating paradigm is not ‘scientific revolution’. What changes in a replaced by another in a ‘revolutionary’ given discipline after one of these revolu- manner, a scientific discipline does indeed tions? It produces ‘a shift in the problems develop in that linear and cumulative way available for scientific scrutiny and in the that has been attributed to the whole of scien- standards by which the profession deter- tific development. ‘No part of the aim of mined what it should count as an admissible normal science is to call forth new sort of problem or as a legitimate problem-solution’ phenomena … Instead, normal-scientific (1962: 6). A reorientation in the discipline research is directed to the articulation of those occurs that consists of ‘a displacement of the phenomena and theories that the paradigm conceptual network through which scientists already supplies’ (Kuhn, 1962: 24). view the world’ (1962: 102). This ‘conceptual Numerous examples of scientific para- network’ is what Kuhn calls a ‘paradigm’, digms are to be found in the history of the

BOX 1.1 PARADIGM

What does Thomas Kuhn mean by ‘paradigm’? He means a theoretical perspective:

• accepted by the community of scientists of a given discipline • founded on the previous acquisitions of that discipline • that directs research through:

š the specification and choice of what to study š the formulation of hypotheses to explain the phenomenon observed š the identification of the most suitable empirical research techniques. 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 11

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natural sciences. Going back to our previous This is the interpretation of Friedrichs (1970) example, we can speak of corpuscular, wave, who, after highlighting the paradigm inspired and quantum paradigms in optical physics. by Parsons’ structural-functionalism, sees in Likewise, as examples of alternative para- the Marxist dialectic approach the second par- digms that have succeeded one another in adigm of sociology, in which the concepts of time, we can quote Newtonian and Einsteinian system and consensus that are central to func- mechanics, Ptolemaic and Copernican cosmo- tionalism are replaced by that of conflict. logy, and so on. This interpretation of the concept of the To what extent can we speak of paradigms paradigm in terms of an overall theoretical in the social sciences? Kuhn notes that the perspective which does not exclude other per- paradigm is a characteristic feature of the spectives but rather is in open competition ‘mature’ sciences. Before the corpuscular with them, is certainly the most widespread theory of light was introduced by Newton, no interpretation and corresponds to the current common paradigm existed among scientists use of the term in the social sciences. in this sector; instead, various schools and Nevertheless, this less rigorous interpretation, sub-schools opposed and competed with one which adapts Kuhn’s original category to the another, each with its own theory and point of status of the social sciences, must not be trivi- view. Consequently, concludes Kuhn, ‘The net alized by equating a paradigm with a theory result of their activity was something less or a school of thought. Indeed, fundamental than science’ (1962: 13). In this perspective, to the concept of the paradigm is its pre- because the social sciences lack a single para- theoretical and, in the final analysis, meta- digm broadly shared by the scientific commu- physical character of a ‘guiding vision’, ‘a view nity, they are in a pre-paradigmatic state, of the world’, which shapes and organizes except perhaps for economics (according to both theoretical reflection and empirical Kuhn, ‘economists agree on what economics research and, as such, precedes both. is’, while ‘it remains an open question what In this interpretation, the concept of the parts of social science have yet acquired such paradigm seems useful in analysing the paradigm at all’ (1962: 14). various basic frames of reference that have What has been said with regard to the been put forward, and which are still being social sciences also holds for sociology. evaluated in the field of social research Indeed, it is difficult to identify a paradigm methodology. that has been agreed upon, even for limited periods, by the community of sociologists. Nevertheless, there exists another interpreta- tion of the thinking of Kuhn, which has 2. THREE BASIC QUESTIONS been proposed in an attempt to apply his categories to sociology. This interpretation redefines the concept of the paradigm, main- Having defined and circumscribed the con- taining all the elements of the original defini- cept of a paradigm and briefly discussed its tion (theoretical perspective that defines the application to the social sciences, we will now relevance of social phenomena, puts forward abandon the slippery terrain of the paradigms interpretative hypotheses and orients the of sociological theory (one paradigm? two para- techniques of empirical research) except one: digms? a hundred paradigms?) for more solid that the paradigm is agreed upon by the ground: the methodology of social research. We members of the scientific community. This will not, however, go deeply into the complex paves the way for the presence of multiple epistemological problems of how many and paradigms inside a given discipline; thus, which philosophical frameworks guide instead of being a pre-paradigmatic discipline, empirical research in the social sciences. sociology becomes a multi-paradigmatic one. Instead, we will confine ourselves to a historical 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 12

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review by briefly describing the fundamental these techniques, however, it is essential to perspectives that have been proposed and explore their philosophical origins, since only become accepted during the evolution of the by doing so can we achieve a full understand- discipline. Since this is a book on social ing of them. research techniques, it seems natural and In order to adequately compare the two proper to begin by raising the question of the above-mentioned paradigms, we will attempt founding paradigms of social research, from to understand how they respond to the fun- which the first operative procedures emerged, damental interrogatives facing social research and which subsequently guided the develop- (and scientific research in general). These can ment of empirical research. Indeed, as has be traced back to three basic questions: Does been said, one of the functions of a paradigm (social) reality exist? Is it knowable? How can is to establish acceptable research methods we acquire knowledge about it? In other and techniques in a discipline. As Hughes words: Essence, Knowledge and Method.1 writes: The ontological question2 This is the question Every research tool or procedure is inextrica- of ‘what’. It regards the nature and form bly embedded in commitments to particular of social reality. It asks if the world of social versions of the world and ways of knowing phenomena is a real and objective world that world made by researchers using them. endowed with an autonomous existence out- To use a questionnaire, an attitude scale of side the human mind and independent from behavior, take the role of a participant the interpretation given to it by the subject. It observer, select a random sample ... is to be asks, therefore, if social phenomena are involved in conceptions of the world which allow these instruments to be used for ‘things in their own right’ or ‘representations the purposes conceived. No technique or of things’. The problem is linked to the more method of investigation ... is self valida- general philosophical question of the exis- ting: its effectiveness, its very status as tence of things and of the external world. a research instrument ... is dependent, ulti- Indeed, the existence of an idea in the mind mately, on philosophical justification. tells us nothing about the existence of the (Hughes, 1980: 13) object in reality, just as a painting of a unicorn does not prove the existence of unicorns. Within the philosophical perspectives that generated and have accompanied the growth The epistemological question3 This is the of social research, can we identify visions that question of the relationship between the are sufficiently general, cohesive and opera- ‘who’ and the ‘what’ (and the outcome of this tive to be characterized as paradigms? It relationship). It regards the knowability of seems so. Indeed, there is broad agreement social reality and, above all, focuses on the among scholars that two general frames of relationship between the observer and the reference have historically oriented social reality observed. Clearly, the answer to this research since its inception: the ‘empiricist’ question depends on the answer to the previ- vision and the ‘humanist’ vision. Various ous ontological question. If the social world labels have been used, including ‘objectivism’ exists in its own right, independently from and ‘subjectivism’; here, we will utilize the human action, the aspiration to reach it and canonical term ‘positivism’ and the less con- understand it in a detached, objective way, solidated ‘interpretivism’. As we will soon without fear of altering it during the course of see, these are two organic and strongly the cognitive process, will be legitimate. opposed visions of social reality and how it Closely connected with the answer given to should be understood; and they have gener- the epistemological question are the forms ated two coherent and highly differentiated knowledge can take: these range from deter- blocks of research techniques. Before describing ministic ‘natural laws’ dominated by the 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 13

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categories of cause and effect, to less cogent constructed to address the manifest limits of (probabilistic) laws, to various kinds of gener- the original version. The original positivist alizations (e.g. Weberian ideal types), to the paradigm is presented both for historical exclusion of generalizations (only specific and reasons – since it was the vision that accom- contingent knowledge being admissible). panied the birth of the social sciences and, in particular, the birth of sociology – and The methodological question4 This is the because the character of the other two para- question of ‘how’ (how can social reality be digms can be better understood by examining studied?). It therefore regards the technical the criticisms levelled against it. instruments of the cognitive process. Here, Sociology was born under the auspices too, the answers depend closely on the of positivist thought. In the middle of the answers to the previous questions. A vision of nineteenth century, when the investigation of social reality as an external object that is not social phenomena was evolving into a subject influenced by the cognitive research proce- of scientific study, the paradigm of the natural dures of the scientist will accept manipulative sciences reigned supreme. Inevitably, the new techniques (e.g. experimentation, the control discipline took this paradigm as its model. of variables, etc.) more readily than a perspec- Indeed, the founders of the discipline, tive that underlines the existence of inter- Auguste Comte and Herbert Spencer among active processes between the scholar and the them, shared a naïve faith in the methods of object studied. natural science. The positivist paradigm is no The three questions are therefore inter- more than this: the study of social reality utiliz- related, not only because the answers to each ing the conceptual framework, the techniques of are greatly influenced by the answers to the observation and measurement, the instruments of other two, but also because it is sometimes mathematical analysis, and the procedures of infer- difficult to distinguish the boundaries ence of the natural sciences. between them (though, for the purpose of our Let us look more closely at the distinctive exposition, we will try to do so). Indeed, it is elements of this definition. The conceptual difficult to separate conceptions of the nature framework: the categories of ‘natural law’, of social reality from reflections on whether cause and effect, empirical verification, expla- (and how) it may be understood and, in turn, nation, etc. The techniques of observation and to separate these from the techniques that can measurement: the use of quantitative variables, be used to understand it. Then again, these even for qualitative phenomena; measurement interrelations are implicit in the very defini- procedures applied to ideological orientation, tion of the scientific paradigm which, as we mental abilities and psychological states (atti- have seen, is both a theoretical perspective tude measurement, intelligence tests, etc.) and a guide to research procedures. Mathematical analysis: the use of statistics, mathematical models, etc. The procedures of inference: the inductive process, whereby 3. POSITIVISM hypotheses regarding the unknown are formed on the basis of what is known and specific observations give rise to general laws; the use Table 1.1 shows a synopsis of the different of theory to predict outcomes; extrapolation paradigms with regard to the fundamental from the sample to the whole population. questions introduced above. First of all, it will According to Comte, the prophet of be noted that two versions of positivism are nineteenth-century sociological positivism, the presented: the original nineteenth-century acquisition of the positivist viewpoint consti- version, to which even the most tenacious tuted, in all sciences, the end-point of a trend empiricists no longer subscribe, and its that had previously passed through theological twentieth-century reformulation, which was and metaphysical stages. Such development 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 14

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Table 1.1 Characteristics of the basic paradigms of social research Positivism Postpositivism Interpretivism Ontology Naïve realism: social Critical realism: social Constructivism: the knowable reality is ‘real’ and reality is ‘real’ but world is that of meanings knowable (as if it knowable only in an attributed by individuals. were a ‘thing’) imperfect and Relativism (multiple probabilistic manner realities): these constructed realities vary in form and content among individuals, groups, and cultures Epistemology Dualism-objectivity Modified dualism- Non-dualism; non-objectivity. objectivity Researcher and object of True results Results probabilistically study are not separate, but true interdependent Experimental science Experimental science Interpretive science in search in search of laws in search of laws of meaning Multiplicity of theories for the same fact Goal: explanation Goal: explanation Goal: comprehension Generalizations: Generalizations: Generalizations: opportunity ‘natural’ immutable provisional laws, structures; ideal types laws open to revision Methodology Experimental- Modified experimental- Empathetic interaction manipulative manipulative between scholar and object studied Observation Observation Interpretation Observer-observed Observer-observed Observer-observed interaction detachment detachment Mostly induction Mostly deduction Inuction (knowledge emerges (disproof of from the reality studied) hypotheses) Quantitative techniques Quantitative techniques Qualitative techniques. with some qualitative Analysis ‘by variables’ Analysis ‘by variables’ Analysis ‘by cases’ Source: Partially adapted from Guba and Lincoln (1994: 109).

did not occur at the same time in all disci- society. Thus, a new science would emerge: plines; it first took place in the inorganic sociology, the positive science of society. sciences, such as astronomy, physics and According to this view, science is universal, chemistry, followed by the organic sciences, and scientific method is unique. The social such as biology. It was therefore natural, in sciences do not differ from the natural the progression from simple to complex mate- sciences, and the positivist way of thinking rial, that the positivist approach should be that brought such great advances in the fields applied to the most complex material of all: of astronomy, physics and biology is destined 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 15

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to triumph even when its focus shifts from in my profession, etc., all function indepen- natural objects to social objects, such as dently from the use I make of them. religion, politics and work. (Durkheim, 1895: 50–51) The first attempt to apply this overall theo- retical perspective to empirical research was made by Durkheim. Indeed, as Durkheim These social facts, even if they are not material pointed out: entities, nonetheless have the same properties as the ‘things’ of the natural world, and from Up to now sociology has dealt more or less this derive two consequences. On the one exclusively not with things, but with concepts. hand, social facts are not subject to human will; It is true that Comte proclaimed that social they are things that offer resistance to human phenomena are natural facts subject to natural intervention; they condition and limit it. On laws. In so doing he implicitly recognized the other hand, just like the phenomena of the there are only things. Yet when, leaving natural world, they function according to their behind these general philosophical state- own rules. They possess a deterministic struc- ments, he tries to apply his principle and ture that can be discovered through scientific deduce from it the science it contained, it is research. Thus, notwithstanding their different ideas which he too takes as the object of study. objects, the natural world and the social world (Durkheim, 1895: 63) share a substantial methodological unity (they can both be studied through the same inves- By contrast, Durkheim actually tried to trans- tigative logic and the same method, hence the late the positivist principles of thought into name ‘social physics’ attributed to the study empirical procedures; he was the first ‘social of society). scientist’, the first true positivist sociologist. The first assertion is, therefore, that social His empirical procedure is founded on the reality exists outside the individual. The theory of ‘social fact’. In his Rules of second is that this social reality is objectively Sociological Method, he states at the outset that understandable, and the third that it can be ‘the first and most basic rule is to consider studied by means of the same methods as the social facts as things’ (1895: 60). For Durkheim, natural sciences. As Durkheim states, ‘Our social facts are: rule implies no metaphysical conception, no speculation about the innermost depth of being. What it demands is that the sociologist Ways of acting, thinking and feeling which should assume the state of mind of physicists, possess the remarkable property of existing out- chemists or in physiologists, when they ven- side of the consciousness of the individual ... ture into an as yet unexplored area of their When I perform the duties as a ... husband or a citizen ... I carry out the commitments I have scientific field’ (1895: 37). And again: ‘Our main entered into, I fulfil obligations which are objective is to extend the scope of scientific defined in by law and custom and which are rationalism to cover human behaviour ... external to myself and my actions. Even when What has been termed our positivism is they conform to my sentiments and when I merely a consequence of this rationalism.’ feel their reality within me, that reality does (Durkheim, 1895: 33) not cease to be objective, for it is not I who Let us now look at how this understanding have prescribed these duties; I have received is acquired. Positivism is fundamentally them through education ... Similarly the inductive, where induction means ‘moving believer has discovered from birth, ready from the particular to the general’5 the process fashioned, the beliefs and practices of his reli- gious life; if they existed before he did, it by which generalizations or universal laws are follows that they exist outside him ... (Likewise, derived from empirical observation, from the for as far as) the system of signs that I employ identification of regularities and recurrences to express my thoughts, the monetary system in the fraction of reality that is empirically I use to pay my debts ... the practices I follow studied. Implicit in inductive procedures is 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 16

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BOX 1.2 ANSWERS GIVEN BY POSITIVISM TO THE THREE BASIC QUESTIONS

Ontology: naïve realism This position stems from everything that has been said regarding the ‘codification’ of social reality, and can be succinctly expressed by two propositions: (a) there exists an objective social reality that is external to human beings, whether they are studying or performing social acts; (b) this reality is knowable in its true essence.6

Epistemology: dualist and objectivist; natural law The assertion that knowledge is attainable is based on two assumptions: (a) that the scholar and the object studied are independent entities (dualism); (b) that the scholar can study the object without influencing it or being influenced by it (objectivity). Investigation is carried out as if through a ‘one-way mirror’. Knowledge assumes the form of ‘laws’ based on the categories of cause and effect. These laws are part of an external reality that is independent of the observer (‘natural laws’); the scientist’s task is to ‘discover them’. There is no fear that the researcher’s values might distort her reading of social reality, or vice versa. This position, which excludes values in favour of facts, necessarily derives from the vision of social fact as given and unmodifiable.

Methodology: experimental and manipulative The methods and techniques of positivist research – like its basic conception – draw heavily on the classical empiricist approach to the natural sciences. Two features of the experimental method are taken up: (a) its use of inductive procedures, whereby general formulations are derived from particular observations; and (b) its mathematical formulation which, though not always attainable, is the final goal of the positivist scientist. The ideal technique remains – even though its applicability to social reality is limited – that of experiment, founded on manipulation and control of the variables involved and the detachment of the observer from what is observed.

the assumption of order and uniformity in adopts this vision. According to Durkheim, nature, that universal organizing principles the social scientist is an explorer ‘Conscious exist. The task of the scientist is, of course, to that he is penetrating into the unknown. He discover these. This vision has long domi- must feel himself in the presence of facts nated the natural sciences and has even been governed by laws as unsuspected as those of identified with the scientific method. In life before the science of biology was evolved. assuming that social life, like all other pheno- He must hold himself ready to make discov- mena, is subject to immutable natural laws, eries which will surprise and disconcert him.’ the positivist conception of society fully (1895: 37) 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 17

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Finally, with regard to the ‘form’ of this to denote the approach that dominated in knowledge, there is no doubt that these laws the period from the 1930s to the 1960s, and of nature will eventually be identified, formu- ‘postpositivism’, which is used to identify its lated, demonstrated and ‘proved’; in their further evolution from the end of the 1960s most complete form, they are laws that link onwards.7 We will therefore outline the prin- cause and effect: cipal shifts in perspective that occurred – over time and with differing degrees of intensity – Since the law of causality has been verified in with respect to the positivist orthodoxy the other domains of nature and has progres- presented in the previous section. sively extended its authority from the phys- One of the first revisions of nineteenth- ical and chemical world to the biological century positivism was made by the school world, and from the latter to the psychological known as logical positivism, which gave rise world, one may justifiably grant that it is like- wise true for the social world. Today it is pos- to neopositivism. The movement formed sible to add that the research undertaken on around the discussions of a group of scholars the basis of this postulate tends to confirm of different disciplinary origins who, in the this. (Durkheim, 1895: 159). second half of the 1920s, constituted the so-called ‘Vienna Circle’. Among its principal In the positivist paradigm, the elements that exponents were the philosophers Schlick and we have called ‘naïve faith’ in the methods of Carnap, the mathematician Hahn, the econo- the natural sciences are all too evident. mist Neurath, and the physicist Frank. A few Underlying the various manifestations of years later, a group of like-minded thinkers positivism there is always, in fact, a sort of (Reichenbach, Herzberg, Lewin, Hempel and enthusiasm for ‘positive’ scientific knowledge, others) was formed in Berlin. In the wake of whereby the ‘scientific method’ is viewed as Nazi persecution, some notable representa- the only valid means of achieving true know- tives of this school emigrated to the United ledge in all fields of human endeavour. States, where the affinity between their views and American pragmatism contributed con- siderably to the spread of neopositivist thought. This influenced other disciplines, 4. NEOPOSITIVISM AND including sociology, which had been develop- POSTPOSITIVISM ing a very rich tradition of empirical research in the United States throughout the 1930s. Throughout the twentieth century, the posi- The new point of view assigned a central tivist approach was continually revised and role to the criticism of science and redefined adjusted in attempts to overcome its intrinsic the task of philosophy, which was to abandon limits. The reassuring clarity and linearity of its broad theorization in order to undertake nineteenth-century positivism gave way to a critical analysis of the theories elaborated twentieth-century version that was much within single disciplines (Schlick hoped to see more complex and detailed and, in some a time when there would be no more books on respects, contradictory and unclear. However, philosophy, but all books would be written some basic assumptions were maintained, in a ‘philosophical way’). This led to the such as ontological realism (‘the world exists rejection of the ‘great questions’ and of all independently of our awareness of it’) and the metaphysical issues that could not be demon- pre-eminent role of empirical observation in strated (‘pseudo-problems’), and which were understanding this world. We will not enter therefore branded as meaningless. Instead, into the details of this development, or the the utmost attention was devoted to method- various phases of its history; rather, we will ological problems in every science, to the mention only ‘neopositivism’, the term used logical analysis of their language and their 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 18

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theoretical output, to the criticism of their very important for the social scientist; ... we assumptions, and – not least – to the proce- must sort out this knowledge and organize it dures by which conceptual elaboration could in some manageable form; we must reformu- be empirically verified. late common sense statements so that they From what has been said, it is evident that can be subjected to empirical test’ (Lazarsfeld epistemological questions are central to this and Rosenberg, 1955: 2,11). In this way, all movement of thought, and the influence it social phenomena could be surveyed, meas- had on the methodology of the sciences, ured, correlated, elaborated and formalized including the social sciences, is comprehensi- and the theories either confirmed or dis- ble. It must be remembered that one of the proved in an objective manner without postulates of neopositivism is the widespread ambiguity. conviction that the meaning of a statement But nothing would ever be the same again. derives from its empirical verifiability. The The twentieth-century conception of science formula ‘the meaning of a proposition is the was by now far removed from the solid cer- method of its verification’ neatly summarizes tainties of nineteenth-century positivism, in this point of view. which a ‘mechanical’ conception of reality What did this conception of science and dominated, together with a reassuring belief scientific knowledge mean for social research? in immutable laws and faith in the irresistible What were the repercussions on operational progress of science. This new philosophic- procedures and research techniques? The scientific atmosphere arose first of all out of main consequence was the development of a developments in the natural sciences and, in completely new way of speaking about social particular, in physics, during the early years reality, using a language borrowed from of the new century. Quantum mechanics, mathematics and statistics. Paul F. Lazarsfeld, Einstein’s special and general theories of rela- the principal exponent of neopositivist empiri- tivity, Heisenberg’s principle of uncertainty – cal methodology in sociology, called this the to cite only a few of the cornerstones of the language of variables. Every social object, new physics – introduced elements of proba- beginning with the individual, was analyti- bility and uncertainty to crucial areas such cally defined on the basis of a range of attri- as the concept of causal law, the objectivity of butes and properties (‘variables’), and was the external world, and even the classical reduced to these; and social phenomena were categories of space and time. analysed in terms of relationships among Theories were no longer expressed in terms variables. The variable, with its neutral char- of deterministic laws, but of probability. The acter and objectivity, thus became the protag- crucial moment in this change was the shift onist of social analysis; there was no longer from classical physics (Newtonian approach) any need to recompose the original object or to quantum physics. According to quantum individual as a whole again. In this way social mechanics, there are processes in elementary research became ‘depersonalized’, and the physics – so-called quantum jumps – that are language of variables, with the measurement not analyzable in terms of traditional causal of concepts, the distinction between depen- mechanisms, but are absolutely unpredictable dent and independent variables, the quantifi- single facts governed by probabilistic laws. cation of their interrelations and the Scientific theories would no longer explain formulation of causal models, provided a social phenomena through models characteri- formal instrument that allowed social scien- zed by logical necessity, and deterministic tists to go beyond ‘the notoriously vague laws were replaced by probabilistic laws everyday language (in a process of) clarifica- that implied the existence of haphazard ele- tion and purification of discourse (that is) ments and the presence of disturbances and 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 19

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fluctuations. If this notion of probabilistic from the cognitive and perceptive activity of indeterminism was valid for the natural humans, the act of understanding remains world, then it would be even more valid for conditioned by the social circumstances and the social world, the world of language, the theoretical framework in which it takes thought, and human interaction. place. The thesis of the theory-laden nature of An element introduced into scientific empirical observations – that is to say, the methodology by this evolution of positivism claim that no clear distinction exists between is the concept of falsification, which was theoretical concepts and observed data – taken up as a criterion for the empirical vali- brings down the last positivist certainty: that dation of a theory or a theoretical hypothesis. of the objectivity of the data collected and of This states that a theory cannot be positively the neutrality and inter-subjectivity of the confirmed by data, and that empirical valida- language of observation. tion can take place only in the negative, It must be said, nonetheless, that this through the ‘non-confutation’ of the theory by process of moving away from the original the data – that is to say, by demonstrating that positivist orthodoxy, first through neoposi- the data do not contradict the hypothesis and, tivism and then postpositivism, did not mean therefore, that the theory and the data are that the empiricist spirit was abandoned. merely compatible. Positive proof is imposs- Modern positivism, when its states that laws ible, since the same data could be compatible (both natural and social) are probabilistic and with other theoretical hypotheses. open to revision, when it affirms the conjec- This position gives rise to a sense of the pro- tural nature of scientific knowledge and in the visional nature of any theoretical statement, end, the theoretical conditioning of the obser- since it is never definitively proven and always vation itself, has come a long way from the exposed to the axe of possible disproof. As naïve interpretation of the deterministic laws Popper writes, the idol of certainty crumbles: of the original positivism. It has lost its cer- ‘The old scientific ideal of episteme – of tainties, but does not repudiate its empiricist absolutely certain, demonstrable knowledge – foundations. The new positivism redefines has proved to be an idol. The demand for the initial presuppositions and the objectives scientific objectivity makes it inevitable that of social research; but the empirical approach, every scientific statement must remain tenta- though much amended and reinterpreted, tive for ever’ (1934, English translation 1992: still utilizes the original observational 280). Man cannot know but only conjecture. language, which was founded on the corner- This point is also illustrated by a statement stones of operationalization, quantification attributed to Einstein: ‘to the degree that our and generalization. And, since we are dealing propositions are certain, they say nothing with research techniques, it is this point that about reality; to the degree that they say interests us here. The operational procedures, something, they are uncertain’. the ways of collecting data, the measurement Lastly, and this brings us to the most recent operations and the statistical analyses have development of the postpositivist approach, it not fundamentally changed. Conclusions has become a widespread conviction that are more cautious, but the (quantitative) techni- empirical observation, the very perception of ques utilized in reaching them are still the same. reality, is not an objective picture, but is At this point, we will conclude our brief theory-laden,8 in the sense that even the simple excursus on the developments of the posi- recording of reality depends on the researcher’s tivist paradigm by filling out the column in frame of mind, and on social and cultural con- Table 1.1 regarding the positions of modern ditioning. In other words, despite the postpositivism on the three fundamental assumption that reality exists independently questions. 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 20

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BOX 1.3 ANSWERS GIVEN BY NEO- AND POST- POSITIVISM TO THE THREE BASIC QUESTIONS

Ontology: critical realism As in the case of positivism, the existence of a reality external to human beings is assumed; but – contrary to what is upheld in the positivist paradigm – this reality is only imperfectly knowable, both because of the inevitable imperfection of human knowledge and because of the very nature of its laws, which are probabilistic. This point of view has also been called ‘critical realism’: realism, in that it assumes that cause-effect relationships exist in reality outside the human mind; critical, in that it underlines the view that the scientist must always be prepared to question every scientific acquisition.

Epistemology: modified dualism-objectivity; middle range, probabilistic and conjectural laws With regard to the question of the relationship between the scholar and the object studied, dualism, in the sense of separation and non- interference between the two realities, is no longer sustained. It is recognized that the subject conducting the study may exert a disturbing effect on the object of study, and that a reaction effect may ensue. The objectivity of knowledge remains the ideal goal and the reference criterion, but this can only be achieved approximately. In the cognitive process, deductive procedures are emphasized, through the mechanism of falsifying hypotheses. The intent remains that of formulating generalizations in the form of laws, even if limited in scope, probabilistic and provisional.

Methodology: modified experimental-manipulative The operational phases of research remain fundamentally inspired by a substantial detachment between the researcher and the object studied (experiments, manipulation of variables, quantitative interviews, statistical analysis, etc.). Nevertheless, qualitative methods are admitted. The scientific community is important as it critically analyses new hypotheses, and can confirm results by means of new experiments (repeated results are more likely to be true).

5. INTERPRETIVISM an almost symmetrical development. If we wished to stress the analogy between the two paradigms, we would introduce the initial 5.1 Beginnings vision of ‘interpretive sociology’, which owed Two versions of the positivist paradigm have both its methodological elaboration and its been presented: the initial nineteenth-century first attempts at empirical research, at the perspective and its critical revision, carried beginning of the twentieth century, to Max out in the 1930s and again in the 1970s. The Weber (his role was symmetrical to that paradigm presented in this section underwent played by Durkheim in positivism). This 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 21

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would then be followed by the 1960s reinter- only through a totally different process, that pretation of the original approach, above all of comprehension (Verstehen). According to in American sociology. This, in turn, gave rise Dilthey, we explain nature, whereas we under- to the various lines of thought found in stand the life of the mind. symbolic interactionism, phenomenological sociology and ethnomethodology, which, in 5.2 Max Weber: objectivity and spite of their differences, are unified by a orientation towards individuality common emphasis on individual interaction. But it is only with Max Weber that this new However, we prefer not to proceed in this perspective enters fully into the field of soci- manner, since there is no discontinuity ology. Indeed, Dilthey had spoken generically between the original Weberian vision and of ‘sciences of the spirit’, among which he subsequent developments, as there was in the singled out historiography. Weber brought shift from nineteenth to twentieth-century the concept of Verstehen into sociology, and positivism. Instead, we will put these two revised Dilthey’s original position. While historical blocks of approaches to social adopting the principle of Verstehen, Weber did research together under the same heading and not want to fall into subjectivist individualism utilize the general term ‘interpretivism’ for all or psychologism; he wanted to preserve the the theoretical visions in which reality is not objectivity of social science both in terms of its simply to be observed, but rather ‘interpreted’. being independent of value judgements, and How did this new vision of social science in terms of the possibility of formulating state- arise? While positivism originated in ments of a general nature, even when an nineteenth-century French and English cultures ‘orientation towards individuality’ is adopted. (we need mention only Auguste Comte, John Regarding the first point, throughout his Stuart Mill and Herbert Spencer) and owed its life Weber reiterated the need for the histori- sociological development chiefly to the French cal and social sciences to be free from any culture (we are, of course, referring to value judgement whatsoever. However, his Durkheim), its most radical and organic awareness of the problem (sharpened by his criticism emerged in the context of German intense involvement in politics and, later, by historicism. the ethical questions arising from the immi- In general, the German philosopher nent threat of world war) exceeded his ability Wilhelm Dilthey is credited with the first criti- to provide an unequivocal answer. None- cal attack on Comtean scientism in the name theless, he never abandoned his conviction of the autonomy of the human sciences – in that the historical and social sciences must be the sense that they are non-homologous to the value-free. ‘The distinction between knowl- natural sciences. In his Introduction to the edge and judgement – that is to say, between Human Sciences (1883), Dilthey draws a fulfilling the scientific responsibility of seeing famous distinction between ‘sciences of factual reality and the fulfilling the practical nature’ and ‘sciences of the spirit’, basing responsibility of defending one’s own ideals – the difference between them precisely on the this is the principle to which we must adhere relationship that is established between the most firmly’ (Weber, 1904). researcher and the reality studied. Indeed, in While value judgements must be kept out the natural sciences the object studied consists of the historical and social sciences, values of a reality that is external to the researcher will, according to Weber, inevitably influence and remains so during the course of the the choice of the objects of study, thus taking study; thus, knowledge takes the form of on a guiding role for the researcher. Even if explanation (cause-effect laws, etc.). In the they play no role in forming judgements, human sciences, by contrast, since there is no values are still involved in what could be such detachment between the observer and called a ‘selective function’; they serve to decide what is observed, knowledge can be obtained upon a field of research in which the study 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 22

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proceeds in an objective manner in order to subjectivity is immediately transparent. ... reach causal explanations of phenomena. Indeed, the Weberian notion of comprehension Freedom from values was therefore the designates a procedure which is very close to first condition for objectivity in the social what textbooks of logic call ‘ampliative induc- sciences. The terms of the second condition, tion’ and which consists of reconstructing motives not directly accessible by cross- understood as the ability to produce state- checking facts. (Boudon, 1984: 31, 51) ments which would be to some extent general, remained to be defined. According to Weber, How can this orientation towards individual- the social sciences are to be distinguished ity yield objectivity? If we start with the indi- from the natural sciences not on the basis of vidual and the subjective sense of his action, their object (as in Dilthey’s contraposition of how can we attain objective knowledge that human sciences with the sciences of the has general characteristics? Here we are faced spirit), nor because their goal is to study social with the second condition for objectivity in phenomena in their individuality, since the the historical and social sciences. social sciences also aim at formulating gener- The answer is provided by the Weberian alizations; rather, the distinction lies in their concept of the ideal type. For Weber, ideal ‘orientation towards individuality’. types are forms of social action that are seen This orientation is primarily one of method. to recur in human behaviour, the typical uni- For Weber the method is that of ‘Verstehen’. formity of behaviour constituted through an However, in defining what he means by this, abstractive process which, after isolating Weber rejects any form of psychologism. some elements within the multiplicity of Verstehen is neither psychological perspicacity empirical fact, proceeds to coordinate them nor sudden illumination; it is the rational into a coherent picture that is free from con- comprehension of the motivations underlying tradiction. The ideal type, then, is an abstrac- behaviour. It is not intuition, but ‘interpreta- tion that comes from empirically observed tion’: understanding the purpose of the action regularities. and grasping the intentional element in The Weberian ideal type impinges upon all human behaviour. The ability to identify with fields of social science and can be found at dif- others, which is inherent in Verstehen, is also ferent levels of generality, ranging from the channelled towards rational interpretation: single individual to society as a whole. Weber putting oneself into the other person’s posi- exemplified ideal types with reference to tion so as to ‘understand’. This involves social structures (for example capitalism), understanding the motivations of actions, the institutions (e.g. bureaucracy, church and sect, subjective meaning that individuals attribute forms of power) and individual behaviour to their own behaviour: because every action, (e.g. rational behaviour). even the most apparently illogical, has its These ‘ideal types’, writes Weber, are not to own inner rationality, its own interior ‘sense’. be ‘confused with reality ... they were con- As Boudon writes: structed in an ideal heuristic manner’ (Weber, 1922a); they are ‘ideal’ in that they are mental For Weber, to understand an individual action constructs; they carry out a ‘heuristic’ func- is to acquire sufficient means of obtaining tion in that they direct knowledge. They information to understand the motives behind are empty shells, ‘fictions lacking life’ as it. In his view, observers understand the action Schutz has described them; they have no con- of an observed subject as soon as they can crete counterpart in reality, but are theoretical conclude that in the same situation it is quite probable that they too would act in the same models that help the researcher to inter- way. ... As can be seen, understanding in the pret reality. For example, probably none of Weberian sense implies the ability of the the three ideal types of power Weber observer to put him or herself in the actor’s place, distinguishes – charismatic power, traditional but does not in any way imply that actor’s power, and rational-legal power – has ever 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 23

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existed in its pure form. The ideal type is a of the Weberian approach: a strong anti- clear, coherent, rational, unambiguous con- deterministic conviction; opposition to all struct. Reality, however, is much more com- philosophies of history and all forms of evolu- plex, contradictory and disorderly. No form of tionism; the fundamental ‘ontological’ differ- charismatic power that has ever existed has ence between natural sciences and social been wholly and exclusively charismatic; sciences, and the irreducibility of the latter to though globally identifiable with this the former’s methods of research; and the Weberian ‘type’, the actual form will doubt- criticism of any attempt to explain human less contain elements of the other two forms action by starting from social systems and the of power. conditioning factors within them. Finally, all The regularities that the researcher pursues of these approaches share – this time in posi- and identifies in order to interpret social real- tive terms – a strong conviction that ‘indivi- ity are not ‘laws’ in the positivist sense. For dual action endowed with meaning’ must be Weber, ‘the number and type of causes that seen as the core of every social phenomenon have determined any individual event what- and of the sociologist’s work. ever, are in fact, always infinite ... and the Weber, however, did not push his method- causal question, when treating the individual- ological approach to extreme consequences. ity of a phenomenon is not a question of laws While he elaborated these concepts in his but rather a question of concrete causal con- methodological writings, in his theoretical nections ... the possibility of a selection within reflections and empirical research he con- the infinity of determining elements’ (Weber stantly operated on a macrosociological 1922b). Instead of laws, then, we have causal level, adopting the perspective of compara- connections, or rather, to use Boudon’s expres- tive history, in an effort to understand sions, mere possibilities or opportunity structures macrostructural phenomena such as the (‘If A, then most frequently B’, Boudon, 1984: economy, the state, power, religion, and the 75). It is therefore impossible to establish the bureaucracy. By contrast, the movement that factors that determine a certain social event or arose in the United States in the 1960s devel- individual behaviour, but one can trace the oped the Weberian perspective in its natural conditions that make it possible. direction, that is, in a ‘micro’ perspective. If Thus, in contraposition to the causal laws of society is built on the interpretations of the positivist approach, which are general and individuals, and if it is their interaction deterministic (though less so in the more prob- that creates structures, then it is the inter- abilistic neopositivist interpretation), we have action of individuals that one must study in statements and connections characterized by order to understand society. This conviction specificity and probability. opened up a completely new area of socio- logical research, the study of everyday life, 5.3 Further developments which had formerly been disregarded as Weber has been discussed at some length non-scientific. because the work of the great German sociolo- It is clear that the interpretivist paradigm gist anticipated practically all the themes that differs radically from the positivist frame of would be subsequently developed in the rich reference. The ‘subjectivist’ view is first of all vein of sociological theory and research that a reaction to the ‘objectivist’ positivist posi- gave rise to approaches such as phenomeno- tion. By treating social reality and human logical sociology (Husserl and Schutz), sym- action as something that could be studied bolic interactionism (Mead and Blumer) and objectively, the positivist approach over- ethnomethodology (Garfinkel and Cicourel), looked the individual dimension: all those which became established in American socio- aspects that distinguish the world of human logy from the 1960s onwards. All these beings from the world of things. The very perspectives share fundamental characteristics elements that disturbed the ‘scientific’ 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 24

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BOX 1.4 ANSWERS GIVEN BY INTERPRETIVISM TO THE THREE BASIC QUESTIONS

Ontology: constructivism and relativism (multiple realities) ‘Constructivism’: the knowable world is that of the meanings attributed by individuals. The radical constructivist position virtually excludes the existence of an objective world (each individual produces his own reality). The moderate position does not ask whether a reality external to individual constructions exists, since it claims that only the latter can be known. ‘Relativism’: these meanings, or mental constructions, vary among individuals; and even when they are not strictly individual in that they are shared by the individuals within a group, they vary among cultures. A universal social reality valid for all persons, an absolute reality, does not exist; rather, there are multiple realities in that there are multiple and different perspectives from which people perceive and interpret social facts.

Epistemology: non-dualism and non-objectivity; ideal types, possibilities, opportunity structures The separation between the researcher and the object of study tends to disappear, just like that between ontology and epistemology. In contrast to the positivist vision, social research is defined as ‘not an experimental science in search of law, but an interpretive one in search of meaning’ (Geertz, 1973: 5), in which the central categories are those of value, meaning and purpose. In pursuing its objective, which is to understand individual behaviour, social science can utilize abstractions and generalizations: ideal types and possibilities or opportunity structures.

Methodology: empathetic interaction between the researcher and the object of study The interaction between the researcher and the object of study during the empirical phase of research is no longer judged negatively but constitutes, instead, the basis of the cognitive process. If the aim is to understand the meanings that subjects attribute to their own actions, the research techniques cannot be anything but qualitative and subjective, meaning that they will vary from case to case depending on the form taken by the interaction between the researcher and the object studied. Knowledge is obtained through a process of induction; it is ‘discovered in reality’ by the researcher who approaches it without prejudices or preconceived theories.

research of the positivist approach and were primary object of interpretive research. It is therefore excluded – individual, motivations on this fundamental difference between the and intentions, values, free will, in short, objects studied that the interpretive point of the subjective dimension that cannot be view bases its alleged superiority over the perceived by quantitative tools – become the positivist approach. The convinced supporter 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 25

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of the interpretive paradigm affirms not only which have guided social research and the autonomy and diversity of the historical shaped its strategies and techniques since its and social sciences from the natural sciences, inception. We will now mention the criticisms but also their superiority, since only an levelled at these two approaches and a few approach that adopts the principle of instances of their radicalization. Verstehen can achieve that understanding For what concerns the positivist paradigm, from the inside which is the basis of the we have seen that great attention was knowledge of behaviour and of the social focused, especially in the period of neoposi- world. tivism, on formulating and developing empiri- These fundamental differences inevitably cal procedures. The radicalization of this imply different techniques and research pro- trend gave rise to a sort of anti-speculative cedures. And it is this aspect that most inter- empiricism in which ‘the method’, and subse- ests us here. Indeed, if the essence of human quently ‘the data’, reigned supreme; the task life differs from that of the natural world, then of the social scientist was no longer to formu- it should be studied by means of different late theories and then to test them empirically, methods from those of the positivist but to collect and describe data under approach. The subjectivist position cannot the naïve illusion that ‘the data speak for adopt ‘the language of variables’. It cannot themselves’. adopt it in the phase of empirical observation This was a process of progressive reduction on account of the centrality of intentional and (hence the accusation of ‘reductionism’) that subjective components which, by definition, went through various phases. First, the escape objective quantification and can be boundaries of theoretical exploration were seized only through empathy. It cannot adopt shrunk; questions of verification, or confirma- it during the phase of data analysis because it tion of hypotheses (ars probandi), were cannot imagine analysing human behaviour stressed at the expense of discovery (ars inve- in terms of the interaction of separate compo- niendi). Subsequently, attention was shifted nents (variables), as the human being is a from the content to the method. This empha- whole that cannot be reduced to the sum of its sis on empirical validation meant that parts. The subjectivist position has therefore questions which could not be translated developed its own research procedures, its immediately and simply into empirically own observation techniques and its own verifiable procedures were excluded from the- ways of analysing empirical reality, which oretical considerations. Theoretical complexity form the body of so-called ‘qualitative was therefore gradually reduced to banality. research’. This will be discussed in greater Finally, attention was shifted from the method detail later. For now, we will conclude our to the data, from the operationalization of presentation of the interpretive paradigm by concepts to the practical problems of collec- summarizing this approach according to the tion and analysis of data (perhaps even statis- scheme shown in Table 1.1. tically sophisticated) – data which by now were bereft of theoretical and methodological background. As Luciano Gallino points out, ‘The immediate results of the research were 6. A FINAL NOTE: RADICALIZATION, what the critics of sociological neopositivism CRITICISM AND NEW TENDENCIES might have expected: a huge mass of data, meticulously recorded, measured and classi- fied, but uncoordinated, lacking significant In the previous sections we have described – connections, and unable to yield adequate with reference to their fundamental concepts knowledge of the object to which they nomi- and their founding fathers – the two paradigms nally refer’ (Gallino, 1978: 457). 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 26

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Interpretivism was no less exposed to accused of ignoring those objects that should criticism. It was not so much Weber’s original stand at the centre of sociological reflection: model as its subsequent interpretations that institutions. Thus, it allegedly neglects aspects came under fire; as we have seen, these took of society which, though stemming from indi- to the extreme the original concept of ‘orien- vidual interaction, have become independent tation towards the individual’. Weber himself of individuals and their choices. This same strove to go beyond subjectivity. He did not basic criticism is also levelled at phenomeno- rule out the possibility of reaching forms of logical sociology, ethnomethodology and cognitive generalization (ideal types); more- symbolic interactionism, which are accused of over, a considerable number of his metho- limiting their interests to interaction and dological treatise deal with his attempt to interpersonal relationships, in that they are reconcile causality and comprehension. In unwilling or unable to address problems that addition, although he started out by focusing transcend the minutiae of everyday life. on the individual, he did not neglect the great Up to now we’ve discussed these issues systemic issues or the institutional dimension against the backdrop of the major currents of of society. sociological thought, on which the discipline By contrast, the new schools of sociological of sociology was founded, which have shaped thought that developed from the 1960s its research techniques and dominated social onwards accentuated the subjective character enquiry from its very beginnings up to the of Weber’s original model and shifted their mid-1970s. The last quarter of the twentieth attention to the world of everyday life and to century has challenged the preceding history inter-subject interaction. Again, this occurred of social research. The 1960s – featuring the through a process of reduction, though in this civil rights movement, student protests, racial case it was the breadth of reflection that was conflicts in urban settings, struggles against reduced, while in the case of neopositivism poverty and inequality, and the rise of femin- the reduction was in the depth of reflection. ism – were an extremely lively period in This shift gave even greater impetus to the Western societies. Sociological theory and two basic criticisms levelled at the interpre- research played a central role and achieved a tive paradigm. great degree of popularity in such a context, The first of these holds that extreme subjec- and sociology seemed to uncover a new ‘mis- tivity rules out the very existence of science, sion’ in its reflections on that decade’s social and of social science in particular. If human changes. There emerged new theoretical per- action always has a unique dimension or if spectives, such as the neo-Marxian and neo- reality is merely a subjective construction, Weberian approaches, critical theory and other then generalizations above the individual new radical perspectives which openly con- level cannot be made and knowledge cannot tested the comfortable alliance between be objective. Moreover, the objectivity of neopositivism and functionalism that had pre- knowledge is also denied by the very mecha- viously dominated social theory and research. nism through which knowledge is pursued, In those same years these new macro- since this involves the non-separation of the perspectives were accompanied by novel researcher from the object studied. In addition, developments in the field of so-called ‘micro- the fact that the researcher cannot transcend sociology’, an umbrella term grouping the object studied also excludes the possibility different schools of thought and theoreti- of inter-subject verification, which is a funda- cal outlooks, that resembled each other in mental principle of science (that is to say, that their interest for the ‘minor’ facts of everyday another researcher can obtain the same result life, micro-interactions among individuals, by elaborating the same or other data). interpersonal dynamics (rather than great Second, the interpretive approach – again historical transformations and major social on account of its focus on the individual – is processes). 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 27

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This abandonment of comprehensive revolutionary effects on social research theoretical perspectives and wide-ranging techniques, except for promoting the full explanations eventually led to a generalized legitimacy and actual use of qualitative critique of any theoretical explanation and research techniques (but without innovating questioned sociology’s status as a science. them in any appreciable way). This tendency has assumed particularly radical traits in recent years (in the 1990s, roughly speaking) in a heterogeneous (and sometimes SUMMARY confusing) intellectual movement that has been labelled ‘post-modernism’. In extremely simplified terms, one could 1. Any ‘mature’ science is accompanied by, define this movement in terms of what it chal- in any given moment in history, its own lenges: modernism, i.e. the consequences of paradigm. Each science’s paradigm is its the Enlightenment, including the critical use ‘guiding vision’, a theoretical perspective of reason over humanity, nature, and society, accepted by the community of scientists and confidence in science, based on order, that directs research effort by specifying rationality, simplicity of scientific explana- what to study and formulating hypothe- tions and the cumulative nature of knowl- ses to explain observed phenomena. edge. ‘Post’-modernism transcends (and 2. In the social sciences, the two paradigms disputes) modernity’s achievements, with a that have historically oriented social critique which can be summed up in four research since its inception have been points: (a) rejection of general theories, which ‘positivism’ and ‘interpretivism’. In order stands accused of totalitarianism, cultural to compare them, we have attempted to imperialism, negation and repression of understand how they deal with the three differences among societies in order to perpet- fundamental questions facing social uate the hegemonic goals of Western culture; research: the ontological question (does promotion of multiple theoretical approaches social reality exist?); the epistemological and languages; defence of the fragmentary question (is it knowable?); and the episte- and non-unitary nature of scientific explana- mological question (how can we acquire tion; (b) rejection of rationality, linearity, and knowledge about it?). scientific knowledge’s simplicity; praise for 3. The positivist paradigm started to take paradoxes, contradictions, opacity, alternative root in social research in the second half of and incompatible multi-faceted outlooks; the nineteenth century, due to the great (c) exaltation of differences, multiplicity of local success achieved by the natural sciences. and contextual truths, rejection of the cumula- Positivism applied to social research tive nature of science; and (d) exaltation of the maintained that social reality should be ‘Other’, differences, minorities; identification studied through the same investigative with the oppressed, assumption of ‘power’ as logic and the same method of the natural an explanatory category at the basis of all sciences, hence the name ‘social physics’ social relationships and structures. attributed to the study of society. This overview of recent tendencies and 4. Over the twentieth century the original potential paradigms in contemporary social positivist outlook has been adapted science is too simple and brief, but we will not to overcome its intrinsic limits. According further develop the issue. Our primary interest to the neopositivist and postpositivist is to describe the basic social science paradigms paradigm, social theories are no longer which have influenced and shaped empirical expressed in terms of deterministic laws, research strategies, methods and techniques. but of probability. Any theoretical state- The new perspectives which have emerged ment has a provisional nature, is never in the last quarter-century have not had definitively proven and always remains 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 28

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exposed to possible disproof. Moreover, addressed in this chapter are further exam- the research community grew increasingly ined in M. Gane, Durkheim’s Project for a convinced that any empirical observation Sociological Science; P. Halfpenny, Positi- is not an objective depiction, but is rather vism in Twentieth Century; S. Whimster, Max theory-laden, in the sense that even the Weber: Work and Interpretation; K.L. Sanstrom, simple recording of reality depends on D.D. Martin and G.A. Fine, Symbolic Inter- the mental framework employed by the actionism at the End of the Century; S. Crook, Social Theory and the Postmodern. researcher. This revised form of posi- An introductory discussion about the paradig- tivism, however, does not repudiate its matic divisions between quantitative and qual- empiricist foundations nor its faith in itative research traditions is given in the first quantification and generalization; and chapter of A. Tashakkori and C. Teddlie, Mixed it promoted a further development of Methodology: Combining Qualitative and quantitative empirical research methods, Quantitative Approaches (Sage, 1998, pp. 185). the so-called ‘language of variables’, a A more comprehensive guide to the different language borrowed from mathematics answers given to fundamental social research and statistics. dilemmas by classical and contemporary 5. According to interpretivism, there exists a schools of thought can be found in N. Blaikie, fundamental ‘epistemological’ difference Approaches to Social Inquiry (Polity Press, between social and natural sciences. This 1993, pp. 238). perspective holds that social reality cannot An attempt to place current approaches to quali- simply be observed, but rather needs to be tative research in a theoretical perspective ‘interpreted’. In the natural sciences the can be found in an essay by Y.S. Lincoln and object of study consists of a reality that is E.G. Guba, Paradigmatic Controversies, Con- external to the researcher and remains so tradictions, and Emerging Confluences, in during the course of research; thus, Denzin and Lincoln (2000). Another, more knowledge takes the form of explanation. detailed attempt, is the book by J.F. Gubrium In the human sciences there is no such and J.M. Holstein, The New Language of detachment between the observer and Qualitative Method (Sage, 1997, pp. 244): the what is observed; and knowledge can be authors identify four ‘idioms’ (naturalism, social constructionism, emotionalism, post- obtained only through a totally different modernism) which inspire recent qualitative process, that of comprehension (Verstehen). research. A discussion of current trends in These fundamental differences inevitably social research from a quantitative standpoint imply different techniques and research can be found in J.H. Goldthorpe, On Sociology: procedures. The subjectivist position Numbers, Narratives, and the Integration of cannot adopt the ‘language of variables’ Research and Theory (Oxford University Press, and has therefore developed its own 2000, pp. 337). observation techniques and its own ways of analysing empirical reality, which form the body of so-called ‘qualitative research’. NOTES

FURTHER READING 1. The treatment illustrated in the following pages borrows heavily from Guba and Lincoln (1994), which deals with the topics more A useful collection of essays that explore the extensively. theoretical perspectives that have shaped 2. Ontology: that part of philosophy that stud- social research methods is the reader edited ies the essence of ‘being’; from the Greek by G. Ritzer and B. Smart, Handbook of Social óntos (to be, being) and lógos (discourse, Theory (Sage, 2001, pp. 552). The issues reflection). 3069-CH01.QXD 3/6/03 7:27 PM Page 29

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3. Epistemology: reflection on scientific knowl- be true in all cases which resemble the former in edge, from the Greek epistéme (certain certain assessable respects’ (Mill, 1843: 288). knowledge). 6. Some epistemological questions (regarding 4. Methodology: from the Greek méthodos the knowability of reality) are introduced into our (pathway to, method). The methodological ques- discussion of the ontological issue (the essence tion has to do with ‘methods’ of social research, of reality) in order to facilitate understanding for meaning an organic body of techniques. It could the reader new to these concepts. Moreover, as also be called (perhaps more correctly) ‘techno- will be seen in the section on the interpretive logical question’, in that it focuses on techniques; paradigm, the two issues are inseparable. this term has been avoided as it has taken on a 7. The criticisms of neopositivism that gave rise different meaning in the common language. to what is now called postpositivism are generally 5. Stuart Mill states that induction is ‘that attributed to Kuhn, Lakatos and Feyerabend. operation of the mind by which we infer what we 8. The expression comes from Hanson know to be true in a particular case or cases, will (1958).