PEDU 7206
Foundations of E A P
Lecture 4 & 5
The Ontological Foundations of EAP
A. Bring the Ontological Foundation Back into the Research of EAP
1. The Critical Realist declarations:
a. “Since Descartes (1596-1650), it has been customary first to ask how
we can know, and only afterwards what it is that we can know. But
this Cartesian ordering has been a contributory factor to prevalence of
epistemic fallacy: it is easy to let the question how we can know
determine our conception of what there is. And if in a certain respect
the epistemic question does seem prior, in another it is secondary to
the ontological one.” (Collier, 1993, P. 137)
b. “I shall concentrate first on the ontological question of the properties
that societies possess, before shift to the epistemological question of
these properties make them possible objects of knowledge for use.
This is not an arbitrary order of development. It reflects the condition
that …it is the nature of objects that determines their cognitive
possibilities for us.” (Bhaskar, 1989)
2. Objectivism vs. Constructivism: Antagonism in ontological perspectives:
Centuries of controversies among social researchers over
epistemological and methodological perspectives have created two
deeply divided definitions of the reality of the social world, namely
objectivism and constructivism
a. Objectivism: Under the domination of the logical-positivism and
analytical-empirical science, the prevailing social ontology, which has
been characterized as objectivism, stipulates the social world as an
objectively fixed and given reality as reality of the natural world. In this
ontological perspective, social reality is stipulated as analytical and
empirical in form, that is, the social world is conceived as a
composition of particles or elements, the structures and operations of
which are observable by human senses. Moreover, the social reality
has also been stipulated as nomological and causal in structure, i.e.
the constitutive particles of social reality are presumed to be
structured in causal laws. The law-like structures of the social world
can further be defined in terms of their degree of universality and
permanence. Accordingly, the “strong” stance within the objectivism
would argue that the law-like structures of social realities are universal
across locations and permanent over time. Such an ontological
stance could be characterized as “objective absolutism”. On the other
hand, the “weak” stance of objectivism would assume that the laws
governing the social world are only probabilistic laws and their
universality and permanence are limited in particular social and
historical contexts.
b. Constructivism: In opposite to objectivism and more specifically in
response to the domination and even assault from the empirical
positivists, the social scientists in the historical-hermeneutic tradition
have turned to interpretivism and constructivism for havens. By
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interpretivism, it refers to the research approach which emphasizes
on the meaning-laden and value-laden nature of the social world.
Accordingly, this group of social scientists focuses on the interpretive
(i.e. meaning attributing) features embedded in social reality and
stresses the uniqueness of each interpretive communities involved as
well as the meanings they imputed to the social reality concerned.
Moreover, some of these interpretativists would even advocate that
the social reality is “a matter of interpretation” and its features and
structures are “open to interpretation” as well. By constructivism, it
refers to the research orientation which underlines the essential roles
of human ideas, believes, and efforts in the constitution of the social
world and more specifically its social institutions. Accordingly, it is
assumed that realities of the social world are subject to construction
by different interpretive communities according to their own ideas,
believes or even vested interests. As a result, social realities are
conceived to be relative in nature, i.e. relative to the subjectivities and
intersubjectivities of the interpretive communities that have power
over the respective social realities in point. Such a research approach
can be characterized as “constructive relativism”.
The “paradigm war” between these two perspectives in social ontology,
especially the “dog fights” between extremists of “objective absolutism”
and those of “constructive relativism” have left the field of social ontology
in complete disarrays if not chaos for decades. On the one hand, there
are advocates holding the ontological perspective of “structural
determinism”, which insists on the definitude of causal laws at work in
social structures. And accordingly human relationship and activities
found in these social structures are conceived to be deterministic in
nature. On the other hand, there are proponents promoting the
ontological perspective of “constructive voluntarism”, which emphasizes
the intersubjectivity and forgeability at work in social reality. Caught
between the crossfire of these two camps, most of the students in social
research are helpless at lost in these ontological, epistemological and
methodological labyrinth.
3. The Critical-Realist Movement
a. Since the second half of the 1970s, Roy Bhaskar, a British
philosopher, has produced a series of work on philosophy of science
and social sciences (1975, 1979, 1986, 1989). His work has
motivated a line of academic work in varieties of disciplines. As a
result, they have together triggered an intellectual movement now
known as Critical Realism.
b. In the past three decades Critical Realism has gained significant
recognition and development in social-science researches; for
examples economics (Lawson, 1997), social psychology (Greenwood,
1994), sociology (Archer, 1995; Danermark et al., 2002), geography
(Sayer, 2000), management and organizational studies (Ackroyd and
Fleetwood, 2000), social research methods (Sayer, 1992), policy
studies (Henry, et al. 1998; Pawson, 2006, 2013; Mark et al., 2000),
and education (in particular sociology of education (Maton, 2014;
Maton & Moore, 2010; Muller, 2000; Moore, 2007, 2009; Scott, 2010;
Shipway, 2012; Wheelahan, 2010; Young, 2008a, 2008b).
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4. What is critical realism?
a. Realism as doctrine in philosophy or more specifically in the
philosophy of science “belief that there is a world existing
independently of our knowledge of it.” (Sayer, 2000, P. 2). It assumes
that the objects of study in science “is ontologically independent of
human mind.” (Niiniluoto, 1990, P. 10)
b. Critical realism as a theoretical branch within realism makes several
specific theoretical claims: (Collier, 1994, P.6-7)
i. Objectivity: It refers to the ontological stance that “what is known
would be real whether or not it were known. Something may be
real without appearing at all.” (P. 6)
ii. Fallibility: It refers to the epistemological stance that knowledge
claims made by critical realists are “not about some supposedly
infallible or corrigible data of appearance.” Instead, they “are
always open to refutation by further information.” (P. 6) Therefore,
social researchers must also be vigilant and critical to their
research results and knowledge claims.
iii. Transphenomenality (going beyond appearance): It indicates that
“knowledge may be not only of what appears, but of underlying
structures, which endure longer than those appearances, and
generate them or make them possible.” (P. 6)
iv. Counter-phenomenallity: It refers to the epistemological stance
which claims that “knowledge of the deep structure of something
may not just go beyond, and not just explain, but also contradict
appears. …It is precisely the capacity of science for counterphenomenality which made it necessary: without the contradiction
between appearance and reality, science would be redundant,
and we could go by appearance.” (P.7)
B. Conceptual constituents of Transcendental Realism of Natural Sciences
Roy Basher starts his buildup of critical realism first with the analysis of the
work and enterprise of natural sciences. One of his initial points of
departure is to criticize the validity of empirical realism, which was the
dominant approach in scientific research. Instead Bhaskar proposes to
replace empirical realism with what he called transcendental realism. It
means that the reality of the natural world is not confine its appearances or
to what we could have experienced. He claims that there are deeper layers
of mechanism and system at work than the mere appearances that we
could sensorily experience. (Collier, 1994, Pp. 25-29)
1. Concept of Depth Realism: The first conception of Bhaskar’s Critical
Realism is his distinction of reality into three domains:
a. Empirical domain: It refers to the aspect of reality which we have
experienced with our senses.
b. Actual domain: It refers to events which have occurred without our
noticing, while we can infer from their effects.
c. Real domain: It refers to the properties within entities, which are able
to triggers events to take place or to constraint them from occurring.
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Domain of Real Domain of
Actual
✓
Mechanism
✓
Events
✓
Experiences
Source: Bhaskar, 1978, P. 13
✓
✓
Domain of
Empirical
✓
2. Features of the domain of the Real: Bhaskar has further differentiated
the features of the reality into levels:
a. Power and liability: Powers or emergent power, in Bhaskar’s term,
refers to the potentials which are able trigger events to take place;
while liability are properties which can prevent or constraint events
from happening.
b. Mechanism: It refers to a set of powers working inter-connectively to
set off the occurrence an event or a chain of events.
c. Structure of the system: It refers to the interconnections among
operative mechanisms, which constitute the underlying structure
against which events are taking places.
d. Open/closed system: It refers the openness or closure (i.e. boundary)
of a given system. According to Critical Realist conception, “no
system in our universe is ever perfectly closed.” (Collier, 1994, P. 33)
And accordingly both our natural and social world are by definition
open systems.
3. Stratification of causation: Taking together these conceptions of the
natural world stipulated by the Critical Realists, theories and models of
causal explanations formulated by scientists can be categorized into
several strata
a. Cause-effect explanation
b. Explanatory mechanism
c. Explanatory structure
i. Structure of closed system: Nomological/law-like explanations
ii. Structure of open system: Theories of tendency or emergency
4. The work of science: Given all these specifications of the operations of
the natural world, Critical Realists contend that the work of natural
science is in no way close to the conceptions of experimental work
stipulated by empiricism (based solely on sensory observation) and
positivism (aimed solely at verifying nomological explanations). Instead,
Critical Realists specify the features of the work of experimental science
as follows:
a. Science as work: Science in essence “is work, not contemplation, not
observation, not taking up of some kind of scientific attitude.” “It is an
active intervention into nature, made by people with acquired scientific
skills, usually using special equipment.” (Collier, 1993, P. 50) And “the
‘product’ is not the new arrangement of matter brought about by the
experiment. …It is the deepened knowledge of some mechanism of
nature.” (P.52)
b. Dr = Da = De coincide: Deepening of knowledge of nature means to
penetrate the empirical world and the actual events and to obtain the
mechanism and structure underlying all human experiences. It is
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through scientific experiment, “we can set up a situation in which
three domains (Dr, Da, De) coincide — in which a mechanism is
actualized, i.e. isolated from its usual codeterminants, so that it can
operate as a closed system, and to manifested as an event
exemplifying the law to which it corresponds.” (Collier, 1994, P. 45)
c. Experiment as closure: “What the experiment does …is to isolate one
mechanism of nature from the effect of others, to see what that
mechanism does on its own.” (Collier, 1994, P. 33) It is “an attempt to
trigger or unleash a single kind of mechanism or process in relative
isolation, free from the interfering flux of the open world, so as to
observe its details workings or record its characteristic mode of effect
and/or to test some hypothesis about them.” (Bhashar, 1986, P. 35;
quoted in Collier, 1994, P. 33)
d. Theory-led endeavor: “The classical sequence of experimental
science is…: first we construct a theory, then we design an
experiment to test it, then we receive nature’s answer to our question.”
(Collier, 1994, P. 40) This indicates that experimental practice cannot
replace theoretical thinking in the work of science. Power of
abstraction and theoretical synthesizing is not only the initial point of
departure for formulation of problems but also the guiding signposts
throughout the path of scientific enquiry.
5. The hierarchy of science:
a. In view of the distinct domains, levels and strata specified by Critical
Realists so far, the enterprise of science itself can then be further
differentiated into “distinct sciences — physics, chemistry, biology,
economics etc. — which are mutually irreducible, but which are
ordered. Physics is in this sense more basic than chemistry, which is
more basic than biology, which is more basic than the human
sciences.” (Collier, 1994, P. 107)
b. For example, Benton and Craib proposed a hierarchy of sciences as
follows. (Benton & Craib, 2011, P. 127)
social sciences
psychology
physiology/anatomy
organic chemistry/biological chemistry
physical chemistry
physics
c. Andrew Collier posposes another hierarchy, which he calls “tree of
science” (Collier, 1994, P. 132)
?
psychological and semiological sciences
social sciences
biological sciences
Molecular sciences
?
d. “This way of ordering the sciences could be justified in terms of the
mechanisms characteristic of each level are explicable in terms of
those of the nest one below it. This corresponds to a view of science
as explaining wholes in terms of the parts of which they are
composed.” (Benton and Craib, 2011, Pp. 126-127) However, it must
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be underlined that the causal flows can be construed in both
directions, that is, “causality can flow down the hierarchy as well as up
it.” (P. 128)
6. Intransitive and transitive dimensions of science:
a. Intransitive dimension of science: According to the basic tenet of
Critical Realism, the natural world exists independently of human
minds and knowledge. Hence, this object of science studies — the
natural world and with all its substances, mechanisms and
structures — constitute the intransitive dimension of the work of
science.
b. Transitive dimension of science: Scientists, with their concepts and
theories, their skills and practices, as well as their communities,
associations and rival schools of thought, they constitute the transitive
dimension of science. What scientists do is to strive to deepen the
existing scientific knowledge of the nature world.
c. Accordingly, “the ‘results’ of scientific inquiry at any time are a set of
theories about the nature of the world, which are presumably our best
approximation to truth about the world….However much science
deepens its knowledge of its intransitive object, its product remains a
transitive object.” (Collier, 1994, P. 51)
d. In light of these distinctions between intransitive and transitive
dimensions in science, we can see that Critical Realists take on
different stances for their ontological and epistemological foundations.
Ontologically, Critical Realists assume its objects of their enquiry are
intransitive and real and the products of their enquiry could be truth.
However, epistemological, Critical Realists admit that their scientific
work and practice at any given in time are only relative to the material,
social as well as theoretical configuration of the scientific enterprise,
in which they find themselves.
D. Distinction between the Natural and the Social Sciences: Conceptual
Constituents of Critical Naturalism
1. The debate between the natural and the social sciences has been raging
on since the nineteenth century around the issue of the unity of scientific
method. Recently Roy Bhaskar reformulates the issue at the beginning
of his book The Possibility of Naturalism as follows. “To what extent can
society be studied in the way as nature?” (Bhaskar, 1998, P. 1) Two
conventional answers to this issue are
a. Naturalism: The positive answer to the issue can be summarized
under the doctrine, which Bhaskar called naturalism. By naturalism, it
refers to the doctrine which asserts that there “is (or can be) an
essential unity of method between the natural and the social sciences.”
(Bhaskar, 1998, P. 2) With this naturalist camp, subdivisions can
further be differentiated
i. Reductionism, which claims that “there is an actual identity of
subject matter” between the two sciences.” (Bhaskar, 1998, P. 2)
ii. Scientism, which “denies that there are any significant differences
in the methods appropriate to studying social and natural subject.”
(Bhaskar, 1998, P. 2) That appropriate method is of course the
scientific method.
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iii. Positivism, which claims that the products of studies in both the
natural and social sciences are the same, that is, to verify causal
laws, which can account for the events under study to the full.
(Bhaskar, 1998; Collier, 1994, P. 102-102)
b. Hermeneutics and interpretive theory: In opposite to the naturalists
positive answer to the issue, social scientists in hermeneutic and
interpretive tradition insist that it is impossible to study society in the
way as nature! They have argued for centuries that human and social
sciences are essentially distinct from natural sciences in terms of their
methodology and epistemology, but most importantly in their
ontological foundation. (These arguments have been explicate on
Topic 2 and 3 in this course)
2. Critical Realists’ stance on the issue of the possibility of naturalism of
social science:
a. Critical Realists have distanced themselves from the epistemological
arguments between positivism and hermeneutics and the
methodological arguments between quantitative and qualitative
research practitioners; they have chosen a different approach to the
issue, by looking into the ontological differences between the natural
world and the social reality. They have synthesized a series of
concepts, which attempt to build a conceptual framework of social
ontology of critical realism.
b. Human agents and their agency: Critical Realists assert that one of
the major differences between nature and society is that society is
made up of human agents, who would not act or behave mechanically
to antecedent causes or stimulus. Human beings are “meaning
making animals”, who forge ideas, hold believes, adhere identities,
plan intentional actions, and carry out projects and agencies. As a
result, in accounting for social events, social scientists could not
simply look for antecedent causes, in the form of necessary and/or
sufficient conditions. They must dig deep into social reality and look
for “reasons”. In fact, Critical Realists have argued at length that
reasons, which include beliefs, desires, ideas, intentions, should
belong to the causal orders in accounting for social events. (Bhaskar,
1998, Pp.80-119; Collier, 1994, Pp. 151-156)
c. Activity-dependent structure and Transformational Model of Social
Activity (TMSA): One of the fundamental differences between
structures of society and nature is that “social structures are
maintained in existence only through the activities of agents (activitydependence), whereas this is not true of structures of nature.”
(Benton & Craib, 2011, P. 135) More specifically, the continuity and
consistency of a given social structure depends mainly on the
willingness and capacity of its members to participate and carry out
the obligations and duties prescribed to their specific positions within
the structure. Therefore, the endurance of a social structure rely on
the efficacies of its institutions of production, socialization, social
control and reproduction.
Bhaskar has named this characteristic of social structure as
Transformation Model of Social Activity (TMAS). That is, social
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structures are more likely to transform than structures of nature and
their endurance are only relative in nature.
d. Concept-dependence and the cultural dimension of social structure:
Since the reproduction of social structures are subject to human
agents’ participations and actions, they are therefore more
fundamentally depending on members’ impressions, perceptions,
beliefs, and conception about the respective structures. As a result,
social structures are not only built on their material grounds same as
the structures of nature, but are also based on their cultural resources,
such as linguistic, cultural and social capitals.
e. Space-time-dependent and context specific: Unlike the structure of
entities found in nature, which are universal across both time and
space; social structures constituted by human agents are heavily
embedded in the specific contexts, in which particular groups of
human agents found themselves. These contexts include historical
contexts, socio-cultural contexts, geo-political contexts, naturalecological contexts, etc.
f. Impossibility of experimental closure: Incomparable to natural
scientists, social scientists are practical impossible to isolate any
fragments of social reality and to design an experimental closure, in
which they can test their hypothesis about specific causal relations
found in society. In fact the openness of the social system is so
immense that it is basically unable to control and/or randomize all the
other co-determinants confounding the specific cause-effect
explanatory models that social scientists are supposed to verify.
g. Unsustainability of intransitive-transitive division in knowledge of
social science: Unlike knowledge of natural science, in which the
distinction between the intransitivity of the natural world and the
transitivity of the knowledge produced by particular groups of natural
scientists is empirically definitive; the division is practically indistinct. It
is because social reality is transitive in nature. They are subject to
change with the beliefs and ideas of human agents. Furthermore, they
may even transform themselves according to findings and theories
produced by social scientists.
3. Critical Realists’ conception of social reality:
Given these essential distinctions between natural and social reality,
Critical Realists’ conception of social reality may be summarized as
follows:
a. Relational model of society: Bhaskar suggests that “society does not
consist of individuals (or we might add, groups), but expresses the
sum of relations within which individuals (and groups) stand.”
(Bhaskar, 1998, P. 26)
b. Studying the persistence and endurance of relations: Bhaskar further
indicates that social sciences in general and sociology in particular
are “concerned…with the persist relations between individuals (and
groups) and with relations between these relations (and between such
relation and nature and the products of such relations).” (Bhaskar,
1998, P. 28-29; my emphasis)
c. Duality of objectivity and subjectivity in social structure:
i. Durkheimian objective-factual conception of social structure
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ii. Weberian subjective-meaningful conception of social structure
iii. Critical Realist synthesis: TMSA and M/M approach
d. Duality of individualism and collectivism in social structure:
i. Atomic reductionism and methodological individualism
ii. Structuralism and methodological collectivism
iii. Critical realist synthesis: SEPM and M/M/ Approach
e. Duality of stability and change in social structure
i. Conception of relativity of persistence and Morphostasis
ii. Conception of Morphogenesis
E. Margaret S. Archer’s Morphogenetic/Morphostatic Approach
1. Morphogenetic Approach
a. Meaning of morphogenesis:
i. The prefix ‘morpho’ refers to ‘of or pertaining to form’ and ‘genesis’
refers ‘mode of formation’. Hence, morphogenesis is commonly in
biology to mean formation of the structure biological organisms,
while in physical geography it refers formation of landscapes or
landforms. (Oxford English Dictionary)
ii. Margaret Archer uses the word in morphogenetic approach to
connote that “the ‘morpho’ element is an acknowledgement that
society has no pre-set form or preferred state; the ‘genetic’ part is a
recognition that it takes its shape from, and is formed by, agents,
originating from the intended and unintended consequences of the
activities.” (Archer, 1995, p. 5)
iii. The approach can then be construed as an echo of the TMSA in
Critical Realism in sociological analysis. It emphasizes both the
possibility of transforming the social structure through social
actions of the agents, and at the same time underline the relative
endurance and resilience of social structures and their conditioning
(not determining) effects on the social actions of human agents.
b. Morphogenetic approach in structure-agency debate in sociology:
Archer allocates her morphogenetic approach against the
longstanding structure-agent in the debate on social ontology in
sociology. Archer asserts that her approach can address three
common “conflations” found in the debate. They are
i. The downwards conflation: It refer to those theoretical stances
which put special emphasis on the determinacy of the social
structure over the agents and their plans of actions (i.e. agencies).
They includes “any uncompromising version of technological
determinism, economism, structuralism or normative functionalism.”
(Archer, 1995, P. 81) As a result, these theoretical stances
constitute a kind of “downwards conflation where structure and
agency are conflated because action is treated as fundamentally
epiphenomenal has many variants….The bottom line is always that
actors may be indispensable for energizing the social system.”
(Archer, 1995, P. 81) The methodological ground grown out the
social ontology of structuralism is commonly known as
methodological collectivism.
ii. The upwards conflation: It refers to the theoretical stances which is
argued for “the primacy of the agent” and underlines that structure
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is but the creation of agency. Social structural are hence reduced
to “a series of intersubjectively negotiated constructs”. (Archer,
1995, P. 84) The methodological ground generated from such
social ontology is called the methodological individualism.
iii. Central conflation: It is “an approach based upon the putative
mutual constitution of structure and agency and finds its most
sophisticated expression in modern ‘structuration theory’.” (Archer,
1995, P. 87) The structuration theory is called made well-known by
the work of Anthony Giddens. However, Archer argues that what
has been suppressed (or conflated) in this mutually constituting
activity is the historical-temporal thickness of society, more
specifically, the enduring institutional practices sedimented over
time. In Archer’s own words, “structural properties (defined
reductively as rules and resources) are held to be outside time,
having a ‘virtual existence’ only when instantiated by actions. In
exact parallel, when actors produce social practices they
necessarily draw upon rules and resources and the inevitable
invoke the whole matrix of structural properties at that instance.”
(Archer, 1995, P. 87) Archer therefore criticizes that Giddens has
not given adequate treatment to the temporal dimension in the
structuration theory.
c. Taking time to link structure an agency: In rectifying these
conflations found in the structure-agency debate, Archer formulated
her theory of morphogenesis by injecting a time dimension into the
framework. She underlines that “the distinctive feature of the
morphogenetic approach is its time dimension, through which and
in which structure and agency shape one another.” (1995, P. 92)
i. Three-part cycles of the morphogenesis: “Morphogenetic
analysis, in contrast to the three foregoing approaches, accords
time a central place in social theory. By working in terms od its
three-part cycles composed of (a) structural conditioning, (b)
social interaction and (c) structure elaboration, time is
incorporated as sequential tract and phases rather than simply
as a medium through which events take place.” (Archer, 1995, P.
89)
Source, Archer, 1995, p. 76.
ii. As a result, Archer claims that her analytical framework has
rectified the three prevailing approaches to structure-agency
debates in sociological theory.
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Source, Archer, 1995, P. 82.
d. Structural condition: This part of the cycle represents the structural
properties accumulated and passed on from past agencies. It also
signifies that this structural property could in fact assert “causal
influences upon subsequent interaction.” These influences are
working through facilitating the some types of interactions but at the
same time constraining some others. In Critical Realists’ terms they
impose selectively either “powers” or “liabilities” on human
interactions. By focusing mainly if not solely on this part of the
morphogenetic process, structuralists are of course confident to
endorse the dominance of the structure on the agency and as a result
have committed the downwards conflation that Archer has aptly
highlighted.
e. Social interaction: This tract of the cycle indicates that the causal
influences of structural properties on agencies are never deterministic
but only conditional and interactive in nature. It is because Critical
Realists presume that “agents possess their own irreducible emergent
power”. Hence, structural properties and agencies are engaging in
mutually “structurating” and “destructurating” interactions. This is the
point in time where Giddens theory of structuration comes in.
f. Structural elaboration: After the social interactions between the
structure and agent in each generation have played out, an
elaborated structure-agency relation will emerge. Analytically, this
may take one of the following outcomes:
i. Morphostasis: It refers to the outcome where the new generation
of human agents in a social system are socialized and
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incorporated into the existing structure as well as culture. And the
system has practically “reproduced” itself.
ii. Morphogenesis: It refers to the outcome where the prevailing
structure and culture of a given social system has been
elaborated, transformed and to the greatest extent revolted.
2. The integration of Morphogenetic approach into the conceptions of
Critical Realism:
Source: Archer, 1995, P. 160.
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F. Comparative-Historical Method for Institutional Research: In Search of the
Methodological Foundations for EAP Studies
1. The limitations of social knowledge: In light of the explications of the
ontological and epistemological foundations of policy studies in more
generally of the social sciences, we can conclude that social scientific
researchers are confront with numbers of limitations in comparison with
their fellow researchers in natural sciences. They include
a. Social sciences are expected to render causal explanations to
social events, that is, to be “explanatory sciences.” (Collier, 1994, P
1611)
b. Social sciences are “sciences without closure.” (Collier, 1994, P.
161) More importantly, social scientists are possible to set up
experimental closure.
c. Social sciences are “sciences with hermeneutic premises.” (Collier,
1994, P. 161) That is they are required to reveal the meanings
embedded in social reality.
d. The explanations social scientists rendered should be more than
immediate causes for empirical events, but must include reasons
and intentions attributed by human agents participated in the
respective events.
e. These explanations should also include contextual factors
(including temporal, spatial, and socio-economical contexts) in
which the human agents concerned find themselves.
f. Last but not the least, social scientists must take into account the
transformative potentials embedded in social realities and more
importantly the emancipatory powers endowed in human agents.
2. In order to eliminate these limitations, social scientists must transcend
the demarcations between the empiricist-positivism and the
interpretive-hermeneutic tradition, more specifically, between the
quantitative and qualitative methods. One of the cornerstones in
bridging these epistemological and methodological chasms is the
comparative-historical method.
a. Margaret Archer, one of the leading sociologists in Critical Realism,
has demonstrated some convincingly the validities of the
comparative-historical method in one of her early research work
Social Origins of Educational Systems (1979).
b. In the study, Archer traces the historical paths of developments of
modern educational systems in four European countries in two
pairs, namely
i. England and Denmark representing Substitutive Model
ii. France and Russia representing Restrictive Model
3. Comparative-historical method has a long, if not the longest, tradition in
the research of social sciences. It can be traced back to the works of
the founding fathers of social sciences, such as Karl Marx, Max Weber
and Emile Durkheim.
4. More recently in the past three decades, there are growing numbers of
publications on empirical research and methodological discussions. For
examples, Collins (1979, 1999), Carnoy & Levin. (1985), Green (1990),
Mahoney & Rueschemeyer (2003), Ragin (1987), Schriewer (1990),
Skocpol (1979, 1982), Somers (2008), Tilly (1984, 1990), etc.
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G. Explanatory Critique
Given the specific natures of social reality and the explanatory power realist
social sciences characterized above, Bhaskar asserts that Critical-Realist
social theorists are equipped with what Bhaskar called “explanatory
critiques” in accounting for social phenomena.
1. Models of explanation in social sciences: So far we have covered three
methodological approaches and epistemological perspectives, it is
revealed that each of them apply different modes of explanation to
account for the social phenomena under study.
a. Nomological causal explanation: It refers to the explanatory models,
which aim to provide law-like explanation in the form of antecedent
cause and subsequent effect causation to the social phenomena
under study. To a less extent, it substantiates at least probabilistic
covariance connection between two variables under study.
b. Teleological explanation: it refers to the explanatory models, which
attempt to provide intentional explanation to human actions. It intends
not to trace antecedent causes for human action but motives and
intentions at work behind given action aiming to the future. Under the
working assumption that humans are rational actions, this explanatory
models has been modified into what is now commonly known as
rational-choice model. Furthermore, there is also another kind of
explanatory model generally called quasi-teleological explanation in
use in social sciences, which render explanations for social actions in
macroscopic scale in the formats of functional and institutional
accounts.
c. Explanatory critique: As critical social scientists, they have employed
yet another kind of explanatory model, which the critical realists
named “explanatory critique”.
2. What is explanatory critique?
a. As formulated by Critical Theorists, such as Horkheimer and
Habermas, they are not contented with verifying causality or/and
revealing meanings, intentions and values in accounting for social
activities; they intends to go beyond the regularities and persistence
found in social structures and/or belief-systems and look at the
possible systemic biases, injustice, and false believes (i.e. ideologies)
at work behind these social regularities.
b. Having revealed the systemic biases and ideologies, critical social
scientists would feel obliged to criticize the “incorrectness”, injustice,
and social ills found in the phenomena under study.
c. Lastly, in order to justify their critique, critical social scientists must
elevate their explanatory tasks from empirical-causal explanations
and/or interpretive-intentional/functional explanations to the level of
“explanatory critique”, i.e. to provide explanations for their critiques.
3. In search of the evaluative ground for the critical social science:
a. In the last section of the concluding chapter of the two-volume work
The Theory of Communicative Theory, Jurgen Habermas underlines
that “In this work I have tried to introduce a theory of communicative
action that clarifies the normative foundation of the critical theory of
society.” (Habermas, 1987, P. 396-7)
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This quotation underlines that one of the essential “task of a critical
theory” is to provide “the normative foundation of the critical theory of
society.” And the normative foundation that Habermas renders for his
own critical theory is exactly the theory of communicative action,
rationality and ethics. (Habermas, 1984 & 1987)
b. Accordingly, in reviewing any critical theories and the explanatory
critiques they provided, one must look for the normative foundation on
which the explanatory critiques and evaluations are based. For
examples,
c. Marx’s normative foundation of explanatory critique: Karl Marx builds
his explanatory critique of capitalism on the normative foundation that
the mode and relation of production of capitalism has generated
i. the extreme inequality of economic distribution biased in favor of
the bourgeoisie against the proletarian, which is the causal result
of the exploitative nature of the relation of production;
ii. the ever accelerating process of commodification, which has not
only alienated and reified the process of production, but also the
labor process as well;
iii. the contradictions between the infrastructure and the
superstructure of the capitalism, most notably the hegemony of
the ideology of the capitalists over the culture of the whole society.
d. Weber’s normative foundation of explanatory critique: Max Weber
builds his explanatory critique on the normative foundation not only on
the economic sphere of capitalism but also on the bureaucratization of
the modern state. Weber underlines that the expansion of the
instrumental rationality into various human organization has produced
the “iron cage” in which humans have loss both the meanings and
freedom in lives.
e. Habermas’ normative foundation of explanatory critique: As cited
above, Habermas has indicated that the normative foundation of his
critical theory of society is the theory of communicative action. By the
theory of communicative action, it refers to “the theory…aims at the
moment of unconditionality of processes of consensus formation. As
claims they transcend all limitations of space and time, all the
provincial limitations of the given contexts.” (Habermas, 1987, p. 399)
However, Habermas argues that in modern society the money
steering apparatus of the market and the power-steering apparatus of
the state have proliferated to such a great extent that the primary
operating ground of communicative actions, i.e. the Lifeworld, has
practically been colonized. (to be explicated in details on Topic 6 & 8)
4. Critical Realists’ normative foundation of explanatory critique:
a. Critical realists, in particular Bhaskar and Collier, approach the issue
of finding the normative ground or in their terms “evaluative language”
for their explanatory critique from another perspective, namely from
methodological an epistemological perspectives rather than from the
substantive theoretical perspective as Marx, Weber and Habermas.
They approach the issue by addressing one of the fundamental
debates in social research, namely the entanglement between fact
and value.
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b. The fact and value aporia in social research: In natural-scientific
research, fact and value are two separate domains, which should not
be conflated in any ways. However, within the tradition of social
research and sociological research in particular, the relation between
fact and value has been one of the most controversial topics annoying
its practitioners. On the one hand, social researchers are supposed to
observe the code of “value-free” in the investigation as suggested by
Max Weber, yet on the other hand, the same Weber has also
advocated that social actions are laden with subjective meanings and
values. As a result, bridging the gap between objective fact and
subjective value has been one of the aporia confronting social
researchers for generations.
c. One of the manifestations of the fact-value aporia in social research is
on the issue whether the objects of study, i.e. social phenomena are
embodied with values or should they be treated as objective facts.
Bhaskar approaches the issue with an example from put forth by
Isaiah Berlin, “that of the following four statements about what
happened in Nazi Germany: ‘the country was depopulated’, ‘millions
of people died’, ‘millions of people were killed’ were massacred’,
‘millions of people were massacred’——the fourth is both the most
evaluative and the most precise and accurate; it gives more truth than
the others. That is so, but the evaluative force arises entirely out of
the factual content. It is not that by bringing values into the discourse
one makes it a fuller statement of the truth, but that that by making a
fuller statement of the truth one implies more value.” (Collier, 1994,
P.178) This example in fact reveals that it is a common feature in
social phenomena to proceed from factual statements to value
statement and more importantly such a proceeding will practically
bring out “more truth” about the social phenomenon in point.
d. This example has also revealed another issue involved in research in
the critical social science in general and explanatory critique in
particular, that is what type of truth has the explanatory critique
brought out in their investigation?
i. First of all, the critique on Nazi’s act of massacred is built on the
normative foundation that it is morally wrong to kill people in large
scale.
ii. Based on factual evidences generated from investigations, social
researchers may and even can infer from “depopulated” to
“massacred”. As a result, the argument has in fact elevated from
factual statement to value judgment/conclusion.
iii. With the normative foundation and the evidence-based inference,
social researchers can substantiate their critique on the social
phenomenon under study as structural biased, ideological false or
simply morally wrong.
Taking together this line of criticism, we can see that the kind of truth
that critical social scientists is pursuing is quite different from the
objective truth of the analytical-empirical scientists and the practical
truth of the hermeneutic researchers, it can be characterized as the
normative truth, which is based with a strong normative foundation or
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even conviction and at the same time supported with explanatory
critiques.
5. Typology of explanatory critiques: Bhaskar has outlined different types of
explanatory critiques, but they are to be developed into substantive
theories by means of “realistic” social researches in various social
domains.
a. Explanatory critique on “cognitive ills” (i.e. cognitive deceptions) and
“communicative ills” (i.e. communicative distortions) in social reality,
i.e. ideology
b. Explanatory critique on “practical ills” in social reality, i.e. institutional
injustice, illegitimate power and systemic bias
c. Explanatory critique on “ethical ills” in social reality, i.e. psychopathological acts and irrational agencies
6. Explanatory critique and normative truth in educational research
In light of the precedent discussions about the meanings of explanatory
critique and normative truth, we can see that educational research in
general and studies of educational administration and policy in particular
are in essence a critical science.
a. The emancipatory and critical nature of education: Education as a
human and social science and practice aiming at developing the
potentials of every members of a given society to the full, it is
therefore by definition an emancipatory project working for the
betterment of human possibilities and potentialities. On the contrary,
educators must be critical to any systemic biases and distortions
which may restraint or suppress the developments of human
potentials. This is in fact the very normative foundation of education.
b. Explanatory critique in educational research: In light of the above
normative foundation or even conviction, education researchers are
obligated to render explanatory critiques, which can provide
evidences in criticizing any form of restraints and suppression of the
developments of human potentials. In more positive sense,
educational researchers should also provide explanatory critiques,
which can improve the current institutional structure and belief in
educational system, i.e. for the betterment of the status quo.
c. In defense of the normative truth of education: Based on the
normative foundation and conviction of helping every human to
develop their potential to the full, and built on the evidences
substantiated from concrete educational research and the substantive
explanatory critiques concluded, educational researchers come to the
position to defend the normative and educational truth they are
obligated to defend. They may be in the forms of educational
inequality and injustice institutionalized in particular educational
organizations and/or policy institutions. They may also appear in the
forms of false believes and ideologies about educational practices
which in fact produce distorting, detrimental or even suppressive
effects to the development of school-children’s potentials.
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