Philosophical Considerations

While a majority of this chapter will focus on the consideration of a suitable methodological approach and the selection and deployment of particular research methods, it is appropriate to set first both the ontological and epistemological context for this thesis. The consideration of epistemological issues and the articulation of the chosen epistemological orientation underpins and justifies the methodological choices taken in this study. However, before a discussion of the epistemological foundation of this study, the underlying ontological perspective and the relationship between ontology and epistemology will be considered.

3.2.1 Ontology

A clear statement of ontological beliefs provides an important context to the decisions taken in designing a successful research project.

“To ensure a strong research design, researchers must choose a research paradigm that is congruent with their beliefs about the nature of reality. Consciously

subjecting such beliefs to an ontological interrogation in the first instance will illuminate the epistemological and methodological possibilities that are available” (Mills, et al. 2006: 26).

Ontology is the study of the nature of reality. “[It] refers to our views as to what constitutes the social world and how we can go about studying it” (Barbour 2008: 20). While there are many perspectives on the nature of reality, in the social sciences, there are three broad and dominant categories and they can be imagined as being set along a continuum: Representationalism, Relativism and Nominalism.

Adherents to the Representationalist perspective understand truth to be discoverable through the verification of predictions and that facts are concrete, but not directly accessible. The second view is Relativism and it asserts that the truth ‘requires

consensus between different viewpoints’ and that facts are dependent on the ‘viewpoint of the observer’. The third view is Nominalism and it asserts that ‘truth depends on who establishes it’ and facts are all human creations (Easterby-Smith, et al. 2003).

As an ontological position, the author sympathises most strongly with a hybrid ontological view that incorporates elements of both Representationalism and

Relativism. This may appear problematic given the need to adopt an epistemological view that favours social constructionist, rather than positivist research methodology. However, despite their differences these ontological and epistemological choices can be reconciled. This reconciliation “[...] is based on the assumption that social reality is independent of us and exists regardless of whether we are aware of it. Therefore, the ontological debate of ‘What is reality?’ can be kept distinct from the epistemological question of ‘How do we obtain knowledge of that reality?” (Collis and Hussey 2003: 52). Having stated the author’s Representationalist/Relativist hybrid view of Ontology –and thus acknowledging potential, pre-existing bias on the nature of reality, facts and

truth– the next section will examine briefly the basic epistemological debate and the epistemological position employed with this particular research project.

3.2.2 Epistemology

Whereas ontology focuses on our view of the nature of reality, epistemology deals with our assumptions of how knowledge of reality is obtained and used. From a research perspective, epistemology is vital as it:

“[...] assumes some vantage point, one step removed from the actual practice of science itself. At first sight this promises to provide some foundation for scientific knowledge: a methodological and theoretical beginning located in normative standards that enable the evaluation of knowledge by specifying what is permissible and hence the discrimination of warranted belief from the

unwarranted, the rational from the irrational, the scientific from the pseudoscience” (Johnson and Duberley 2006: 3).

Epistemological perspectives within management studies can be imagined –in a most general sense– along a continuum, which includes the following groupings: Positivism, Interpretivism and Constructivism. These classifications correspond roughly to the ontological designations described above; however, these epistemological views are not necessarily tied to their respective ontological counterparts: Representationalism, Relativism, and Nominalism. As previously stated, one’s views on the nature of reality and one’s views on the nature of knowledge can be independent.

While successfully applied to the Social Sciences, positivism has its roots in the natural sciences and favours the quantitative methods of scientific investigation as the only legitimate investigative approach. It is an approach that “[...] has the elements of being reductionistic, logical, and [with an] emphasis on empirical data collection, [is] cause-

and-effect oriented, and deterministic based on a priori theory” (Creswell 2007: 22). This epistemological orientation is partial to research methods such as experiments, surveys, quantitative data and statistical analysis (Thietart, et al. 2001).

A positivist epistemological approach to the current study suits neither the author’s views nor the preferred treatment of text. Given the qualitative nature of the dataset, the lack of investigator control over past events, and the preference for an inductive, theory- building research design, a positivist epistemological approach will not be chosen.

The second major epistemological paradigm within management studies is

Interpretivism. Unlike the adherence of positivism to the principles of natural scientific inquiry, interpretivism sees a fundamental difference between the subjects of study in the natural sciences (molecules, plants, animals, etc.) and the subjects of study in the social sciences (people, organisations, societies, etc.). This fundamental difference between the natural and social sciences is explained by Laing (1967), as he stresses the need to “[...] realise that there is an ontological discontinuity between human beings and it—beings [...] Persons are distinguished from things in that persons experience the world, whereas things behave in the world” (p. 53). The acknowledgment of human

experience adds a new complexity to the study of the social sciences. Lee (1991) elaborates on the implications of the unique nature of persons when he writes that, “[...] the same physical artifact, the same institution, or the same human action, can have different meanings for different human subjects, as well as for the observing social scientist” (p. 347). Therefore, facts and meaning have a distinctly subjective nature based on a multiplicity of perspectives. As explained by Thietart, et al. (2001),

paraphrasing Guba and Lincoln (1994), “ [...] there is not one sole reality –which would be possible to apprehend, however imperfectly– but multiple realities; the product of individual or collective mental constructions that are likely to evolve over the course of time” (p. 113).

The possibility of evolving multiple meanings of realities and facts provides a unique challenge for the researcher who must:

“[...] interpret this empirical reality in terms of what it means to the observed people. In accepting these intersubjectively created meanings as an integral part of the subject matter the researcher [...] is studying, [he] must collect facts and data describing not only the purely objective, publicly observable aspects of human behavior, but also the subjective meaning this behavior has for the human subjects themselves” (Lee 1991: 347).

This undertaking requires different methodologies and methodological tools. Therefore, in opposition to the preference for quantitative methodologies and techniques in a positivist approach, qualitative methods of inquiry tend to populate the interpretivism epistemological approach. Interpretivism is relevant with respect to this project in that it recognises that both observable objects and phenomena, such as social interaction, power relationships and social institutions, are real and can be studied given an appropriate methodological approach.

Finally, at the other end of the epistemic spectrum is the social constructivist paradigm. While positivism recognises an external and true reality and interpretivism asserts a multiplicity of realities based on different observers, constructivism advocates that there is, in fact, no independent reality and that all facts and notions of reality are human constructions. Easterby-Smith, et al. (2003) outline the primary assignment of a researcher within the constructivist epistemological paradigm:

“In starting from a viewpoint which does not assume any pre-existing reality, the aims of the researcher are to understand how people invent structures to help them make sense of what is going on around them. Consequently, much attention is given to the use of language and conversations between people as they create their own meaning” (p. 34).

It should be noted that in addition to the view that reality and facts are human

constructions, they are also in a constant state of revision and reinvention as a result of ongoing social interactions (Bryman and Bell 2007). While the constructivist attention to social phenomena is encouraging, the fact that it assumes absolutely no objective reality is perhaps epistemologically extreme. This research project is an examination of real events with very real implications. There is a practical, public-policy orientation to this work and while it will necessarily deal with many socially constructed phenomena, to embrace the more radical elements of a relativist/constructivist approach is not desirable.

The three paradigms (positivism, interpretivism, social constructionism), described above, represent rigid embodiments of epistemological orientations; however, in practice researchers often hold less dogmatic views. As such the boundaries amongst the paradigms can be crossed in instances when it is both practically useful and

logically coherent to do so. Tsoukas (2000) makes a strong argument for bridging these paradigms in order to access the truth. To this end, he suggests that:

“Realists [positivists] are right in saying that there is a social world outside our heads. Constructivists are right in claiming that the social world is constituted by language-based distinctions which are socially defined and established. Both sides can be reconciled if it is accepted that social reality is causally independent of actors (hence realist have a point) and, at the same time, what social reality is depends on how it has been historically defined, the cultural meanings and distinctions which have made it this reality as opposed to that reality (hence the constructivists also have a point)” (p. 531).

Tsoukas’ attempt to bridge elements of differing epistemological paradigms is helpful in accommodating both the researcher’s ontological leanings and the epistemological needs of this research project. This compromise between two otherwise rigid and oppositional paradigms leads to, a viewpoint known as Critical Realism.

Critical Realism retains ontological elements of positivism, hence the term realism, while acknowledging that study within the social sciences can benefit from a more Interpretivist/Constructivist epistemological approach thus providing a broader range of methodological tools than would otherwise be available to a strict Positivist. As

Easterby-Smith, et al. (2003) explain:

“[c]ritical realism makes a conscious compromise between the extreme positions: it recognizes social conditions (such as class or wealth) as having real

consequences whether or not they are observed and labelled by social scientists; but it also recognizes that concepts are human constructions” (pp. 32-33).

The foci of this study are key rhetorical strategies employed during the legislative reform debates of the post-reporting phase of the 9/11 Commission inquiry. These rhetorical acts, and the texts in which they are recorded, are socially constructed artefacts. An examination of these artefacts leads to a discussion of social constructs such as sensemaking, hegemonic narrative, legitimacy and authority, none of which can exist outside the boundaries of the social world. As such, Critical Realism’s

acknowledgement that social constructions have a consequential impact on the material world is epistemologically relevant to this research project. Simply because these social constructs do not have physical characteristics that can be easily measured or quantified through a positivistic approach does not mean that they do not exist. In the same way, that our inability to observe some natural scientific phenomena does not diminish the reality of their existence (Miles and Huberman 1994). Having outlined the

philosophical foundations of this research project and reconciled these ontological and epistemological influences, the next section of this chapter will concentrate on the selection and justification of a methodologically grounded theory approach.