The Philosophy of Management Research

Eric W.K. Tsang

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781315463193
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

The field of management research is commonly regarded as or aspires to be a science discipline. As such, management researchers face similar methodological problems as their counterparts in other science disciplines. There are at least two ways that philosophy is connected with management research: ontological and epistemological.

Despite an increasing number of scattered philosophy-based discussions of research methodology, there has not been a book that provides a systematic and more comprehensive treatment of the subject. This book addresses this gap in the market and provides new ideas and arguments for guiding management researchers.

1
Philosophy

An under-laborer serving researchers

Economics, psychology, and sociology are commonly regarded as the mother disciplines of management; ¹ philosophy is often perceived as a recondite subject remotely related to management. ² Yet, the fact is that every management researcher subscribes to a certain philosophical perspective consciously or unconsciously. ³ There are at least two ways − ontological and epistemological − that philosophy is connected with management research. Researchers’ beliefs about the nature of the phenomena that they investigate reflect their ontological commitment. If ontology is concerned with the entities that constitute reality, their categorization and relations, epistemology is concerned with how researchers acquire, formulate, and justify their knowledge claims. Researchers’ ontological commitment often affects their epistemological orientation. Their ontological and epistemological stances together affect the methods they consider legitimate in carrying out empirical research and determine what they regard as a valid contribution to theory.

Students of management research mostly associate research methodology with statistical analysis, without being aware that certain methodological problems are intrinsically philosophical in nature. An apotheosis of such problems is the well-known methodological debate that took place in economics more than half a century ago. Marginal theory in microeconomics assumes that firms maximize profits by equating marginal revenue and marginal cost. However, Lester’s (1946) empirical study found that managers did not arrive at their production decisions through consulting schedules or multivariate functions showing marginal cost and marginal revenue. Lester (1946) thus attacked the realism of marginal theory’s assumptions. This methodological problem has an ontological dimension because it is about whether or not an assumption corresponds with reality. There is also an epistemological dimension because researchers face the question: is it justifiable to have a theory, such as marginal theory, that has unrealistic assumptions? In response to the debate aroused by Lester’s challenge, Friedman (1953: 15) put forward his famous methodological thesis:

… the relevant question to ask about the “assumptions” of a theory is not whether they are descriptively “realistic,” for they never are, but whether they are sufficiently good approximations for the purpose in hand. And this question can be answered by seeing whether the theory works, which means whether it yields sufficiently accurate predictions.

His response attracted rejoinders from not only economists but also philosophers. Instead of settling the original debate, the thesis expanded it to become the most important methodological debate in economics (Mäki 2000).

Although the field of management is short of a similarly prominent debate, a recent heated debate concerning the nature of entrepreneurial opportunities has caught the attention of at least the entrepreneurship segment of the field. In delineating the domain of entrepreneurship research, Shane and Venkataraman’s (2000) landmark paper considers the defining feature of entrepreneurial phenomena “the discovery and exploitation of profitable opportunities” (p. 217). The objective existence of entrepreneurial opportunities constitutes the foundation for entrepreneurship as a distinctive subject of study, with the nexus between individuals and opportunities forming the most promising research topic. Their stress on the objectivity of opportunities leads some researchers to deem that the discovery approach is based on a realist ontology (e.g., Alvarez and Barney 2013; Calás et al. 2009; Ireland 2007; Roscoe et al. 2013).

One of the major challenges facing the discovery approach is that opportunities are supposed to exist “out there,” somewhat similar to “mountains – exist as objective phenomena just waiting to be discovered and exploited” (Alvarez and Barney 2007: 11). Some researchers attempt to address this ontological conundrum by emphasizing the creative agency of entrepreneurs and argue that “opportunities do not exist until entrepreneurs create them through a process of enactment” (Alvarez et al. 2013: 307). Based on the premises of constructivism, the creation approach proposes that opportunities are socially constructed entities which do not exist independently of the ways entrepreneurs conceive and develop them (Spedale and Watson 2014).

The opposing stances of the discovery and the creation approaches nicely illustrate how a fundamental conceptual issue − the nature of entrepreneurial opportunities − is deeply embedded in philosophy. The issue has far-reaching methodological implications because the two approaches provide different recommendations as to what constitutes a research problem, what theoretical procedures to follow, and how data are analyzed and interpreted. This debate also demonstrates the importance of philosophical training, which is currently neglected by most doctoral programs in management. ⁴ Contrary to the view of some researchers mentioned earlier, the discovery approach is grounded in empiricism instead of realism, a mistake that can be avoided easily by those who possess a reasonable level of knowledge in philosophy. To clarify the confusions caused by philosophical misunderstandings in the debate, my colleague and I propose the actualization approach, which is truly based on realism (Ramoglou and Tsang 2016).

A major reason for the perception that philosophy is hard to understand is the proliferation of vastly divergent perspectives. It is beyond the scope of this book to discuss them in detail. Rather, the next section briefly compares some major philosophical perspectives that have been discussed by management researchers.

A brief comparison of key philosophical perspectives

Table 1.1 Comparison of positivism, postmodernism, critical realism, and pragmatism

	Positivism	Postmodernism	Critical realism	Pragmatism
Ontology	Objective reality with causality conceived as a constant conjunction of events	Reality socially constructed through subjective meanings, shared language, and social politics; multiple realities possible	Objective, stratified reality with domains of the real, actual, and empirical consisting of structures, mechanisms, and events	Objective reality, stressing the influence of the inner world of human experience in action
Epistemology	Empirical testing and verification of theories based on a hypothetico-deductive approach, with an aim of discovering law-like relationships that have predictive power	Knowledge produced by particular language games; rejection of metanarratives and acceptance of pluralism and fragmentation	Theoretical explanations retroduced from empirical data for describing the structures and mechanisms that generate the observable events, emphasizing explanation over prediction	Concepts and theories as instruments to solve human problems rather than as representations of reality; truth as an increase in the power to cope with the environment
Methodology	Researcher assumed to be unbiased and value-free; tendency toward using quantitative methods such as surveys, experiments, and analysis of archival data	Involvement of researcher in shaping research results explicitly described in detail; preference for semiotic and deconstructive techniques	Researcher reminded of the need to control for bias; no preference for any specific form of research methods	Researcher as active participant in the process of transformation; preference for mixed research methods

Since the 1980s there have been a growing number of articles in the management literature that employ philosophy to tackle methodological problems. The appendix reports a systematic review of 50 such articles published in nine leading management journals during the periods starting from their first issues until the end of 2015. Several popular philosophical perspectives emerge from the review. Table 1.1 summarizes the comparison of these perspectives in terms of ontology, epistemology, and methodology. Although they by no means exhaust the various perspectives that have appeared in the management literature, they provide a concise overview of the divergent ontological, epistemological, and methodological assumptions that different perspectives may represent. ⁵

Positivism

Positivism, also called logical positivism, is a philosophical movement initiated in the 1920s by the Vienna Circle − a group of philosophers, scientists, and mathematicians who met periodically for discussions in Vienna from 1922 to 1938. Positivism flourished for about two to three decades and came under severe attack in the second half of the last century (Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy 1999). In spite of its demise, positivism is often considered the most popular philosophical perspective among management researchers as they are usually trained in using quantitative research methods (Daft and Lewin 1990; Gephart 2004; Johnson and Duberley 2000).

Positivism assumes the existence of an objective, mind-independent reality that can be investigated by unbiased and value-free researchers. It adopts the Humean conception of causality, regarding the constant conjunction of events as an indicator of a causal relationship. To develop general theories that consist of law-like relationships among a set of empirically measurable constructs, positivists follow Hempel’s (1965) covering law model of explanation and adopt a hypothetico-deductive approach to empirical research. Theories are expected to not only explain but also predict phenomena, reflecting Hempel’s (1942: 38) argument for the symmetry between explanation and prediction:

An explanation… is not complete unless it might as well have functioned as a prediction; if the final event can be derived from the initial conditions and universal hypotheses stated in the explanation, then it might as well have been predicted, before it actually happened, on the basis of a knowledge of the initial conditions and general laws.

The covering law model introduces a logic of scientific explanation: the explanandum (i.e., that which is explained) should be logically deducible from a set of explanans (i.e., that which does the explaining) that include general laws (Douglas 2009).

Establishing a nomothetic body of knowledge usually requires statistical analysis of large databases. Moreover, generalizability of research results depends, to a great extent, on sample size. Therefore, positivists often prefer using quantitative methods such as questionnaire surveys, experiments, and analysis of archival data. A caveat is that positivists do not confine themselves to the use of quantitative methods. As Phillips (1987: 96) well says, “A positivist, qua positivist, is not committed to any particular research design. There is nothing in the doctrines of positivism that necessitates a love of statistics or distaste for case studies.” In fact, positivism is a popular perspective underlying case studies in management (Gephart 2004).

Postmodernism

Postmodernism is a late-twentieth-century intellectual movement in the social sciences, ranging from economics, psychology, and sociology to cultural studies and urban planning (Rosenau 1992). Its influence extends to art, music, architecture, and literature, and it is considered to be one of the greatest challenges to established knowledge in the last century (Wisdom 1987). If the meaning of positivism is frequently misunderstood (see Phillips 2000; Wight 1998), the meaning of postmodernism is even more so as “there is no unified postmodern theory, or even a coherent set of positions” (Best and Kellner 1991: 2). Bearing the risk of over-simplification, I here summarize a few characteristics shared by the more popular postmodernist positions in the management literature such as constructivism and interpretivism.

Potter and López (2001: 4) summarize two key achievements of postmodernism as to promote “a more widespread recognition of the sociological determinants of knowledge” and to challenge “previous naïve notions of intellectual and scientific progress.” Instead of assuming an objective reality, postmodernism regards reality as socially c...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of illustrations
• Preface
• Articles
• 1 Philosophy: an under-laborer serving researchers
• 2 Explanation: different ways of answering “why?”
• 3 Assumptions: not something to be assumed away
• 4 Theory testing: a seemingly straightforward process
• 5 Generalization: a controversial endeavor
• 6 Replication: an ignored necessity
• 7 Historiography: a neglected research method
• 8 Looking ahead: to be, or not to be, a science
• Appendix: how philosophy contributes to research methodology
• Name index
• Subject index