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This paper provides a critical realist reflection on methodological decisions that frame examination of the effectiveness of destination branding using food and cuisine. The authors use a multi-method strategy to evaluate the degree of congruence amongst (1) destination marketers' promotional food images, (2) internal stakeholders' perception of images, and (3) tourists' views of food destinations. Results reveal that critical realism enhances the capacity to explore the less observable forces influencing food image across diverse stakeholder groups and builds a more coherent attribute-based framework to measure gaps in perception. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Older single women in Australia are increasingly experiencing homelessness. Age and gender seem inherently related to single older women's housing crises, but no attempt has been made to account for the causes of their homelessness through an intersectional lens. This article develops a complex and contingent causal explanation of the structures and mechanisms implicated in growing homelessness for this group. We demonstrate an original use of critical realist-informed intersectional analysis which is characterized by stratified social ontology and emergence. We theoretically reframe existing literature to demonstrate how the intersectional causal powers of gender and age ('gender*age') discrimination and conventional life course experiences intersect to generate financial precarity for older women. Our causal model explains how economic insecurity, structural and individual contexts, and crisis events interact, challenging older women's housing security and precipitating first-time homelessness later in life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

William Outhwaite is well-known as an early proponent of critical realism and for his work on European politics, critical theory and on Jürgen Habermas. In this wide-ranging interview, he discusses his life and career, including how he came to write on subjects that intersected with and developed themes Roy Bhaskar was also working on at the time. This work resulted in three early books, Understanding Social Life, Concept Formation in Social Science and New Philosophies of Social Science, the last of which makes the case for the incorporation of critical theory and hermeneutics into critical realism. He goes on to discuss various issues, including, briefly, his involvement in an early discussion group with Bhaskar, his participation in the Realism and the Human Sciences conferences and how he and Margaret Archer came to edit Andrew Collier's Festschrift. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this wide-ranging interview Graham Scambler provides an overview of his long academic career. He discusses how he became a medical sociologist, his early work on epilepsy and stigma, his part in the development of sociology textbooks for medical students, the diversity of his work and his many collaborations, his 'theoretical turn', his longstanding interest in critical realism and his attitude to 'bridge building' between philosophy and empirical work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the issue of innovation is widely recognized in many scientific disciplines, innovators themselves have received scant attention in research literature. The aim of this study is to explore the experience of innovators from the perspective of the social agency paradigm developed by Margaret Archer, which suggests that structural and cultural properties affect individual reflexivity through the accessibility of resources and the beliefs that agents endorse. Data was collected through individual in-depth interviews with Polish innovators, revealing that they function in an entrepreneurial culture with ease in establishing networking relations. However, institutions in the national innovation system continue to reflect post-Soviet hierarchies, creating a division between those who have access to resources and those who do not. The study supports the hypothesis that post-Soviet culture is a factor in determining the low innovation level in Poland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Selcuk University Social Sciences Institute Journal is the property of Selcuk University Social Sciences Institute Journal and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Novel information technologies (ITs), such as mobile devices and third-party cloud services, offer users an increasing variety of action possibilities, i.e., affordances. Organizational IT policies, however, often specify their actualization—i.e., turning those affordances into action—as undesired. Organizations face the challenge that to reach their goals, employees still frequently take advantage of these affordances by using undesired ITs and thereby deviate from IT policies. Although prior work has extensively studied how goaloriented users actualize affordances that are associated with outcomes that support organizational goals, little attention has been paid to the structures, mechanisms, and conditions underlying affordances that deviate from organizational IT policies. We conceptualize these affordances as deviant affordances. Leveraging the orders of change framework and using a multimethod research design integrating interview and experimental studies, we identify three key mechanisms underlying deviant affordances—i.e., tension, deadlock, and actualization mechanisms—that can link together to produce a deviant outcome supporting both the users’ individual goal and an organizational goal. Our work explains the importance of users’ perceived deadlock in stimulating the generation of deviant outcomes that support organizational goals through improving task, contextual, and innovative job performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the integration of critical realist ontology, epistemology, and methodology into giftedness and gifted education research. Although there is no consensus about the complex nature of giftedness, a paradigmatic shift is underway, emphasizing the impact of contextual and social factors in shaping gifted performance. Despite this shift, the ontological, epistemological, and methodological stances are often overlooked, leading to an incomplete understanding of the complex interaction between individuals and their context and constraining the potential to offer realistic and functional interventions for gifted education. Critical realism enables us to explore complex interactions, generate hypotheses, identify causal mechanisms, advance theoretical frameworks, and construct functional interventions for policy practices with its ontological, epistemological, and methodological arguments. This work contributes to the field by showcasing how critical realism's core concepts and tenets can be applied to various aspects of giftedness and gifted education and suggesting multiple avenues for further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this article is to explore structural preconditions for occupational well-being among blue-collar temporary agency workers within the Swedish manufacturing industry based on managers' views and expectations of the worker. Through 25 interviews, we investigate how blue-collar temporary agency workers are seen by management using critical realism and the concept of 'norm circles' to analyse spatial, relational, sociotechnical and normative structures. We show how structures and norm circles possess alienating or dealienating mechanisms that precondition blue-collar temporary agency workers' occupational well-being. The findings indicate management's role as an important gatekeeper in determining structural preconditions for blue-collar temporary agency workers' occupational well-being. By introducing aspects of skill and acquired skill, along with social aspects changing over time, this article contributes to the existing literature on blue-collar temporary agency workers' occupational well-being. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 2005, Ram Roy Bhaskar was the examiner for a PhD thesis by Dr. Chris Sarra entitled Strong and Smart: Reinforcing Aboriginal Perceptions of Being Aboriginal at Cherbourg State School. Bhaskar described the thesis as 'an exemplary paradigm of how research should be conducted' and suggested that it would be 'invaluable for all future studies of indigenous people in Australia and indeed to educationalists and social theorists throughout the world'. With thanks to Chris Sarra, we are delighted to be able to publish this examiner's report, which illustrates educational themes in Bhaskar's work and provides Bhaskar's response to Sarra's critique of his idea that there is a 'common core humanity'. In its practical consideration of the question of human identity – a question currently much debated – this report is an excellent and timely complement to Bhaskar's (2020) article Critical Realism and the Ontology of Persons. It also showcases Bhaskar's concepts of Power1/Power2 and concrete universality/singularity. We hope that publishing this report will draw attention to Sarra's exceptional work which, according to Bhaskar, 'may well come to take on the role of a paradigm for multi-ethnic and similarly divided and contested communities'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this review essay, I set explore Heikki Patomäki's seventh sole-authored book in English, World Statehood. I set out the thematic structure and chapter order and then address whether the concept of 'self-transformative capacity of contexts' implies a central conflation and what is assumed if one argues that there is a tendential form of civilizational progress. I conclude with discussion of a causal process theory of time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses concerns that critical realism is a philosophy in search of a method, and that little guidance exists for the application of the philosophy to social research. It advances the idea that the absence of a philosophically embedded method gives critical realists the freedom to choose methods best suited to answering research questions under investigation. The paper utilizes a study into business advisor knowledge transmission, explicating how a sequential world views approach can be used to progressively expand knowledge about the topic. In this context, the research design further illustrates the symbiotic relationship of two different research methods: in-depth interviews & focus groups. The paper does not imply that any method is better than any other, rather adopts the position that methods must always suit the research aim and provide the best approach for answering the research question. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critical realism provides an alternative to positivism and interpretivism. It foregrounds ontology and an evaluative approach to knowledge, while promoting eclectic reasoning, transdisciplinarity, and ethical research across the quantitative/qualitative, macro/micro and other divides. Health researchers have usefully employed critical realism, though it has also been dismissed as strange, a source of self-deception and hubris. Furthermore, it has been accused of dehumanizing many people. Responding to these charges, this article makes the case for carefully employing critical realism within and beyond social studies of health. It first outlines some basic critical realist tenets before summarizing two exemplars within the sociology of health, illness and medical work. The discussion section, observing the principle of hermeticism, engages with some criticisms before offering a prolegomenon to research on the COVID-19 pandemic response. In conclusion, a 'radical' proposal is ventured for possible transformative action so that society is less hierarchical, more equal and salutogenic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the neglect of Marxism has been a pervasive characteristic of IR theory, there has been a marked revival of interest in Marxism. Marx's materialist insights into the general historical development of societies, as well as his critique of capitalism and political economy, have served as alternative starting points for different critical approaches to IR and offers a welcome alternative to neorealism, constructivism, and poststructuralism that have dominated IR for several decades. Marxism provides a redefinition of IR by focusing on changes in material circumstances, historical conditions, and society instead of assuming unchanging and fixed structures of anarchy or the state. Marx's analysis and insights into the dynamics of international relations have become even more important given the ongoing crisis of neoliberal capitalism, the rise of authoritarianism, right-wing nationalist populisms, and the racial and gendered subordinations accompanying them pointing to the importance of Marxifying IR and IRifying Marxism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research on the 'meaning of work', especially concerning the Global South, is scarce. This paper aims to reduce this scarcity by applying critical realist meta-theory to the work and life history interviews of workers in Sri Lanka. A key discovery is that finding meaning in life through work is a personal emergent power and that, as such, it explains the way that individuals consciously manoeuvre their life-journeys towards a desired end - a modus vivendi - in a dialectic which involves both emergent structural change (morphogenesis) and agency. This paper also reveals that Margaret Archer's theory of reflexivity, based on interviews with Western individuals, cannot be transferred rigidly to the reflexivity of Global South individuals, and therefore more work on reflexivity within this context is required. This paper therefore makes a theoretical contribution to the existing meaning of work scholarship, and it extends existing understandings of the concepts of reflexivity and emergence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gregory Bateson's career from anthropologist, through his development of cybernetics and systems theory, to developing ideas around 'the sacred', has parallels with Roy Bhaskar's intellectual journey. This paper proposes that as well as Bateson's theory of cybernetics and systemic thought making a contribution to basic and dialectic critical realism, his final and posthumously published Angels Fear: Towards and Epistemology of the Sacred adds to our understanding of Bhaskar's metaReality. Similarities between the development of Bateson's work from 1936 to 1987 and Bhaskar's work from 1975 to 2016 enable the development of theory that adds to both of their respective appreciations of metaReality and the sacred. Thus, by starting a conversation between Bateson and Bhaskar, we can develop a higher order understanding of the world than proposed by Bhaskar's metaReality alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In international politics, bridging the gap between the real and knowledge poses a persistent challenge as translating the real into concepts and narratives can nurture the epistemic fallacy. Critical realism addresses this by separating ontology from epistemology at the meta-theoretical level, yet in practical research, critical realism tends to impose assumptions about the ontological complexity of the real at the transcendental level. This paper examines the practical difficulty of overcoming the epistemic fallacy in International Relations inquiries, asserting that critical realism does not effectively guide practical inquiries in separating ontology from epistemology at a methodological level. Despite the meta-theoretical separation, research inquiries can remain theory-laden and epistemically dependent. The solution lies in problematizing ontological presentation, and sustaining critique at the discursive level on International Relations theories, methodologies, and implications. This approach maintains a critical focus on ontological aspects at the practical level to deal with the challenge of the epistemic fallacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper promotes critical realism as a suitable and fruitful philosophical foundation for the development and implementation of urban digital twins. The proliferation of a-theoretical digital twin research and practices, not declaring their philosophical positions, is threatening the scientific soundness of this new paradigm and offers little evidence for reflecting on the knowledge it produces. To address this issue, first, this paper uses focus group discussions to explore digital twin experts' perceptions of digital twin best practices for urban management and uncover the philosophical worldviews underlying these perceptions. A philosophical worldview is a general orientation about the world that is described in terms of ontological and epistemological assumptions and views on human nature. The inferred philosophical worldviews are then compared with critical realism principles, supporting the argument that critical realism provides a suitable philosophical foundation for digital twin practices in urban management envisaged by participating experts, as well as enhancing current forms of digital twin practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I assess some recent critical realist constructive criticisms of Theodor Adorno, one of the leading thinkers of the Frankfurt School tradition of critical theory. I argue that while there are similarities between Adorno's treatment of causality and the critical realist notion of powers, these connections should not be taken to imply that Adorno's conception of critique requires a critical realist powers ontology. I show that Bhaskar's transcendental realism is at odds with the basic commitments of Adorno's historical materialism. I go on to clarify such materialism and show that to Adorno, capital is the historical compulsion characteristic of modernity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Caroline New is an energetic activist who has interpolated critical realist ideas into the front-line of political activism. In this wide-ranging interview, she begins by reflecting on her life and how she became a realist and her account is illustrated with personal anecdotes recalling memories of well-known philosophers and activists from the time. She discusses how her position set her apart from other feminists and she examines the interacting threads of longstanding debates on the political left, as well as longstanding debates within critical realist circles, such as the relative importance of quantitative methods in social research and the scope for agency as a source of intentional change. Finally she brings some of her ideas to bear on contemporary issues. This engaging interview notably provides some of the social context in which critical realism developed, while also pointing towards its future potential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues the case for taking a critical realist (CR) approach to social work research. The normativity in social work is often under-communicated in the social sciences, resulting in research that has an unclear value base as its starting point. Social work practice promotes social change and people's development, empowerment, and liberation. By taking a CR of view as a starting point for researching social problems, the focus shifts towards explaining phenomena by revealing and discussing the mechanisms through which they are produced and maintained. Child welfare issues are argued to be "wicked problems", on top of which the practice of social work itself is a complex field. Two studies from the field of child and family welfare are presented here to illustrate how CR has been fruitfully applied in research on such complex phenomena. These two studies comprise research on child protection assessment and parental high conflict. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Occupational health and safety management systems (OHSMS) promote healthy workplace environments through regulating hazards and health promotion activities. Abuse within elite sports is one hazard that threatens the health and safety of elite adult athletes. Despite the widespread existence of evidence-informed guidelines to safeguard youth athletes, few safeguards have been developed for elite adult athletes, despite sport being their primary occupation. Through a critical realist lens, we used a thematic meta-synthesis to search, appraise and synthesize 20 articles conducted with elite adult athletes who have experienced abuse. We present three themes to highlight: (a) how abuse types (sexual, psychology, physical, and financial) are fluid and expand over time, (b) the contextual factors that influence abuse (individual, relational, structural, cultural), and (c) temporal impacts of abuse throughout athletes' early, late, and post-sport careers. The present work is discussed in relation to perceived advancement of OHSMS and safe sport through protecting athletes from the hazards present within their occupational environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study sought to understand the travel experiences and expectations of wheelchair tourists. The increasing demand for wheelchair tourists to visit natural destinations, the barriers while travelling, and the inclusivity of tourism are the main motivations of this study. While previous studies have investigated accessibility in tourism, they have rarely focused on inclusive tourism, especially from wheelchair tourists' perspective. Driven by social constructivism theory, this research presents the results of the experiences of Indonesian wheelchair tourists in natural destinations by utilising the exclusion-inclusion and critical theory. In this emancipatory disability research, snowball sampling was employed to conduct semi-structured interviews with ten wheelchair users, and the empirical materials were thematically analysed. The findings revealed that participants were excited about travelling, but the barriers made wheelchair tourists more selective in choosing natural destinations. Inclusivity was perceived to be an issue that required the achievement of a cultural shift. While accessibility was deemed necessary, service and concern from tourism providers and other tourists were crucial at the lower experience level during travel. A 'friend in tourism' was reported as necessary to push toward inclusivity and equality in the tourism industry to ensure a better future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Morphogenetic Régulation approach (MR) contributes to the Morphogenetic Approach by explaining the material and ideational origins of change and stasis in agency, structure, and culture. In this paper, we focus on the expressive quality of ideas and systemic persistence in three research projects. The first demystifies inclusive governance and its adverse impacts. It shows how, contrary to institutions of governance, inclusiveness is not simply a norm but actually the explication of corporate agents' ideas about rational choice institutionalism which leads to adverse impacts on vulnerable groups and ecologies known as adverse inclusion. The second investigates the role of ideas as adequacy and self-explication in guiding Palestinian actors' actions towards the deepening of neoliberalization in Palestine. The third explains the relevance of the systemic persistence problematique for understanding how three juxtaposed themes – Web2, Web3, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) – are shaping the political economy and infrastructure of the Internet. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the 2022 International Association for Critical Realism (IACR) Conference, which focused on the theme of "Realist Complexity, between Causal and Complex Systems." The conference attracted over 120 participants from diverse backgrounds across 31 countries, including many PhD students. The special issue aims to showcase selected presentations from the conference, covering topics such as systems theory, autopoiesis, programmatic assessment in medical education, realist evaluation, and the relationship between democracy and human nature. The articles provide insights into the intersection between critical realism and complex systems, offering diverse perspectives on these subjects. [Extracted from the article]

Traditional, positivist assessment approaches generally fail to capture the nuances of learners' clinical competence in medical programmes. This has led to the implementation of an alternate assessment approach known as 'programmatic assessment', which embraces subjectivity of human judgement in holistic decision making in clinical settings. Faculty and staff have found the introduction of programmatic assessment to be challenging because it is a major, complex change to the traditional way of carrying out assessment. Extending our previous work, where we used critical realism to explore students' experiences of programmatic assessment, we here unpack the underlying conditions and mechanisms triggered by programmatic assessment's implementation. We applied Bhaskar's concept of ontological stratification, retroduction and Archer's theoretical accounts of morphogenesis/stasis to theorize the interplay between the socio-cultural entities that constrain and enable desired changes in assessment practices, and those that condition students and staff to accept or reject the new 'non-traditional' assessment processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article aims to study the intersection between critical realism and complexity theories through the existing literature on complex systems via an engagement with Luhmann's autopoiesis. With reference to the philosophies of substance and persistence, I build on previous critical realist scholarship and provide an explanation for what the literature has only noted as the limitations and potentials of autopoiesis for complex systems thinking and its compatibility with Critical Realism. By highlighting how Luhmann's autopoiesis is not a trans-immanent/ perdurantist-exdurantist system, I show first how a trans immanent system through the method of calibration entails a complex causation involving objects in the environment of systems and not just within their boundaries. Second, I explain how a trans-immanent system fits with CR via the Morphogenetic Régulation framework by exploring the theme of crisis in terms of the movement from inadequate to adequate understanding of objects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses a question posed by the increase of democratic backsliding: whether democracy itself is compatible with human nature. It analyses democracy as a layered system consisting of three levels: the political/institutional, the social/interactional and the psychological/intrapsychic. At each level it uses evolutionary theory to describes features of a 'light side' of human nature that makes democracy possible, and of a 'dark side' of human nature that leads to democratic backsliding. At the political/institutional level these features are the reduction of reactive aggression and the capacity for the intragroup stranger. At the social/interactional level they are the cultural evolution of cooperative norms and an inclusive group identity. At the psychological/intrapsychic level they are the coherent, continuous positive self-experiences produced by shared positive emotions. However, these mechanisms can misfire at each level, producing the dark side that leads to democratic backsliding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This document is a reply to a roundtable discussion on the concept of the "three domains of reality" in critical realism. The author, a practical sociologist, expresses surprise at the negative views expressed in the roundtable and offers their own perspective. They argue that the concept of the three domains (Real, Actual, and Empirical) is useful for understanding the world and resolving confusions in research. They address criticisms of the concept, such as confusion over terminology and the need for clear explanations, and emphasize the importance of recognizing the interconnectedness of the three levels of reality. The author concludes that the concept of the three domains is a valuable tool for interdisciplinary research and everyday life. [Extracted from the article]

This article advocates for the validity of Realist Evaluation (RE) as a manifestation of Critical Realism in evaluation research despite criticisms suggesting that the former disregards principles from Bhaskarian ontology. Specifically, I argue that critics overstate RE's philosophical actualism in their argument that its inclination towards technocratic knowledge impedes its scrutiny of stratified social systems. Notwithstanding its limitations in fully elucidating causal structural mechanisms in social inquiry, I argue that RE's research rationale can contribute to the stages of explanatory research based on CR by bridging the comprehension of mechanisms linked to micro-interventions with exploring potential structural forces operating across levels of reality. To illustrate this point, I present a case of a policy evaluation study I led that demonstrates how a RE-oriented research design facilitated a transition from investigating specific programme mechanisms within the interventions' context to proposing transcendental questions about the governance of the education system in Colombia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In times of accelerated digital transformation, many organizations still struggle to put enterprise systems to effective use quickly. While prior work suggests either system or task complexity as a source for these difficulties, this case study of a major system implementation at a European bank reveals the most important source to be the complexity arising from co-dependency between the system and the task. We conceptualize this codependency as inherent in system-enabled tasks by proposing system dependency (the extent to which a task is supported by a system) and semantic dependency (the degree to which semantic understanding is required for task completion). Together, these dependencies create representational complexity, which constrains users from achieving effective use in system-enabled tasks and can explain differences in achieving effective use through variations in learning effort. The concepts and insights emerging from this study provide researchers and practitioners with a deeper understanding of what complexity means and why, in some contexts, learning how to use systems effectively takes longer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, I discuss and analyze how vulnerabilities within the group of young masculinities can be recognized in the context of youth work. I analyze vulnerability from three different perspectives: a contextual, a performance, and a relationship perspective. The discussion is grounded on critical realism and adaptive theory focusing on how vulnerability is interconnected with social structures and social agency. The theoretical conceptualization on these three perspectives on vulnerability can be implemented in order to generate a nuanced understanding of how social groups, such as boys' and young men's vulnerabilities are manifested in practice. To acknowledge vulnerabilities it is essential to understand how all human life is conditioned by social structures, gender norms, and social relationships. However, being vulnerable does not exclude the dimension of human agency. Therefore, all vulnerable groups and individuals are accountable for their actions, particularly with regard to how they encounter others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Ideas y Valores is the property of Universidad Nacional de Colombia and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Recherches en Sciences de Gestion is the property of ISEOR and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This study explores students' perceptions of blended learning and its impact on their sense of belonging at a post-92 UK university. A critical realist framework that considers the interlocking domains of subjective experience, objective events and observations, and the mechanisms and structures that underpin them is used to situate these perceptions, while a mixed methods approach enables a multi-layered insight into the captured diversity of student experience. The quantitative and qualitative results demonstrate that while the student self-reported experience of blended delivery is mixed, its perceived impact on academic performance is negligible. The effects of blended and remote learning on students' sense of belonging, however, are profound and require a change in current practices to accommodate the affective aspects of learning and university experience. The study responds to the calls within the literature for more in-depth investigations of student experience, especially as regards student perceptions of that experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Even in academic spaces, the ontology of plagiarism is contested, but it is even more so in Protestant evangelical contexts. Thus the very notion of plagiarism in the academy--and now in religious spaces--is unclear and may be subject to criticisms of power and questions of who gets to define what plagiarism means. In this article, we aim to elucidate the reemerging conversation about plagiarism in sermonic discourse captured in the 2021 #Sermongate scandal. We introduce the systematic, histo-cultural factors which have worked to shape these ontological beliefs about sermonic plagiarism and advocate for a general set of plagiarism standards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critical realism is a valuable philosophical stance in providing an in-depth analysis of multi-dimensional and multi-layered relationships in social science. Considering the scarcity of studies on this philosophical framework in social science, this study aimed, from multiple viewpoints, to examine the multi-faceted and multi-stratified experiences, events, structures, and mechanisms underlying democratic school climate in primary school education in Northern Cyprus, through a critical realist philosophical stance. The analysis of the data obtained from teachers, headteachers, and students in five state schools revealed that certain factors limited the opportunities for achieving a democratic school culture. The inadequacy of the education system manifested itself in various forms at the empirical level and therefore affected the climates of the participating schools. The fragmented governance, the pressure of the college entrance examination, and the lack of integration of the newly arrived migrants were found to be influencing the climate in the participating schools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using an (eco-)feminist Marxist-Polanyian theoretical lens, this article explores the diverse relations between contemporary care-crisis symptoms in Western Europe and its generative structures. It investigates the potential of three possible responses to the crisis to transform rather than reproduce these structures: (un)conditional cash transfers, universal basic services, and time politics. Drawing upon critical realism and the evolutionary mechanisms of variation, selection, and retention, we seek to make sense of the dynamic between competing crisis construals and their effects on actuality. To answer our research question What are the transformative potentials of different responses to the contemporary care crisis in Western Europe?, we move from meta-theoretical abstractions to a theoretically grounded, concrete application of critical realism in the social sciences. We conclude that a symbiosis of time politics and universal basic services together with a universal, but not unconditional, guaranteed (minimum) income offers substantial transformative potentials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Part 1 of this interview, Professor Patomäki discussed his work and career up to the Global Financial Crisis. In Part 2 he turns to his later work. Questions and issues range over the use of retroduction and retrodiction, the degree of openness and closure of systems, and the role of iconic models, and scenario-building and counterfactuals in social scientific explanation and the exploration of possible and likely futures (distinguished from desirable futures). Patomäki suggests that a variant of his 'scenario A' captures significant features of an increasingly competitive and conflictual world. Among other matters, Patomäki also discusses his recent work on the war in Ukraine, his 'field theory' of global political economy, and the possibility of world statehood. The interview concludes with Patomäki's views on the imperative of hope. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The context of the present article is my research on philosophies of female education and the questions of female Bildung in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in England. Female writings seem to rely on the theoretical background provided by the well-known male authors in order to present a critical and ironical reading. In my study, I highlight the ways of development expressed in the open and closed spaces in Mary Wollstonecraft's novels. In the quite autobiographical Mary (1788), in accordance with the characteristic aversion to the household, the heroine feels at home in nature, or on the road (cf. homelessness). Meanwhile, having left the suffocating milieu of her home and her marriage, she finds her peace and partner in her own way. In the unfinished novel, Maria (1798), the prisonlike environment of the wife with her actual imprisonment in the Gothic asylum, physically represents the patriarchal restraints in women's lives. Maria is a rebel, she leaves her husband, and later her readings free her mind. In both novels the heroines struggle with the expectations of the age and their paths of life display the possibilities for development offered to a young woman in the second half of the eighteenth century-in the framework of Wollstonecraft's early Bildungsromane. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of bilig: Journal of Social Sciences of the Turkish World is the property of bilig: Journal of Social Sciences of the Turkish World and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Eco-Marxism presents a debate between two theoretical schools: metabolic rift theory, developed by John Foster and others, and world-ecology, proposed by Jason W. Moore. The debate refers ultimately to ontology, more precisely to the relation between society and nature. Critical realism plays a central role as the philosophical underlabouring for metabolic rift theory and has implications regarding the Anthropocene/Capitalocene debate as well. Reviewing the debate through CR categories provides clarity about the specifically social character of the causes of ecological disruptions. Using CR, metabolic rift theorists could explain the interdisciplinary character of their analyses. By distinguishing between real transfactual mechanisms and their actual interaction in open systems, I intend to show that neither metabolic rift theory, nor its interdisciplinary approach to the Anthropocene, involve Cartesian Dualism, as Moore claims. World-Ecology provides an alternative historical account of capitalism's environmental history, but it does not critically replace metabolic rift theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Randomized controlled trials have been criticized for their inability to identify and differentiate the causal mechanisms that generate the outcomes they measure. One solution is the development of realist trials that combine the empirical precision of trials' outcome data with realism's theoretical capacity to identify the powers that generate outcomes. Main Body: We review arguments for and against this position and conclude that critical realist trials are viable. Using the example of an evaluation of the educational effectiveness of virtual reality simulation, we explore whether Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling can move statistical analysis beyond correlational analysis to support realist identification of the mechanisms that generate correlations. Conclusion: We tentatively conclude that PLS-SEM, with its ability to identify 'points of action', has the potential to provide direction for researchers and practitioners in terms of how, for whom, when, where and in what circumstances an intervention has worked. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article draws on insights of young people learning to make natural pigments and traditional paintings in acute climate vulnerable areas. Why do they paint during ongoing crises and how do they voice their future concerns? Critical realism is applied as a meta-theory in this field-based study in a slum area in Kolkata and the Sundarbans mangrove forest. Methods comprise focus groups, semi-structured interviews, and participant observation. Analysis was done in an abductive process, applying Roy Bhaskar's model of 'four-planar social being'. The analysis demonstrates how painting with natural pigments leads the young ones towards: (a) discovering beauty in nature (b) transcendence of borders (c) transformation and responsible action (d) discovering one's own dignity. Findings are discussed considering the key concepts co-presence and crisis system. I reflect upon how this local effort can inspire a new economy, with the signposts: becoming co-present with the natural world and the necessity of beauty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research necessarily entails the close interrelation of concepts and arguments, including solutions to a range of meta-questions, whether acknowledged explicitly or not. Despite this, few detailed accounts currently exist that support researchers to develop their complex conceptual architectures, especially in critical realist spheres. Indeed, many published accounts often omit much of this 'messiness' that sits behind, yet is foundational to, research projects. Those accounts that do seek to portray how/why researchers have made decisions (e.g. about connections between research philosophy, methodology, methods, theory and empirical evidence) tend to focus on one set of meta-questions, or occasionally on the relationships between two sets, at a time. Therefore, this paper presents a flexible framework – supported by specific examples from studies – that we hope will be useful in supporting researchers from all traditions, but especially critical realists, to carefully think through and develop more holistic connections in their conceptual architecture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article offers an omissive critique of integral theory. To this objective, the article draws upon dialectical logic to investigate the affinities between integral theory and critical realism. Section 1 identifies new possibilities regarding the role of metatheory in practice by unpacking the metatheoretical coordinates of critical realism and integral theory. After providing a brief history of the origins of critical realism and integral theory, I review the ontological, epistemological, and methodological metatheorems of dialectical critical realism, and I put them to work to provide an omissive critique of integral theory. Then I introduce the notion of strictly non-dialectic because it functions to explain formally how integral theory relates to critical realism. Section 2 isolates the inadequacies at every moment in the passage from the MELD dialectic. Section 3 concludes the article with a discussion of the implications of foregrounding a critical realist ontology for integral theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Realist evaluation has gained prominence in the field of evaluation in recent years. Its theory-driven approach to explaining how and why programmes work or not makes it attractive to many novices, early career researchers, and organizations implementing various programmes globally and relevant to policymakers and programme implementers. While realist evaluation seeks to be pragmatic, adopting principles and methods that can be used to help focus an evaluation, its deep ontological and epistemological foundations make its application in real-life situations challenging. In this paper, we seek to unpack the key tenets scaffolding the practical application of realist evaluation. Although Pawson and Tilley foreground realist evaluation in applied scientific realism, we argue that an amalgam of scientific and critical realist principles underpins realist evaluation. We unpack these principles and illustrate how they fit into each other to provide a cogent theoretical foundation for realist evaluation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Part 1 of this wide-ranging interview Heikki Patomäki discusses his early work and career up to the Global Financial Crisis. He provides comment on his role as a public intellectual and activist, his diverse academic interests and influences, and the many and varied ways he has contributed to critical realism and critical realism has influenced his work. In Part 2 he discusses his later work, the predicament of humanity and the role of futures studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What does it entail to study the climate crisis from – or consistently with – a critical realist perspective? The paper addresses this question in three steps. First, it considers the boundaries of critical realism in relation to climate crisis research. In this context it identifies climate science as a field that in important respects resonates implicitly with critical realism. Conversely, a book by human ecologist Andreas Malm is introduced as an example of a work that, while sympathetic to critical realism, in key respects contradicts core features of it. Second, to illustrate what an analysis of the crisis informed by critical realism can look like, the paper brings into focus the main causes of the climate crisis – including the capitalist growth imperative, neoliberalism, and consumer culture. Finally, the status quo project, the green growth project and the degrowth project are identified as fundamentally different ways of approaching the climate crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I discuss critical realists' and contemporary sociological pragmatists' approaches to conceptualizing social mechanisms, which, on my reading, each involve some ambiguities or confusions. I sketch some corrections and clarifications that bring into view ways pragmatism and critical realism might inform each other in a constructive fashion on the question of what social mechanisms are. Finally, I suggest a concept of social mechanisms that is compatible with both critical realist and pragmatist insights, as a starting point from which to launch further conversation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]