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To enact a just and sustainable blue economy, one must consider all the actors involved in its shaping. This paper argues that a quintuple helix approach to stakeholder engagement – involving government, academia, the business community, and civil society – and an inclusive transdisciplinary action research (TAR) methodology are promising avenues with which to do so. Embracing critical pragmatism as a foundational framework, key ideas from three strands of research are consolidated: (1) the recent work on the geographical dimension of socio‐technical sustainability transitions; (2) the literature on just sustainabilities and just transition; and (3) action research and transdisciplinary approaches to problem solving. This allows for the reimagination of a common future for the blue economy that is developed through a different kind of democratic process driven and informed by co‐learning, and shared experiences. By adopting a transdisciplinary action research approach, actors from different disciplines and spheres of experience can gain a better mutual understanding and find commonality through the open door of collaboration. The theoretical argument presented in this paper is illustrated by a vignette of an ongoing TAR project at Southern Connecticut State University, which outlines the challenges and opportunities inherent to implementing a TAR approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims: To identify barriers and enablers that influence engagement in and acceptability of diabetes prevention programmes for people with pre‐diabetes. The results will provide insights for developing strategies and recommendations to improve design and delivery of diabetes prevention programmes with enhanced engagement and acceptability for people with pre‐diabetes. Methods: This review used a critical realist approach to examine context and mechanisms of diabetes prevention programmes. Medline, Embase, PsycInfo, Cinahl, Web of Science, Scopus and Pre‐Medline were searched for English language studies published between 2000 and 2023. A quality assessment was conducted using Joanna Briggs Institute critical appraisal tools. Results: A total of 90 papers met inclusion criteria. The included studies used a variety of quantitative and qualitative methodologies. Data extracted focused on barriers and enablers to engagement in and acceptability of diabetes prevention programmes, with seven key mechanisms identified. These included financial, environmental, personal, healthcare, social and cultural, demographic and programme mechanisms. Findings highlighted diverse factors that influenced engagement in preventive programmes and the importance of considering these factors when planning, developing and implementing future diabetes prevention programmes. Conclusions: Mechanisms identified in this review can inform design and development of diabetes prevention programmes for people with pre‐diabetes and provide guidance for healthcare professionals and policymakers. This will facilitate increased participation and engagement in preventive programmes, potentially reducing progression and/or incidence of pre‐diabetes to type 2 diabetes and improving health outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses critical realism to identify mechanisms that activate successful relationships. It draws data from a longitudinal, mixed‐methods study of youth who used multiple services. It examines functionality of four relational mechanisms: power, recognition, responsiveness and mutuality that lead to positive change and explores the implications of these for practice with youth with complex needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Emergence is central to critical realism, but there has been little attempt to develop a systematic account of this concept within the tradition. Two notable exceptions are seen in the work of Dave Elder‐Vass and Tony Lawson. However, both face problems in responding to reductionist claims and accounting for downward causation. This paper proposes contextual emergence as a robust alternative that overcomes these issues and provides a better justification for critical realism's stratified worldview. Contextual emergence explains that while properties at a lower 'level' offer necessary conditions, for emergence to obtain, there must also be contingent conditions at a higher 'level'. This approach maintains many of critical realism's intuitions about emergence, providing a robust account of ontological stratification and downward causation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Philosophy of social science (PoS) typologies can help practitioners in the social sciences to reflect upon the often‐tacit assumptions embedded in research. Existing PoS typologies however suffer from various shortcomings, one of them being a tendency to present extreme versions of the assumptions underpinning research. Having considered this and other shortcomings, the present paper advances a flexible PoS typology. Operating with strong and moderated versions of three PoS perspectives – positivism, constructionism and (critical) realism – the typology captures key assumptions underpinning a broad range of contemporary social research. Moreover, it opens up the possibility of contemplating the assumptions embedded in research in a more fruitful way. To render tangible how the typology constitutes an improvement over existing typologies, it is used in reflections on sustainability research on climate negotiations, green growth and housing development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are several theses in political science that are usually explicitly called 'laws'. Other theses are generally thought of as laws, but often without being explicitly labelled as such. Still other claims are well‐supported and arguably interesting, while no one would be tempted to call them laws. This situation raises philosophical questions: which theses deserve to be called laws and which not? And how should we decide about this? In this paper we develop and motivate a strategy for thinking about laws in political science which integrates two core concepts: spatio‐temporal stability and social mechanisms. The proposed strategy is a set of guidelines that political scientists can use to reflect on and argue about specific cases within their discipline, not a clear‐cut demarcation criterion. We defend and motivate this strategy and apply it to two cases (one with respect to state repression, one about parliamentary elections). After we have developed and motivated our strategy for political science, we show that our proposal is relevant for other disciplines in the social sciences. We explain how our views fit into critical realism and embed them in the debate on laws in general philosophy of science and in the philosophy of the social sciences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Agency, understood as the capacity to act independently and to make one's own choices, is considered central to children's development. Thus, education, and hence education curricula, have a role in the development of learner agency. While curriculum development is a key focus for educational theory, research, policy, and classroom practice, the potential implications of curriculum content selections for learner agency remain underexplored. Theoretically, this paper engages with critical realism, explaining how it can provide theoretical foundation for a more comprehensive view of learner agency and, by implication, more balanced curricula. Empirically, the paper draws on the findings from a content analysis of the national curriculum documents of four countries with relatively high scores in international comparative tables, England, Australia, Hong-Kong, and Canada, to develop a new typology of primary curricula. Based on the extent of emphasis placed on knowledge versus skills, values, and attitudes, three types of curricula were identified: knowledge-based, skills-oriented, and learner-centred. Due to its significant theoretical and practical influence globally, we focus on the knowledge-based model and its likely impact on students' agency. We conclude by highlighting the importance of making learner agency a key orientation of the curriculum and suggesting directions for future research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the gradual evolution of the French Régulation school (FR) for the study of capitalism through the lens of structure and agency. The analysis first segments the school into two epochs, the early Régulation, led by authors Aglietta and Lipietz, and the later Régulation, which saw the rise of Boyer. We find that the gradual progression that occurred within the FR school is linked to its authors' implicit ontic engagement with structure and agency, which, in turn, provides natural linkages to Critical Realism. In the second part of the paper, we demonstrate how the comparison between Morphogenetic Régulation and French Régulation (FR) can facilitate a much deeper reading of the structure‐agency debate pertaining to the transformation of capitalism. In so doing, it discusses the value addedness of Morphogenetic Régulation through three specific concepts by stressing their relevance for contemporary studies in international political economy. These concepts are: stratified emergence; causality and the problématique of hierarchy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper re‐examines a key feature of Emile Durkheim's sociology of knowledge from a critical realist perspective. It is argued that Durkheim's attempt to establish a social basis for the categories in The Elementary Forms of Religious Life should be understood along ontological rather than epistemological lines. This brings to light new problems with the argument which, however, can be brought fruitfully into contact with the more recent social psychological literature on collective intentionality. This yields insights into future lines of inquiry into social cognition and theories of human conceptualizing capacities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a widely accepted conception that institutions are norm systems or norm‐guided practices. Opening this conception itself to discussion, the paper initially discusses a group of concepts, such as norm, power, practice, structure, etc., that are related to the definition of institution. Following the discussion, it focuses on the possibility of understanding institutions as spaces. Finally, the paper suggests that institutions mediate ontologically between structure and agency within a framework developed with a critical‐realist approach, and formulates the two sides of this mediation (structure‐institution and institution‐agency) as two spatialities. While the institution as a topos corresponds to a ground on which social structures materialize their causal powers, the institution as a locus manifests itself as a place where agents reproduce and/or transform with their strategic and dispositional actions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, critical realists have increasingly engaged with the thought of Charles S. Peirce (1839‐1914), the founder of the American pragmatist tradition. But the engagement has been mostly narrow in focus and at times misinformed. This paper examines points of continuity between Peircean thought and critical realism with respect to causation, ontology, and truth. Its purpose is to lay the groundwork for further and more fruitful engagement between the traditions by bringing attention to some things critical realists may not have known, and to correct some inaccurate things they thought they knew, about Peirce's philosophy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Charles S. Peirce's realism has been neglected by pragmatists and critical realists alike in the current debate over metatheoretical realism in sociology. This paper introduces Peirce's view of what is at stake in the question of realism, specifically regarding causation. Leveraging current interest in Peirce's conception of abduction, I show how realism about causation is implicit therein. I present a genealogy of the concept of real causation Peirce embraces. I explicate Peirce's view of the scientific significance of realism about causation, and why he finds it compelling. Finally, I argue that Peirce would intervene in the current debate by saying that those committed to abductive theorizing and causal explanation are implicitly realist. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To uncover pathways for understanding and alleviating poverty, this paper offers an alternative approach for examining the real and unseen processes of destitution and in‐work poverty which shape the lives of consumers. We apply a critical realist paradigm structured around three core tenets—stratified realities, complex causations and generative structures—to surface the nuanced complexities of these issues. A critical realist lens encourages impact by focusing on the deep causes of enduring social problems and provides transformative consumer research scholars with an integrative way to work toward transformative policy action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When critical realists consider epistemology they typically start from "epistemological relativism." We find this position necessary, but we also find it insufficient because it lacks a critique of the highly unequal social relations among observers themselves—relations that shape the very production of knowledge. While it is indeed the case that all knowledge is fallible, it is also the case that all knowledge is positioned, with a particular standpoint. What is more, the social power relations between standpoints organize the production of truth in ways that produce systematic distortions. In this paper, we propose a critical realist social epistemology. We introduce feminist standpoint theory and postcolonial theory as our suggested interventions into critical realism and we use two case studies of existing work to highlight i) the social production of truth and the real, and ii) what is at stake for radicalizing epistemology in critical realism. In so doing, our paper emphasizes the epistemic complexities that continuously shape ontology, a commitment to subaltern voices or experiences, and a thorough interrogation of the relations between positions of knowledge production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The aim of this paper is to advance understanding of interactive knowledge sharing (KS) processes through exploring the role of transactive memory systems (TMSs) and Web 2.0. In the context of the information systems literature, there is little focus on their particular role in KS. To address this gap, this paper develops a conceptual model based on activity theory and critical realism outlining the role of TMS and Web 2.0 as mediating tools. This paper further reveals that their use as tools depends on deeper underlying structures/factors embedded within the community, namely, informal networks and trust among people. The new conceptual model and theoretical propositions are then illustrated by a qualitative study undertaken in Bulgarian organisations. This illustrative case provides support for the model, where TMS and Web 2.0 are found to facilitate KS. It further demonstrates that informal networks and trust among people support the use and the positive effects of these tools. The contribution of this paper is in the new analytical approach and conceptual model developed, which advances our understanding of interactive KS by explaining the linkages between the various factors involved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay attempts a critical defense of Kwasi Wiredu's decolonization program in response to criticisms raised against it by Olúfẹ́mi Táíwò in his paper, "Rethinking the Decolonization Trope in Philosophy" (Spindel Supplement 2019). Táíwò claims that decolonization has lost its way as a trope of scholarly discourse owing to some fundamental misconceptions on the part of its pioneering advocates, notably Kwasi Wiredu and Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o. I limit myself to Wiredu in this essay and argue that Táíwò's criticisms are misdirected and generally lose their potency because they are based on a less than accurate picture of Wiredu's decolonization program. Nevertheless, Táíwò's critique underscores the importance of identifying and separating Wiredu's decolonization approach, which is pragmatic, from afrocentric decolonization, which is preoccupied with pedigree and hostile to anything of foreign provenance as a result. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the social sciences there is a long standing debate over the primacy of structure or agency in shaping human behavior. Structurationists like Giddens think of individuals' agency and collective features as two sides of the same coin while emergentists including Archer and Elder‐Vass claim that structurationists are blurring an important ontological distinction——they argue for effective social analysis, we should think of structures and individuals as different things because emergence happens when the properties of the collective are not reducible to the properties of the parts that constitute them. This paper contributes to the agency‐structure debate by showing how production and reproduction of emergent properties of social groups sharing same normative commitments (norm circles) can be empirically studied using two behavioral game theory experiments, adding a previously neglected insight that strategic uncertainty can lead to coordination failures of individual behaviors within norm circles, manifested as unintended outcomes of interdependent actions that are difficult to predict. Here the synchronic relation between the unpredictable collective outcomes of each game round and agential reactions of the participants to them defines emergence——the previous outcomes are diachronic inputs but they appear in the new outcome only through their effects on the individual decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to contribute to a growing critical and reflexive awareness of the implications of gendered assumptions about ontology, epistemology, and ethics in academic research governance and practice. It provides a retrospective account of the authors' shared experiences of an autoethnographic study of lap dancing clubs, focusing on critical or "sticky moments" encountered, and considering the implications of these for research more widely. It does so by highlighting the gendered power relations shaping academic research, showing how Judith Butler's critique of the heterosexual matrix can be applied to a critical, reflexive understanding of the impact of binary, hierarchical gender power relations. The analysis provides insight into some of the ways in which autoethnographic research on sexualized work may become messy, dirty, and sticky in ways that accentuate power inequalities but also open up moments of opportunity for gender binaries and hierarchies to be revealed, challenged, and resisted. Using a Butlerian lens to reflect on our experiences, we contribute to understanding how heteronormative assumptions shape perceptions of what makes "good," "clean," and ethically (formally) approved research that conforms to the governmental norms of the heterosexual matrix and, by implication, those contaminating forms of research that disrupt or resist its disciplinary effects. As ethnographic research is often messy by its very nature, and particularly so when situated within sex/sexualized work, we aim to show how gendered assumptions can inhibit reflexivity in academic knowledge production, resulting in research processes that are (paradoxically) unethical. In response, we suggest three ways in which gender reflexive research might be pursued, by: (i) identifying gendered assumptions reflexively and dialogically, (ii) adopting an anti‐essentialist approach that foregrounds experiential, embodied knowledge, and (iii) developing an anti‐hierarchical methodology. We do so in the hope of opening up ways that might enable others to avoid heteronormative assumptions having potentially detrimental consequences for their research and to offer a starting point for developing gender reflexive knowledge production in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transdisciplinarity, which seeks to transcend the limits of existing disciplines and the boundaries between science and society, has become a hallmark of sustainability science. Since transdisciplinarity requires researchers to co‐produce knowledge by drawing together diverse knowledge systems, knowledge integration becomes a key challenge. However, the practice of knowledge integration brings to the fore tensions around philosophy, methodology and the role of the researcher. The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the value of applied critical realism in enabling knowledge integration in transdisciplinary research, and in engaging these important tensions. I introduce tools from applied critical realism to enable knowledge integration across disciplinary and science‐society boundaries in sustainability science. Using an illustrative case of place‐based social‐ecological research from South Africa, I demonstrate the application of these tools. I conclude with a reflection on how they enable reflection on tensions related to philosophy, methodology and researcher positionality, identifying some of the challenges I experienced in putting these tools to work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The capability approach (CA) is a framework for understanding, assessing, and promoting the quality of human lives and social justice. It focuses on capabilities – people's freedoms and opportunities to live in valuable ways. Although its proponents readily acknowledge that capabilities can depend on personal, social and environmental factors, little attention has been paid to the ontology of capabilities (what they are and how they are caused and constituted) and the inherent relationality of the approach is often not well followed through in research and practice. This, we suggest, leaves the CA vulnerable to misinterpretation and misappropriation. In this paper we draw on the complementary lenses of critical realism, hermeneutics and complexity theory to develop an explicitly relational ontology of capabilities that explains how capabilities, as potential for ways of being or forms of doing, are generated by both personal agency and material and social structures. We demonstrate how these lenses can illuminate the relational constitution of particular capabilities through reference to a composite case involving a man called Bert and his healthcare team. We outline how our relational ontology of capabilities can demand and support more theoretically coherent and socially just approaches to CA informed practice, research and policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Humanitarian medical organizations rely on information on and from the ground to evaluate their effectiveness and accountability. Related digitalization efforts within health information systems assume an instrumental rationality in the use of data. However, previous research identified a multitude of factors influencing actual information use for evidence‐based decision‐making for healthcare delivery. This case study, anchored by critical realism philosophy, unpacks these nuances against the backdrop of a globally operating organization (Médecins Sans Frontières). It aims to highlight the contextual conditions and structures that enact the contingent mechanisms at work in project monitoring within humanitarian health management information systems. By applying an affordance‐based causal analysis, three mechanisms are identified: first, an analytics service provides templated analysis modalities resulting in user–producer–provider relationships; second, the rationalization and synchronization of content and software artifacts gives rise to the standardization strategy of flexible generification; third, the study uncovers the potential for increased internal social discourse and advocacy through collaborative and mobile data analysis. This paper proposes that mechanism‐based explanations can be useful for theory‐building in information systems research as well as for providing insights to practitioners in the humanitarian health sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the question of the relations between emotions and personhood, with a view to advancing a critical realist account of the role of emotions in social life. It is argued that the constitution of persons has to be approached from an ontological perspective, and that this raises questions about how sociology has addressed the meaning and role of emotions. Margaret Archer's critical realist perspective on them as commentaries on human concerns is broadly endorsed, but some significant correctives are proposed, especially with respect to the important distinction between primary and secondary emotions. To this end, it is argued that the affect spectrum theory advanced by Warren TenHouten can be fruitfully appended to a critical realist theory of emotions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper critically analyses realist evaluation, focussing on its primary analytical concepts: mechanisms, contexts, and outcomes. Noting that nursing investigators have had difficulty in operationalizing the concepts of mechanism and context, it is argued that their confusion is at least partially the result of ambiguities, inconsistencies, and contradictions in the realist evaluation model. Problematic issues include the adoption of empiricist and idealist positions, oscillation between determinism and voluntarism, subsumption of agency under structure, and categorical confusion between context and mechanism. In relation to outcomes, it is argued that realist evaluation's adoption of the fact/value distinction prevents it from taking into account the concerns of those affected by interventions. The aim of the paper is to use these immanent critiques of realist evaluation to construct an internally consistent realist approach to evaluation that is more amenable to being operationalized by nursing researchers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper constitutes an extended response to Athanasia Chalari's paper The Causal Impact of Resistance, which suggests that one may derive from internal conversations a causal explanation of resistance. In the context of our engagements with critical realism and digital research into social movements, we review Chalari's main argument, before applying it to a concrete case: the student protests in London, 2010. Whilst our account is sympathetic to Chalari's focus on interiority, we critique the individualism that is implicit in her argument, arguing that it emerges because of an underlying neglect of the relational aspects of resistance. Instead, we offer a relational realist analysis that treats resistance as process within an ontologically stratified account of reality that is mindful of the contingency of political acts. Taking this route, we establish resistance as an emergent relation, generative of distinctive 'relational goods' in the context of collective action, which we locate at different levels of reality, as we move from an analysis of individual to collective reflexivity. In doing so we offer a sympathetic critique of Chalari, building on the thought provoking arguments contained within it, whilst also making a contribution to the theorisation of social movements and the 'relational turn' within realist social theory ( Archer, 2010, 2012). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There are many differing ways to be a realist about language. This paper seeks to classify some of these and to examine the implications of each for the study of language. The principle of classification it adopts is that we may distinguish between realisms on the basis of what exactly it is that they take to be real. Examining in turn realisms that ascribe reality to the external world in general, to causal mechanisms, to innate capacities, to linguistic signs, to social structures, to language systems, and to linguistic groups, the paper summarises the case for a particular critical realist ontology of language. In the process, it engages briefly with the work of Saussure, Chomsky, Halliday, and more recent explicitly realist thinkers such as Bhaskar, Pateman, Archer, Sealey and Carter. One implication is that language itself is not a phenomenon that separates us from a causally structured world, but rather a part of that world, a part with an identifiable causal structure of its own that is similar to that of other normative phenomena. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers the place of knowledge in developing a socially just curriculum. It pursues the unusual route of a critique of Social Realism, a small but influential tendency in curriculum studies which claims that knowledge has been squeezed out by recent curriculum reforms and that there has been a descent into relativism. This paper shares the Social Realist view that 'powerful knowledge' is needed, and particularly by disadvantaged or marginalised young people. However, it critiques Social Realism's limited definition of 'powerful knowledge', arguing that for knowledge to be truly powerful, it must open up issues of power and inequality. It contests the Social Realist argument that critical pedagogy which begins from a subaltern stance is intrinsically relativist, arguing instead that alternative perspectives can help uncover concealed truths and break through hegemonic paradigms and ideologies. It argues that this is entirely compatible with a Critical Realist epistemology. Furthermore, the paper presents reasons why a socially just curriculum needs to draw upon the vernacular knowledge of marginalised groups as well as the canonical knowledge of academic disciplines to produce truly powerful knowledge and a social justice curriculum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are gradually becoming important artifacts for people with disabilities (PWDs). This paper investigates the use of mobile phones in the daily activities of PWDs in sub‐Saharan Africa. The study argues that mobile phone use empowers PWDs, but little is known about what contextual factors and under what underlying mechanisms such empowerment occurs. By adopting Thapa and Omland's (2018) critical realism methodology, we aim to understand the underlying mechanisms, structures and conditions that shape empowerment through mobile phone use by PWDs in Nigeria. The Capability Approach (CA) was engaged as the theoretical framework. Semi‐structured interviews and focus group discussions with twenty‐four PWDs were used as the primary source of data. Our findings reveal that contextual factors such as personal, social and environmental factors enable/hinder empowerment for PWDs. Similarly, mechanisms such as accessibility and acceptability, technology knowledge, social media and mobile phone features are found to be the main underlying mechanisms triggering the events we observed. However, we argue that these mechanisms are enacted from other enabling structures such as the ubiquity of mobile phones, caregivers and contextual conditions like the personal innovativeness in mobile phone use and the low price of mobile phones. Our findings contribute to the critical realism methodology, policy and theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critical realism has been an important advance in social science methodology because it develops a qualitative theory of causality which avoids some of the pitfalls of empiricist theories of causality. But while there has been ample work exploring the relationship between critical realism and qualitative research methods there has been noticeably less work exploring the relationship between dialectical critical realism and qualitative research methods. This seems strange especially since the founder of the philosophy of critical realism, Roy Bhaskar, employs and develops a range of dialectical concepts in his later work in order to extend the main tenets of critical realism. The aim of this paper is to draw on Bhaskar's later work, as well as Marxism, to reorient a critical realist methodology towards a dialectical approach for qualitative research. In particular, the paper demonstrates how dialectical critical realism can begin to provide answers to three common criticisms made against original critical realist methodology: that the qualitative theory of causal powers and structures developed by critical realists is problematic; that critical realist methodology contains values which prove damaging to empirical research; and that critical realists often have difficulties in researching everyday qualitative dilemmas that people face in their daily lives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article views the confrontation between pragmatism and Kant's Critical undertaking as very possibly the single most consequential agon of contemporary philosophy, given the utter irreconcilability of their respective ways of addressing the concerns of First Philosophy, with regard to the enabling conditions of cognitive realism. Pragmatism favors an informal, fluxive, "instrumentalist" form of empiricism, impossible to complete, opposed to any and all the ontic and epistemic fixities of Kant's Rationalism. Reason (Vernunft) cannot be more than a fiction. Kant has no supporting criterion of realism. The article proposes an empirical criterion of the distinctive (given) "duality" of sensory "appearings" and "appeareds" (that is, objects) as yielding a plausible "cognitive faculty" (involving "reasoning"—inference, for instance—but not Vernunft) that, in accord with the drift of evolutionism and Aristotle, readily extends to languageless animals as well as humans. It serves as the linchpin of the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I encourage consideration of a self‐structure singularity such that structural forces like racism or capitalism do not bear influence on individual actors in a given social field. Instead, individuals enact those forces through carrying out even the smallest of everyday occurrences. Structural forces emergent as individual actions and lived experiences can be understood through the lens of Karen Barad's agential realism as a materially discursive apparatus in lieu of being conceptualized as separate, mutually exclusive indices of social behavior worthy of theoretical consideration in their own right. Further, I propose autoethnography as a method by which critical psychologists can initially engage with the mutual instantiation of structures and lives. I encourage self‐structure examination through critical autoethnographic practices as an initial way to recognize self‐structure singularity in one's own life so as to facilitate a more comprehensive and nuanced understanding of the societal groups or individuals a critical psychologist desires to study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of modern nursing practice that is embedded within complex social situations, critical discussions about the contribution of major philosophers are relevant and important. Whilst nurse theorists have advanced and shaped nursing as a discipline, other major philosophers can offer much to advance nursing enquiry. In this paper, we focus on philosopher Roy Bhaskar who, amongst others, developed critical realism, a philosophy for social science which connects with how many of us think about the world. Bhaskar's work focuses our attention on the interplay between structure and agency and on the search for the causative or generative mechanisms that explain the social world. Bhaskar was interested in human emancipation, and we suggest his work is of great importance to advance understanding of complex social situations. Critical realism has already been endorsed by a range of disciplines, especially in research which focuses on real problems and acknowledges the complexities of the social world. In recent evidence from healthcare literature, there has been a surge in research using realist methodology (realist evaluation and realist synthesis), which is underpinned by the philosophy of critical realism and which offers a different perspective to understanding nursing and healthcare problems through the realist lens. However, we suggest that sufficient attention is not always paid to the philosophical roots of this methodology. In this paper, we provide insight into Bhaskar's work and demonstrate how research positioned within critical realism and realist methodology can advance nursing and healthcare-related knowledge. Through shining a light on Bhaskar, we illustrate how critical realism philosophy is a natural fit with human and health science enquiry, including nursing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critical realism is a philosophy of science, which has made significant contributions to epistemic debates within sociology. And yet, its contributions to ethnographic explanation have yet to be fully elaborated. Drawing on ethnographic data on the health-seeking behavior of HIV-infected South Africans, the paper compares and contrasts critical realism with grounded theory, extended case method and the pragmatist method of abduction. In so doing, it argues that critical realism makes a significant contribution to causal explanation in ethnographic research in three ways: 1) by linking structure to agency; 2) by accounting for the contingent, conjunctural nature of causality; and 3) by using surprising empirical findings to generate new theory. The paper develops the AART (abduction, abstraction, retroduction, testing) research schema and illustrates its strengths by employing a Bourdieusian field analysis as a model for morphogenetic explanation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There has been very little research into management consulting interventions in public sector organisations, especially in emerging economies. This paper aims to fill this void by narrating the empirics of a consulting assignment carried out by a large international consulting firm in a Pakistani public sector organisation. The study found that consultants' recommendations of 'businesslike' management controls, such as a modern performance measurement system and a 'state-of-the-art' information system, were rejected outright by the client management. Employing a critical realist perspective that focuses on the structural conditions facing both the client and the consultants, and on the strategies adopted by both parties, the study aims to explain the empirics of the case. Through structural and strategic analysis, this paper aims to enhance our understanding of the dynamics of management consulting in public sector organisations, especially in emerging economies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper offers a comment on Jacobs (2012) published previously in this journal. Particular attention is paid to how theoretical pluralism may be defended on paradigmatic grounds whilst being mobilised as a vehicle of generating practice-relevant insights. My critique of Jacobs focuses on his ambiguous positioning of multi-paradigm research and the possibilities of developing some 'indigenous' accounting theory to render research relevant for practice. As an alternative mode of addressing these issues I propose a position based on critical realism and elaborate on how it may be used to stimulate and defend theoretical pluralism in public sector accounting research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The fundamental dilemma in the middle power study is the repeated epistemic fallacies that attempt to answer an ontological question of middle powers with epistemic features. With the common epistemic belief that middle powers are significant actors that play some constructive roles, South Korea is automatically designated as a middle power as long as the agent (researcher or practitioner) finds comparable middle power‐like characteristics in South Korea's material attributes and foreign policy behaviors. However, this research adopted a critical realist research design that addresses the epistemic fallacy and finds the "real world" that makes South Korea's middle power categorization necessary. It analyzed South Korea's middle power rhetoric in South Korean presidents' and foreign ministers' foreign policy discourses, and ultimately uncovered that the "real world" behind South Korea's middle power rhetoric has been its environment comprised of the dominant and less dominant countries. As the less dominant country, South Korea has utilized the middle power title to balance and neutralize the asymmetrical power relations and create an environment more conducive to South Korea's national interests. This includes the removal of South Korea's deeply ingrained victim mindset. Yet, it should be emphasized that such a conclusion is valid only because of the critical realist research design, committed to ontological realism, epistemological relativism, and judgmental rationalism. If not, South Korea's unequal power environment would be viewed as merely an additional condition that a "middle power" South Korea must deal with. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The renewed interest in Marxism that occurred in social sciences and humanities after the 2008 economic crisis has not yet found its counterpart in spatial planning. This paper examines what Marxist planning theory and practices could mean in the current conjuncture. It does so through scrutinising (1) the vibrant Marxist discourse in planning that existed in the late 1970s and early 1980s, (2) the recent history (since the 1980s) of planning theory and its relation to the political economy, and (3) the current political economic context (not least defined by the diabolic crisis). Where previous Marxist approaches to planning were very strong on analysing the political economy, I argue there is currently a need—with old hegemonies losing ground, communicative approaches losing support, and neoliberalism in the political economy losing legitimacy—to also discuss establishing alternatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Superficially, Actor Network Theory (ANT) and critical realism (CR) are radically opposed research traditions. Written from a realist perspective, this paper asks whether there might be a basis for finding common ground between these two traditions. It looks in turn at the questions of realism, structure, and agency, analysing the differences between the two perspectives and seeking to identify what each might learn from the other. Overall, the paper argues that there is a great deal that realists can learn from actor network theory; yet ANT remains stunted by its lack of a depth ontology. It fails to recognize the significance of mechanisms, and of their dependence on emergence, and thus lacks both dimensions of the depth that is characteristic of critical realism's ontology. This prevents ANT from recognizing the role and powers of social structure; but on the other hand, realists would do well to heed ANT's call for us to trace the connections through which structures are constantly made and remade. A lack of ontological depth also underpins ANT's practice of treating human and non-human actors symmetrically, yet this remains a valuable provocation to sociologists who neglect non-human entities entirely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper replies to Porpora, King, and Varela's responses to my earlier paper “For Emergence”, focussing on the relationship between the concepts of social structure and social relations. It recognises the importance of identifying the mechanisms responsible whenever we make claims for the emergence of causal powers, and discusses the mechanism underlying one case of social structure: normative institutions. It also shows how critical realism reconciles the claims that both social structures and human individuals have emergent causal powers that combine to produce actual social events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To provide rigour when preparing a research design, the researcher needs to carefully consider not only the methodology but also the philosophical intent of the study. This, however, is often absent from reported research and provides the reader with little evidence by which to judge the merits of the chosen methodology and its influence on the study. The purpose of this paper is to set out the case for critical realism as a framework to guide appropriate action in practice development and realistic evaluation for understanding the consequences of those actions. It is evident that critical realism and critical social science share common ground. Emancipatory practice development (ePD) is based on the philosophy of critical social science and therefore by virtue is linked to the tenets of critical realism. Until now, the evaluation of ePD programme has been well served by 4th-generation evaluation. However, this paper outlines the need for a different approach to evaluation, one that is based on critical realism, that is concerned with emancipation, and that can be used in the ever-changing environment of clinical practice. Realistic evaluation not only links strongly to ePD programmes, but also serves as the basis for effective research questions that will test the outcomes of the research and inform the transferability of ePD mechanisms into differing contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper undertakes an historical re-evaluation of Louis Althusser's philosophical legacy for modern Marxism. While Althusser self-consciously sought to defend the scientific character of Marxism, many of his closest followers eventually exited the Marxian paradigm for a post-structural post-Marxism. We argue that this development was predominately rooted in a series of philosophical errors that proved fatal in a period of retreat for European socialism. There has always been, however, a second post-Althusserian legacy associated with the critical realist conception of Marxism initiated by Roy Bhaskar. Bhaskar found part of his inspiration in Althusser's successful posing of the question of Marx's science and this paper sets out to excavate the proper links between Althusser and Bhaskar in order to deepen the relationship between critical realism and scientific Marxism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to note the convergence between two critical realist philosophies of science, namely, that of Roy Bhaskar and Bernard Lonergan with regard to the intelligibility of experimental activity. Bhaskar very explicitly argues that 'differentiation implies stratification.' The idea is that because the situations produced in laboratories are special instances of closure (like the solar system in the open universe, they do not represent the general case) the significance of experimental activity is that it brings about regularities with a view to understanding scientific laws at a deeper level. This is to say, when experiment is properly understood, the weaknesses of empiricism are exposed. Although he is not as explicit, Lonergan also has recourse to this argument. The parallels between Bhaskar and Lonergan are not surprising given the Aristotelian heritage that is manifest in their common concern for a realist ontology. Nevertheless, some differences between the two emerge, for example, in Lonergan's concern with the development of statistical science, and as well, a firm commitment to substance (rather than to powers, simply). Some attention to the significance of experimental activity for the debate surrounding realism is explored; it is suggested that Lonergan has something to offer in the subsequent conversation associated with Maxwell, van Fraassen, Hacking and Cartwright. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The need for formulation of solid explanatory theories is heightened in information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D) by the high incidence of failure, which involves substantial costs for the countries affected. A core argument of this paper is that a critical realist ontology offers intellectual tools that can ground the formulation of causal theory in ICT4D. The paper illustrates such potential through the case study of India's Unique Identity Project (Aadhaar), which Indian states are increasingly using within their anti‐poverty programmes. Following a critical realist retroductive methodology, the paper seeks to explain the incorporation of Aadhaar into India's main food security system, the Public Distribution System; an incorporation somewhat paradoxical given the mistrust often associated with biometric infrastructures in social protection. Critical realism allows construction of a theory of trust‐building in Aadhaar, based on mechanisms of institutionalisation (state governments framing Aadhaar as a core institutional means to receive benefits) and image formation (authorities systemically associating Aadhaar with an image of effective pro‐poor reform). Based on primary and secondary data collected over the course of six years, this paper contributes a theoretical explanation of an important phenomenon in Indian development, and illustrates how a critical realist philosophy is instrumental in building the type of causal theory that is needed in ICT4D. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents my reflections on adopting critical realist (CR) assumptions in information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D) research over the last decade. Critical realism, and its notion of generative mechanisms as contingent causality, offers one potential way to frame and engage in research that is compatible with the contextual nature of developing ICT4D theory. However, CR can be difficult to understand and operationalize. This paper provides practical insights on how to engage in ICT4D research underpinned by the CR philosophy of science. As such, the bulk of this paper presents insights and implications of accepting CR assumptions in the research process, looking at different elements of research (eg, including forming research questions, theory building, engaging in research). I use examples in ICT4D research to illustrate these implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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The paper aims to facilitate more adequate critical engagement with current affairs events by journalists, and with current affairs texts by audiences. It draws on social theory to provide the intellectual resources to enable this. The academic ambition is for the framework to be adopted and developed by social thinkers in producing exemplary critical readings of news and current affairs texts. To this end it is offered as a research paradigm. The paper situates its argument in relation to the wider literature in media and cultural studies, acknowledging the subtle skills required to appreciate the relative autonomy of texts. However, it draws attention to the lack of an adequate perspective with which to assess the frames, representations, and judgments within news and current affairs texts. To address this lacuna it proposes the conception of a social-theoretical frame, based on a number of meta-theoretical approaches, designed to provide audiences with a systematic means of addressing the status and adequacy of individual texts. Social theoretical frames can reveal the shortcomings of media framing of the contextual fields within which news and current affairs events take place. Two illustrative case studies are used to indicate the value and potential of the approach: the analysis of a short newspaper report of the return of protesters to Cairo's Tahrir Square in 2011, and a critique of four current affairs reports from various genres on the political turmoil in Thailand leading up to the clashes of May 2010. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the fundamental question of how data-intensive e-research methods could contribute to the development of learning theories. Using methodological developments in research on self-regulated learning as an example, it argues that current applications of data-driven analytical techniques, such as educational data mining and its branch process mining, are deeply grounded in an event-focused, ontologically flat view of learning phenomena. These techniques provide descriptive accounts of the regularities of events, but have limited power to generate theoretical explanations. Building on the philosophical views of critical realism, the paper argues that educational e-research needs to adopt more nuanced ways for investigating and theorising learning phenomena that could provide an account of the mechanisms and contexts in which those mechanisms are realised. It proposes that future methodological extensions should include three main aspects: (1) stratified ontological frameworks, (2) multimodal data collection and (3) dynamic analytical methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the difference between the orthodox assumption that adult‐child sexual contact is both wrong and harmful and another that focuses upon moral panics. The latter view emphasises that the personal or social harm arising from adult‐child sexual contact is open to question. The tension between these two positions is laid out in order to examine their different assumptions about what exists (ontology), how it is understood (epistemology) and how we appraise power discrepancies in relationships (ethics). Resources from the philosophy of critical realism are deployed to critique the applicability of moral panic theory to child sexual abuse and understand the persistent presence of that theory, despite its poor evidence base. It is concluded that child sexual abuse is not a moral panic at all and that practitioners should be wary of the influence of this line of reasoning in their professional training and literature. ‘Examines the difference between the orthodox assumption that adult‐child sexual contact is both wrong and harmful and another that focuses upon moral panics’ Key Practitioner Messages: A minority academic position is that adult‐child sexual contact is usually harmless and ethically and psychologically warranted in society. Public and professional concern about the contact is depicted as a ‘moral panic’. The recent history of that minority position is examined and justifications from policy libertarians and pro‐paedophile groups summarised. Using resources from the philosophy of critical realism, this position is critiqued for its unwarranted reliance on the assumption that adult‐child sexual contact has become a moral panic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rom Harré's generative account of causality has been drawn on heavily by advocates of critical realism. Yet Harré argues that critical realists often exaggerate the extent to which powerful causal explanations of social phenomena can be developed. Certain proponents of critical realism have responded to Harré's criticisms by suggesting that it is useful to consider the relevant issues in relation to the familiar Aristotelian classification of four causes. In this paper I contribute to this debate and pursue a similar strategy. The paper adds to existing contributions in two ways. Firstly, I outline how Harré sees his generative account of causality as linking up with Aristotelian themes. It emerges that Harré at times conceives of his generative theory as part of an alternative to the Aristotelian system while at other times he draws connections between it and a reformulated account of formal causality. Secondly, I argue that when we consider the positions of Harré and proponents of critical realism on the scope of causal explanation in the social realm in relation to the interpretation of final causes offered by another philosopher profoundly influenced by the Aristotelian tradition, namely Charles Peirce, we can see both as limited in certain respects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mixed method study designs are becoming increasingly popular among nurse researchers. Mixed studies can have advantages over single method or methodological investigative designs. However, these advantages may be squandered where researchers fail to think through and justify their theoretic decisions. This paper argues that nurse researchers do not always pay sufficient heed to the philosophic and theoretic elements of research design and, in consequence, some mixed study reports lack argumentative coherence and validity. It is here suggested that Hempel's concept of equivalence can be stretched to usefully illustrate one of the main threats to argumentative coherence in mixed study design. The critical realist theory of Roy Bhaskar is then introduced and this, it is proposed, offers one means by which Hempel's equivalence dilemma can be overcome. Critical realists recognize the existence of logical connections between the ontological, epistemological, and methodological premises that underpin their work. They are therefore more likely to produce coherent studies than uncritical pragmatists who ignore such linkages and, paradoxically, critical realists can be epistemological pluralists because, in re-conceptualizing the ontological basis of inquiry, problems associated with the mixing of alternative metaphysics are circumvented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]