The latest issue of IJPDLM contains a paper by Jesper Aastrup, Copenhagen Business School, and Arni Halldorsson, University of Southampton. This is a Special Issue from the Nofoma 2008 conference, edited by Gyöngyi Kovács and Karen Spens, Hanken, Finland.
We presented this paper at the 2008 Nofoma conference in Helsinki Finland (and received the Schenker Best Paper award). We have been struggling with some issues of justification of our research approaches and types of scientific explanations, and decided to mix our thoughts about this. Although the paper is written in the context of logistics, the implications may also apply for other disciplines such as marketing, purchasing and operations management. We will hopefully come back to this context later.
From the abstract:
The purpose of this paper is to develop the paradigmatic justification for the use of case studies in logistics research. The argument is based on a critical realist (CR) ontology and epistemology. The current logistics paradigm’s flat ontology – based on regularity – is replaced by an ontology emphasising structures and mechanisms underlying actual events in the form of logistics practice and performance.
…Based on this CR view of the logistics domain it is argued that the justifications for conducting case studies lie in their ability: to reach the causal depth required for revealing the real domain of logistics activities and performance: to reveal the working of mechanisms in loosely coupled structures showing open systems characteristics through a constant alternation between abstract and concrete reasoning and; to include the causal powers and effects of agents’ ascribed meanings. Also, it is argued, in contrast with Yin’s work which refers to the possibility of generalising case studies, that the justification of case studies not only must refer to their complementary role in research but also must build on groundings that allow this form of research to take a primary role in knowledge creation.
…The arguments have direct implications primarily for the scientific justification for case studies in logistics.
Árni
Full reference:
Aastrup, Jepser and Halldorsson, Arni (2008): “Epistemological role of case studies in logistics: A critical realist perspective”, International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management, Volume 38, Issue 10, pp. 746-763.
