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Emancipative Social Science

Theory and Method, Reflexivity and Power, Values and Foundations

SUNY Potsdam

As recent contributions to the social science reformation literature, the books reviewed in this essay articulate rather different visions of social science. Set against the background of the `science wars', incorporating a model of human decision-making, and drawing upon the ideas of Aristotle and Foucault, Bent Flyvbjerg expounds his own `phronetic social science' that highlights context, value rationality and power. Andrew Sayer, on the other hand, targets `defeatist' strains of postmodernism and assesses the concerns of critical social science from an already established theoretical framework: the philosophy of critical realism. A few problems with these books are discussed, including Flyvbjerg's views on cognitivism's failure to investigate `value rationality' and Sayer's linking critical realism with postmodernist anti-foundationalism. The complexities of foundationalism, ignored by both books, are discussed further in a concluding section.

Key Words: critical realism • defeatist postmodernism • foundationalism • phronetic social science • pomo flip • value rationality

Theory & Psychology, Vol. 13, No. 2, 275-284 (2003)
DOI: 10.1177/0959354303013002007


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