Date: Fri, 22 Nov 2002 08:30:59 +0000
From: "karl.maton" <karl.maton-AT-pop.ntlworld.com>
Subject: Re: BHA: nature of the split in Critical Realism


Phil Walden wrote:

>Hi Mervyn and listers,
>
>First of all, Mervyn, let me say that I am shocked by the shabby treatment
>you have received, despite the fact that as elected editor of JCR you were
>doing a grand job, and unpaid too.  I have just read the statement by the
>IACR Council with astonishment as it is obviously a complete gloss and
>entirely fails to shed light on the causes of the split that has occurred.
>
>Can I ask you, Mervyn, for some further clarification.  It has been my
>perception, based on my experience of the Critical Realist fraternity over
>the last several years, that the main split within Critical Realism is
>between those who see Critical Realism merely as a tool for their social
>scientific research, on the one hand, and those who are interested in DCR,
>TDCR, or in some way in the philosophical potential of Critical Realism on
>the other. Would I be right in thinking that the treatment you have received
>is a coup perpetrated by the former against the latter?
>
>Best regards,
>
>Phil Walden
>
>
>
>
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>
>  
>
Hi Phil,

I feel the division you highlight an extremely important one. Perhaps it 
is in fact primary to the one usually identified between the various 
acronyms of CR, DCR, etc. By adding a word here I'm not suggesting it 
was important in the recent arguments over the journal (as I do not know 
and am not a participant), but I did want to say that this issue is one 
which has come to reoccupy my thoughts. It is, though, slightly more 
interesting than a straight tool / philosophy split. For example, it 
strikes me that many who one might consider to be more than philosophers 
are (perhaps fed up with their disciplines not listening) trying to 
bypass disciplinary knowledge and set up critical realism and its 
variants (such as morphogenesis and realist social theory) as the only 
things needed to achieve practical social theorising. So, we now have 
books purporting to work in the sociology of education (for example) 
which can somehow ignore entirely its two major and most influential 
theorists, both of whom could be seen as compatible with the conditions 
set up by critical realist approaches.

With best wishes,

Karl

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Karl Maton
School of Education, University of Cambridge

Email: karl.maton-AT-ntlworld.com
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