Positivism has been enjoying a strong epistemology in social
science for their scientific approach in explaining social phenomena. The
positivist’s inquiry for causal inference has drawn the attention of many
scholars in social science. However, positivism has been received severe
criticism from other scholars on epistemology. One critique comes from
pragmatist standpoint that ask the question whether positivism is practical
enough in their explaination on social phenomena. According to Dewey (1999),
pragmatists consider concepts, hypotheses, and ideas as endogenous sources for
inquiry rather than external constraints. Molly Cochran (2002) thinks that
Dewey's pragmatism offers an alternative research model for international
relations researchers who are away from positivism. Jonathan B. Isacoff (2009)
sees pragmatism as a guide to historical developments in international relations.
Finally, according to William James (1907), pragmatism is the "mediating
philosophy" that reconciles empirical epistemic responsibility with
moral-religious optimization.
This reaction paper study tries to highlight the critics from
pragmatist for positivist. This paper is look at the reading from Hamati-Ataya,
James Johnson, Joseph S. Nye, OsmoKivinen and Tero Piiroinen. These scholars
try to argue that there is another epistemology that offers another way in
explaining in social science.
Hamati-Ataya (2012) tries to offer pragmatism as epistemology
in international relations through the debates of positivism vs.
post-positivism. Although, at the beginning she admits that pragmatism is still
considered as a new and alternative epistemology in international relations,
Ataya argues that pragmatism is relevant to international relations theory.
Based on Kaplan’s Systematic Pragmatism study, Ataya is carefully scrunitising
the weaknee of positivism in understanding reality and knowledge. According to
her (2012), positivist’s mainly focus on how reality and knowledge leads to
their “ dual fallacy” on objectivity and intersubjectivity of reality. She
suggests that pragmatists explain how reality and knowledge as a result of
human interpretation, thus reality and knowledge can be used into human
purpose.
In my opinion, Ataya is indeed giving the idea the comparison
of positivists and post-positivists and pragmatists. Ataya’s defence about
pragmatism could be easily doubted by positivists as she could not provide any
tools on how pragmatism explain phenomenon in international relations.
James Johnson stated that political scientists typically use
positivist and positivism concepts for rhetorical purposes. In addition,
Johnson thinks that positivism is a mistaken doctrine. Pragmatists consider
science as a problem-solving activity like other human practices (Johnson,
2006: 225). Pragmatists consider theories and methods as a tool for problem
solving. Pragmatists see success in solving empirical and conceptual problems
(Johnson, 2006: 228). Related to theory, pragmatism will not test the theory,
rather will judge the theory by its consequences (Johnson, 2006: 227). He wrote
his article based on King, Keohane and Verba’s (KKV) book. And he criticised
positivism based on KKV’s book.
In my opinion, Johnson offers a through critique on
positivism mechanism and defends pragmatism while trying not to fall into
post-positivists camp. However, similar to Ataya, although Johnson tries to
highlight the problem of causal inference.
Kivinen and Piiroinen suggest the pragmatist
perspective in social science by comparing the study of Searle and Dewey on
their pragmatist in social scientific inquiry particularly in the field of
sociology (Kivinen & Piiroinen, 2007). According to the authors, the key of
understanding human, mind and language can be found in sociological
explanations (Kivinen & Piiroinen, 2007). Kivinen and Piiroinen argue that
certain pragmatist guidelines open more efficient ways for empirical research. The
authors suggest that there is an alternative methodology in explaining human
behaviour in social realms. According to the them, concepts to be observed in
the world are tools of action, therefore it does not need to make a causal
relationship between concepts. It is a pragmatist perspective that suggests
that “action explains all social life" (Kivinen & Piiroinen, 2007:p.
109). The authors suggests that pragmatists offers a different approach on what
they call it as "being-oriented inside out have a lot of to offer for the
methodology of research"( Kivinen & Piiroinen, 2007: 110). The authors
propose a relational methodology that combines Dewey's understanding of
classical pragmatism with the anti-representationalist perspective.
In my opinion, from Kivinen and Piironen, we can learn the
different way in conducting social research, science can be used as an action.
However, they do not provide a useful tools on how to applied the conceptual
actions on explaining human being. The question arises from here how that
actions, language and mind of human beings can explain the truth of the
reality.
From Joseph Nye, we learn that the gap between theoritical
academic world and the practical world. He cririticises the academics
particularly the international relations field seems to enjoy their own
privilege of being sophisticated to find the truth. While the practitioners
need more recipes to overcome problems. I think Nye provides a good description
the gap between academic and practical world especially in international
relations. It is inevitable that is the gap is real between theoritical and
practical schemes of both natural and social science. This is because it takes
time for science to deal the real problems of society which are very dynamics.
Science needs time to be proven that it can explain the truth of the reality. I
think the word 'bridging' in Nye's article to shorten the gap between academic
and practical means to be a “long” bridge. This is because science needs to
stick on their 'scientific' manners to explain social phenomena and it takes
times for science to pursue the truth. I do not reject the idea that academic
realm can be used in practical world, but I think the academic theoritical
inqury should be maintained in the way of what they are doing now. I argue that
academic World should keep on their path in pursuing the truth in the World. I
think that pragmatists could find a space tos tay firmly in academia.
In conclusion, from all reading, we could see that all
authors try to criticise positivism as epistemology in social science. They
mostly suggest that positivism is not flexible enough overcome “real” problems
of society. They suggest that positivism needs more pragmatic tools for the
academics to explain and provide recipe for society illness. However, in the
end they do not provide any tools how to use the pragmatic way of thinking in
explaining reality.
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