10.

1177/1077800403259492
QUALITATIVE
Maxwell / REEMERGENT
INQUIRY / SCIENTISM
February 2004 ARTICLE
Reemergent Scientism, Postmodernism,
and Dialogue Across Differences

Joseph A. Maxwell
George Mason University

The reemergence of a narrowly defined “scientifically based research” that marginalizes

qualitative approaches represents a major threat to qualitative research. A postmodern
perspective not only challenges this essentialist definition of “science” but also critiques
tendencies of qualitative researchers to essentialize proponents of “science.” These argu-
ments raise the issue of dialogue across the differences between researchers working in
different paradigms. Such dialogue can promote a better understanding of the value of
qualitative research; it can also sensitize qualitative researchers to the importance of
validity concerns and alternative interpretations in their work. Addressing the latter
issue strengthens the argument that at least some qualitative research can be fully “sci-
entific” without giving up the essential characteristics of qualitative inquiry.

Keywords: qualitative research; scientifically based research; postmodernism;

validity

At the outset, I want to acknowledge that I share a kind of postmodern per-

spective with Lather (2004 [this issue]), a postmodernism that asserts that
diversity is fundamental and irreducible, and one that displays an “incredu-
lity toward metanarratives” that assert a unified, totalizing understanding of
some phenomena. One statement of this perspective that I particularly reso-
nate with is by the philosopher Richard Bernstein (1992), who in his analysis
of Habermas and Derrida, asserted,

I do not think there is a theoretical position from which we can reconcile their
differences, their otherness to each other—nor do I think we should smooth out
their “aversions and attractions.” The nasty questions that they raise about each
other’s “project” need to be relentlessly pursued. One of the primary lessons of
“modernity/postmodernity” is a radical skepticism about the possibility of a
reconciliation—an aufhebung, without gaps, fissures, and ruptures. However,
together, Habermas/Derrida provide us with a force-field that constitutes the
“dynamic, transmutational structure of a complex phenomenon”—the phe-
nomenon I have labeled “modernity/postmodernity.” (p. 225)

Qualitative Inquiry, Volume 10 Number 1, 2004 35-41

DOI: 10.1177/1077800403259492
© 2004 Sage Publications

35

Downloaded from qix.sagepub.com at Bobst Library, New York University on May 25, 2015
36 QUALITATIVE INQUIRY / February 2004

For me, an important implication of this postmodern perspective, one that

was not explicitly addressed by Lather (2004), is the possibility of dialogue
across differences. I worry about the danger of essentializing and “othering”
those with whom we disagree and of consequently dismissing the value of
dialogue and exchange with them. So what I want to do here is to take seri-
ously both the irreducibility of difference and the possibility of dialogue and
to raise some “nasty questions” about issues that seem important to me and
that are not addressed in Lather’s article. I do this as a “critical friend” and in
the spirit of dialogue that I have advocated. I am obviously approaching this
issue from my own experience and standpoint, as someone who has done a
fair amount of work on mixed-method research and who teaches both quali-
tative and quantitative research methods. People with different standpoints
will obviously have different perspectives.
There are some places where I cannot raise such “nasty questions” effec-
tively because Lather’s (2004) position and mine are too similar. One of these
is our reaction to the attempt by the Bush administration and its allies to leg-
islate a particular definition of “scientific inquiry,” one that misrepresents
and marginalizes qualitative research. Like Lather, I am scared to death of this
agenda and what motivates some of its proponents. Even though I believe
that this agenda is bound to fail in the long run, the short-run damage that it
can do is enormous.
I also agree with Lather’s (2004) critique of the National Research Council
report Scientific Research in Education (Shavelson & Towne, 2002), which is that
despite the committee’s attempt to promote an inclusive view of science, the
report is grounded in narrow and outdated assumptions about what it means
to be “scientific,” assumptions that do not even validly represent actual prac-
tice in the natural sciences, let alone apply to educational research. My
grounds for this critique may be somewhat different from hers because I am
sympathetic to many of the characteristics of science that the authors of this
report advocate. I believe that we can retain the essential features of qual-
itative inquiry—a concern with meaning and interpretation, an emphasis on
the importance of context and process, and an inductive and hermeneutic
strategy—and still defend our work as scientific (Maxwell, 1996, 2002, in
press-a, in press-b).
I would thus challenge Foucault’s assertion, discussed by Lather (2004),
that the social sciences “are not sciences at all.” I certainly agree that not all
qualitative or social inquiry is scientific, but I think some of it is, or can be, sci-
entific, and I value this scientific approach as one among many ways to con-
duct educational inquiry. I am therefore not willing to cede the term “science”
to quantitative, variable-oriented approaches.
In making the claim that qualitative research can legitimately be seen as
scientific, I am not attempting to assimilate qualitative research to a neoposi-
tivist paradigm or to subordinate it to quantitative or experimental research. I
am arguing, however, that for us to credibly make this claim, we will need to

Downloaded from qix.sagepub.com at Bobst Library, New York University on May 25, 2015
 Maxwell / REEMERGENT SCIENTISM 37

pay more explicit attention to issues of validity—the criteria we use for decid-
ing between alternative interpretations, explanations, and theories of the
things we study. Lather and I have both addressed this issue, from our own
perspectives (Lather, 1993; Maxwell, 1992), and it is a topic of renewed con-
cern in qualitative research. I see this concern for validity as the essential char-
acteristic of science; as Donald Campbell (1986) argued, “The social crux of
science . . . is the ability to render implausible rival hypotheses. . . . The central
mode of argument involved is closer to the hermeneutic methods than to
some idealizations of scientific certainty” (pp. 125-126).
I also think that this is an area where qualitative researchers can learn
something from a dialogue with the more open-minded advocates of “scien-
tific inquiry.” A particularly salient “cautionary tale” for qualitative research-
ers is the rise and fall of facilitated communication as a method for working
with autistic and severely retarded persons. This technique, promoted as a
communication breakthrough for individuals who had generally been seen
as incapable of any sort of linguistic communication with others, involves
the use of a “facilitator” who assists the client with typing messages using a
keyboard—messages that often contrast strikingly with the client’s previ-
ously assumed communication ability. Facilitated communication was
initially advocated on the basis of qualitative studies that were claimed to
demonstrate the technique’s validity and effectiveness (e.g., Biklen, 1993;
Crossley, 1992).1 However, subsequent research using controlled testing has
almost uniformly failed to support the view that these messages were actu-
ally produced by the client and has strongly suggested that the messages
were consciously or unconsciously “cued” by the facilitator (Jacobson,
Mulick, & Schwartz, 1995; Mostert, 2001). This controversy gained consider-
able notoriety when some facilitators began generating messages alleging
sexual abuse of the client, allegations that were almost invariably rejected by
the courts because of the absence of any corroborating information.
One of the outcomes of this controversy was a methodological polariza-
tion of the debate; proponents of facilitated communication rejected quantita-
tive and experimental assessments as artificial, intrusive, and disrespectful of
clients, whereas critics dismissed qualitative studies as “anecdotal” and sub-
ject to irreparable biases. (An important exception is a study by Twachtman-
Cullen [1997] involving in-depth qualitative case studies of three facilitators
and their clients. This study paid particular attention to alternative expla-
nations and validity threats and supported the claim of experimentalists that
the facilitated messages were being unconsciously shaped by the facilitator.
The study also documented serious ethical problems in the use of facilitated
communication.) This polarization led to an almost complete absence of
meaningful dialogue between the two positions on how to investigate the
claims regarding facilitated communication and has undoubtedly exacer-
bated the disdain for qualitative research displayed by many researchers in
this field.

Downloaded from qix.sagepub.com at Bobst Library, New York University on May 25, 2015
38 QUALITATIVE INQUIRY / February 2004

Thus, although I value many of Foucault’s insights, I worry that the

Foucauldian perspective can itself become a “totalizing metanarrative,” dis-
missing issues of science as irrelevant to qualitative research and essentializ-
ing those approaches to research that are labeled “scientific.” I emphasize this
because I think that such a stance is not only an inaccurate portrayal of science
but also potentially counterproductive in that it tends to polarize our relation-
ship with advocates of “scientific inquiry” and to make productive dialogue
much more difficult.
I also think that Lather (2004) and I may disagree about the most effective
strategies for challenging the assumptions about “scientific inquiry” dis-
cussed above and the political agenda that they inform. I endorse Lather’s
critique of the political motives (using “political” in the broad sense of having
to do with power) that drive these efforts. But I also think that we can effec-
tively challenge this reemergent scientism on rational and empirical grounds,
showing how it misrepresents the actual logic and practice of science
(Maxwell, in press-a).
I would also argue that we should try to communicate to the proponents of
“scientific inquiry” how qualitative research can be of value in their work,
because it addresses some of the limitations of quantitative and experimental
research. My concern for this strategy is motivated by the finding of much
research on the diffusion of innovations that one of the key factors in the
adoption of an innovation is whether the innovation meets a felt need of the
potential adopter (Rogers, 1995; cf. Maxwell, 1993). If we want “scientific”
researchers to adopt the “innovation” of qualitative research, we will need to
show them how this innovation can help them to attain those goals that both
they and we want to achieve.
Lather’s (2004) critique of the attempt to redefine “science” in educational
research warns against “systems of thought dominated by the logic and lin-
guistics of male sexual organs” (p. 25). I want to caution qualitative research-
ers against a second masculinist and patriarchal perspective: the system of
thought dominated by the logic and linguistics of war, a system of thought
that metaphorizes the relationship between qualitative researchers and the
proponents of “scientific inquiry” as one of battle, enemies and allies, attack
and defense, and victory and defeat. This metaphor, “argument is war,” has
been extensively analyzed by Lakoff and Johnson (1980); like all metaphors, it
can reveal things we might otherwise miss, but it can also narrow and rigidify
our thinking and blind us to other ways of seeing.
Motivated by my concern about the narrow definition of “science” held by
some of those promoting a scientific approach to educational research, I regis-
tered for an all-day workshop at the 2003 American Educational Research
Association meeting “Designing and Implementing Randomized Field Trials
for Educational Interventions.” In doing this, I was both engaging in “covert
ethnography” (though I made no attempt to conceal my views) and, attempt-
ing to initiate a dialogue with these advocates of “science,” in educational

Downloaded from qix.sagepub.com at Bobst Library, New York University on May 25, 2015
 Maxwell / REEMERGENT SCIENTISM 39

research. The initial presentations were not encouraging; presenters de-

scribed randomized field trials (often denoted by the acronym “RFTs”) as
“the next stage,” a “higher plane,” “better evidence,” and “the gold standard”
for educational research. However, as the workshop continued, a more
nuanced and less dogmatic perspective began to emerge, aided by some chal-
lenging questions from participants. A senior National Institutes of Health
researcher speculated that the institute’s commitment to randomized trials
might be overly rigid, particularly for understanding issues of implementa-
tion and dissemination of findings, and that collecting “rich preintervention
data” might accomplish some of the same purposes as RFTs. It also emerged
that the presenters have established a long-term collaborative relationship
with a large urban school district to conduct RFTs, a relationship that has sig-
nificantly altered some of their initial views.
The final exercise for the workshop was to design an RFT for a hypotheti-
cal California school district to assess the effect of reducing class size, using
the workshop’s parameters for designing RFTs. This initiated a spirited dis-
cussion of how best to do this and raised some serious concerns about the
parameters. In the midst of this discussion, one senior presenter said, “Wait,
we’ve got this all wrong. Negotiating an institutional and community part-
nership should be the first parameter. It’s a developmental process; you can’t
design the RFT prior to this.” I also found that my own contributions, includ-
ing suggestions about the value of qualitative research in answering the kinds
of questions the workshop was addressing, were well received by many of the
presenters and participants.
This experience reinforced my belief that the advocates of “scientific in-
quiry” are not monolithic and that at least some of them are open to dialogue
on the issues on which we disagree. As I said earlier, I am speaking from my
own standpoint here and am not asserting “One Right Way” of addressing
this issue. But I do want to argue for the importance and value of dialogue
across the differences that Lather (2004) has described and we now face, and
also for an awareness of the dangers of “othering” those with whom we dis-
agree. According to Rogers (1995), a major factor in successful implementa-
tion of change is understanding the clients’ perspective and situation. Under-
standing people who are different from us and learning how to converse with
them are among the most important contributions that qualitative research
can make to human understanding. As qualitative researchers, we should be
able to use these skills to help us address the situation Lather has so trench-
antly analyzed.

NOTE
1. My initial reaction to this literature, shortly after it appeared, was that the “ethno-
graphic” accounts that were presented in support of facilitated communication were

Downloaded from qix.sagepub.com at Bobst Library, New York University on May 25, 2015
40 QUALITATIVE INQUIRY / February 2004

quite inadequate as ethnography and incapable of credibly supporting the claims that
were being made for the method. I am not claiming that facilitated communication is
never a useful approach or that the messages generated never represent valid communi-
cations from the client; I think the jury is still out on this issue. However, it seems clear
that the technique was grossly oversold, that major validity threats were not addressed
by proponents, and that its promotion raised and then crushed the hopes of many par-
ents of children with severe communication disabilities.

REFERENCES
Bernstein, R. (1992). The new constellation: The ethical-political horizons of modernity-
postmodernity. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Biklen, D. (1993). Communication unbound. New York: Teachers College Press.
Campbell, D. T. (1986). Science’s social system of validity-enhancing collective belief
change and the problems of the social sciences. In D. W. Fiske & R. A. Shweder
(Eds.), Metatheory in social science: Pluralisms and subjectivities (pp. 108-135). Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Crossley, R. (1992). Getting the words out: Case studies in facilitated communication
training. Topics in Language Disorders, 12, 46-59.
Jacobson, J. W., Mulick, J. A., & Schwartz, A. A. (1995). A history of facilitated communi-
cation: Science, pseudoscience, and antiscience. American Psychologist, 50, 750-765.
Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (1980). Metaphors we live by. Chicago: University of Chicago
Press.
Lather, P. (1993). Fertile obsession: Validity after poststructuralism. Sociological Quar-
terly, 34(4), 673-693.
Lather, P. (2004). This is your father’s paradigm: Government intrusion and the case of
qualitative research in education. Qualitative Inquiry, 10(1).
Maxwell, J. (1992). Understanding and validity in qualitative research. Harvard Educa-
tional Review, 62(Fall), 279-300.
Maxwell, J. A. (1993). Gaining acceptance for qualitative methods from clients, policy-
makers, and participants. In D. M. Fetterman (Ed.), Speaking the language of power
(pp. 105-115). Washington, DC: Falmer.
Maxwell, J. A. (1996). Qualitative research design: An interactive approach. Thousand Oaks,
CA: Sage.
Maxwell, J. A. (2002). Realism and the role of the researcher in qualitative psychology.
In M. Kiegelmann (Ed.), The role of the researcher in qualitative psychology (pp. 11-30).
Tübingen, Germany: Verlag Ingeborg Huber.
Maxwell, J. A. (in press-a). Causal explanation, qualitative research, and scientific in-
quiry in education. Educational Researcher.
Maxwell, J. A. (in press-b). Using qualitative methods for causal explanation. Field
Methods.
Mostert, M. (2001). Facilitated communication since 1995: A review of published stud-
ies. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 31(3), 287-313.
Rogers, E. M. (1995). Diffusion of innovations (4th ed.). New York: Free Press.
Shavelson, R. J., & Towne, L. (Eds.). (2002). Scientific research in education. Washington,
DC: National Academy Press.

Downloaded from qix.sagepub.com at Bobst Library, New York University on May 25, 2015
 Maxwell / REEMERGENT SCIENTISM 41

Twachtman-Cullen, D. (1997). A passion to believe: Autism and the facilitated communica-

tion phenomenon. Boulder, CO: Westview.

Joseph A. Maxwell is an associate professor in the Graduate School of Educa-

tion at George Mason University. He has a Ph.D. in anthropology from the
University of Chicago and has published work on qualitative and mixed-
method research, sociocultural theory, and medical education. He is currently
working on a book on critical realism as a stance for qualitative research.

Downloaded from qix.sagepub.com at Bobst Library, New York University on May 25, 2015