Opinions: Business History and Anthropology

Abstract

No available abstract

Lovely and likely: Using historical methods to improve inference to the best explanation in strategy

“…Importantly, and similarly to hermeneutics, contextualization limits risks arising from the researcher projecting their own biases about a context onto a research setting and those biases potentially influencing their interpretations of the particular settings under study (Wadhwani & Hansen, 2014). Suddaby et al (2020) note an affirmative case where contextualization may have challenged biases: Both the presentations of "disruptive technology" (Christensen & Bower, 1996) and "technological discontinuities" (Foster, 1986) rely on a premise that "risks of change today are somehow more profound than in the past (p.…”

“…Importantly, and similarly to hermeneutics, contextualization limits risks arising from the researcher projecting their own biases about a context onto a research setting and those biases potentially influencing their interpretations of the particular settings under study (Wadhwani & Hansen, 2014). Suddaby et al (2020) note an affirmative case where contextualization may have challenged biases: Both the presentations of “disruptive technology” (Christensen & Bower, 1996) and “technological discontinuities” (Foster, 1986) rely on a premise that “risks of change today are somehow more profound than in the past (p. 541).” Rather, write Suddaby et al (2020, p. 541): “What is increasing, Lepore (2014) and others (Fox, 2014) conclude, is the rhetoric used to create the perception that we are in an era of unmitigated change.” Thus, Suddaby et al report how Lepore challenged Christensen's and Foster's parsimonious and generalizable explanations by suggesting that the contextualization used to support these explanations lacked consilience with historical observations.…”