40 MEANING AND METHODOLOGY
The revised conception of science advanced by presupposition theorists suggests that attempts
to divide the world into ontologically distinct categories of “facts” and “values,” or into dichoto-
mous realms of the “empirical” and the “normative,” are fundamentally flawed (Hawkesworth
1988). Such attempts fail to grasp the implications of the theoretical constitution of all knowledge
and the theoretical mediation of the empirical realm. They fail to come to grips with the valuative
character of all presuppositions and the consequent valuative component of all empirical propo-
sitions. The theoretically mediated world is one in which description, explanation, and evaluation
are inextricably linked. Any attempt to impose a dichotomous relation upon such inseparable
processes constitutes a fallacy of false alternatives, which is as distorting as it is logically unten-
able. For the suggestion that “pure” facts can be isolated and analyzed free of all valuation masks
the theoretical constitution of facticity and denies the cognitive processes through which knowl-
edge of the empirical realm is generated. Moreover, the dichotomous schism of the world into
“facts” and “values” endorses an erroneous and excessively limiting conception of human rea-
son, a conception that fails to comprehend the role of practical rationality in scientific delibera-
tion and that fails to recognize that science is simply one manifestation of the use of practical
reason in human life. Informed by flawed assumptions, the positivist conception of reason fails to
understand that phronesis is operative in philosophical analysis, ethical deliberation, normative
argument, political decisions, and the practical choices of daily life as well as in scientific analy-
sis. Moreover, in stipulating that reason can operate only in a naively simple, “value-free,” em-
pirical realm, the positivist presuppositions that inform the fact/value dichotomy render reason
impotent and thereby preclude the possibility that rational solutions might exist for the most
pressing problems of the contemporary age.
Although the arguments that have discredited positivism are well known to philosophers, they
have had far too little impact in the discipline of political science. This is especially unfortunate
because the critique of positivism has wide-ranging implications for that field of study. The
postpositivist conception of knowledge suggests that theoretical assumptions have a pervasive
influence upon the understanding of the political world, accrediting contentious definitions of
politics, and validating particular variables while invalidating others. Moreover, positivist as-
sumptions mask the controversial character of evidence adduced and the contestability of accred-
ited strategies of explanation. Thus the postpositivist conception of science opens new areas of
investigation concerning disciplinary presuppositions and practices: What are the most funda-
mental presuppositions of political science? What limitations have been imposed upon the consti-
tution of knowledge within political science? By what disciplinary mechanisms has facticity been
accredited and rendered unproblematic? How adequate are the standards of evidence, modes of
analysis, and strategies of explanation privileged by the dominant tradition? Have methodologi-
cal precepts subtly circumscribed contemporary politics?
Questions such as these focus attention upon the political implications of determinate modes
of inquiry. The politics of knowledge emerges as a legitimate focus of analysis, for the analytic
techniques developed in particular cognitive traditions may have political consequences that posi-
tivist precepts render invisible. In circumscribing the subject matter appropriate to “science,”
restricting the activities acceptable as “empirical inquiry,” establishing the norms for assessing
the results of inquiry, identifying the basic principles of practice, and validating the ethos of
practitioners, methodological strictures may sustain particular modes of political life. For this
reason, the positivist myth of methodological neutrality should be supplanted by an understand-
ing of methodology as “mind engaged in the legitimation of its own political activity” (Wolin
1981, 406). Such a revised conception of methodology would enable and require political scien-
tists to examine the complex relations among various conceptions of politics, various techniques