THE MEANINGS OF METHODOLOGYinvolvement. People create society and society cre-
ates people, who in turn create society in a contin-
uous process.^20 Thus, human beings exist within an
ongoing relational process.
CSS notes that humans can be misled and have
unrealized potential. One important way this hap-
pens is through reification, which occurs when we
become detached from and lose sight of our con-
nection or relationship to something that we created
ourselves. By severing connections to our own cre-
ations, we no longer recognize ourselves in them
but treat them as being alien, external forces that
have control over us. By “forgetting” and not see-
ing connections, we lose control over our creations.
Humans have tremendous potential that often goes
unrealized because we find breaking free from be-
liefs, conditions, and situations largely of our own
making difficult. To realize their full potential,
people must look beyond immediate surface ap-
pearance and break through what they reified to see
how they possess the capacity to change situations.
- What is the view on human agency (free
will, volition, and rationality)?
CSS blends determinism and voluntarism to
emphasize bounded autonomy, or how agency and
structure cooperate. Bounded autonomy suggests
that free will, choices, and decision making are not
unlimited or open ended; rather, they either must
stay within restricted boundaries of options or are
confined within limits, which can be cultural or
material boundaries. A CSS researcher identifies a
range of options, or at least what people see as being
realistic alternatives, and allows for some volition
among those options. People make choices, but the
choices are confined to what they believe is pos-
sible. Material factors (e.g., natural resources, phys-
ical abilities) and cultural-subjective schemes (e.g.,
beliefs, core values, deeply felt norms) set what
people believe to be possible or impossible, and
people act based on what they believe is possible.
Sewell (1992) observed that social structures are
simultaneously cultural and material. What a person
sees, thinks, or feels (i.e., culture) shapes a person’s
action in the material world. Material objects, condi-
tions, and resources depend on the cultural schemas.
Researchers recognized that “so-called hard data
were themselves cultural products that required
interpretation” (Sewell, 2005:190). If a person’s
worldview defines an action as being impossible, a
material resource as being unavailable, or a choice as
being blocked, his or her “free will” choices are lim-
ited. If for reasons of culture a person does not see an
insect as a source of food or having three wives si-
multaneously as morally possible, cultural beliefs re-
strict the use of material resources and make some
actions impossible. Material and subjective-cultural
factors interact. Cultural-subjective beliefs that de-
fine material resources as available restrict volition,
and material conditions can shape people’s cultural-
subjective experiences and beliefs. Under certain
conditions, collective human actions can alter deep
structures of the material conditions and cultural be-
liefs, and this can expand the range of volition.5.What is the relationship between science
and common sense?
CSS sees common sense as containing false
consciousness: the idea that people are often mis-
taken and act against their own true best interests
as defined in objective reality. Objective reality lies
behind myth and illusion. False consciousness is
meaningless for ISS because it implies that a social
actor uses a meaning system that is false or out of
touch with objective reality. ISS states that people
create and use such systems and that researchers can
only describe such systems, not judge their value.
CSS states that social researchers should study sub-
jective ideas and common sense because these
shape human behavior, yet they contain myth and
illusion that can mask an objective world in which
there is unequal control over resources and power.
The structures that critical researchers talk
about are not easy to see. Researchers must firstReification An idea used in critical social science re-
ferring to when people become detached from and
lose sight of their connection to their own creations and
treat them as being alien, external forces.
Bounded autonomy An approach to human
agency and causality used in critical social science that
assumes human action is based on subjective choices
and reasons but only within identifiable limits.
False consciousness An idea used by critical social
science that people often have false or misleading ideas
about empirical conditions and their true interests.