Action Research:Exploring Perspectives on a Philosophy of Practical Knowing

摘要

In the context of management and organization studies, the potential of action research for generating robust actionable knowledge has not been yet realized. While there are historical reasons for this with roots in different philosophies of social science, there are areas of common ground that may be explored fruitfully. This paper works from the insight that there are two key perspectives on action research: one from inside the action research community and one from outside. It explores how action research is a form of science in the realm of practical knowing and that this perspective provides an insight into how the views of action research from inside and from outside may be engaged. It proposes a general empirical method and the notion of interiority, based on the operations of human knowing, with a focus on how we know, rather than on what we know, as a synthesis, whereby the two perspectives on action research may be engaged.