A classification of the philosophical assumptions of management science methods

Abstract

This paper presents a framework within which to examine and compare the main philosophical assumptions underpinning management science methods. It takes the position that they all have in common the basic mechanism of modelling, but that they differ in terms of what they model (ontology), how they model (epistemology), and why they model (axiology). A wide range of both hard and soft methods and methodologies ace categorised within the paper. One of the purposes of the framework is to assist in the process of multimethodology—that is, combining together several methods in an intervention. In particular, it will assist users in understanding both the implicit or explicit assumptions underlying methods, and their principle aims and purposes, in order to be able to make more informed and critically aware choices when designing particular combinations in practice.

Keywords:

• critical OR/systems
• hard OR/systems
• methodology
• multimethodology
• paradigm
• pluralism
• soft OR/systems

Acknowledgements

I thank the referees for their very useful comments.

Notes

1 * This part of the research was assisted by Hariklia Tsoukia as part of her MSc project. It has also been seen by the originators of the methods where that was possible and their comments have been taken into account, although responsibility for the precise wording in the table rests with the author. I thank Russ Ackoff, Peter Bennett, Colin Eden, John Friend, Werner Ulrich.