“Unfortunately,
the belief that every theory must have its empirical support (and vice versa)
now constrains the kinds of social science projects that are undertaken, alters
the trajectory of academic careers and drives graduate training. Rather than attempt
to imitate the hard sciences, social scientists would be better off doing what
they do best: thinking deeply about what prompts human beings to behave the way
they do.”
While a valuable
scholarly work should offer – in my opinion – a theoretical contribution or at
least discuss the theoretical implications of its findings, I tend to agree
with the above statement, which concludes Clarke and Primo’s article in the New
York Times. When reading social science articles, I sometimes feel that the
link that they make between their findings and established theoretical frames
is not convincing enough and was mainly intended to please reviewers. Rather
than focusing on their important and interesting findings and trying to explain
what do they actually mean, the authors overextend their work by using big
words, such as “Framing” and “Agenda Setting”, which are not necessarily
relevant to what they did.
After I, for
example, conducted a study regarding the relationship between the consumption
and discussion of online news, I offered theoretical contributions, including a
new perspective on a controversy in the literature regarding audience news
preferences. However, one of the reviewers suggested that I use the “Uses and
Gratifications” theory. I did not think it was relevant, tried to explain why
not, and after other revisions – the paper was accepted for publication.
On the other hand,
as Clarke and Primo asserted, theoretical models can be of great value even if
they are never supported by empirical testing. Anthony Downs’ “economic theory
of democracy” and Kenneth Arrow’s “impossibility theorem”, which were described
by the authors, are compelling examples in my view. If a scholar can offer
theoretical models that may help me understand the complicated reality, I will
be happy to know about them, regardless of empirical data.
I think that the
quality of a scholarly work should not be based on the number of citations. “Is
it really wise to base tenure and promotion upon journal articles that are
never cited?” Newton and Roberts posted on Knight Blog. “It’s difficult to
imagine working journalists promoted for writing stories no one ever mentioned.”
While it is disappointing that many articles are never cited, my answer to the
above question is yes. If a quality journal decides to publish a scholar’s
work, it usually means that this work was subjected to a rigorous review and
has something important to offer. So the scholar deserves credit for that.
Right, it’s difficult to imagine working journalists promoted for writing
stories no one ever mentioned, but the academia is not a news organization.
As Robert Jensen,
I would like to see more scholars asking important questions about how systems
of power work. But as he acknowledged, it is easier to criticize when you have
tenure. So criticizing colleagues who are trying to get tenure for investing
time in building status in academic cliques rather than helping to save the
world is not entirely fair. “America is burning,” Jensen wrote, “and professors
have a choice to fiddle or fight.” I favor fighting, but sometimes one needs to
fiddle until being able to fight.
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