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‘Learning from’ in Religious Education, as a mode of moving towards interdenominational and interfaith learning, has a long and fruitful history. However, It has been criticised for being overly subjective as it mainly encourages learning about oneself. Though this has value, it needs to address better the need to understand rather than simply use the religious tradition that is being studied. It raises the question of the objectivity of ‘Learning from’ religions. It is argued that interpreting the correctness of one’s understanding of a text entails more than ‘learning about’ a religious tradition. It should also include a process of self-reflection to enable a judgement of one’s accuracy in comprehending the text’s grammar as well as its underlying more universal truth. This calls for a movement towards what the philosopher-theologian, Bernard Lonergan, named intellectual conversion, a personal appreciation of what true knowledge entails. It is thus contended that ‘Learning from’ religions needs not only awareness of one’s ‘signals of transcendence’ but also of how they can be developed, in light of what is being presented, leading to an informed and wise choice of worldviews about how one is to live, which is an admirable goal of Religious Education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: PrEP, a highly effective HIV prevention measure, provides autonomy to individuals in managing their HIV acquisition vulnerability. Despite its availability in tenofovir-based oral pills and injectable cabotegravir formulations, PrEP uptake among Black cisgender women in the U.S. South, a region with a high HIV burden, remains critically low. This demographic faces a disproportionately high rate of new HIV diagnoses, yet fewer than 10% of women in the US who could benefit from PrEP are currently receiving it. Methods: Utilizing a critical realism interpretative framework, this narrative review employed a tri-level analysis strategy to examine the empirical, actual, and real domains influencing PrEP implementation among Black women in the Southern U.S. The empirical level refers to observable events and data (e.g., PrEP uptake rates), the actual level encompasses experiences and actions that may not always be directly observed (e.g., healthcare interactions and community engagement), and the real level involves the deeper structures and mechanisms (e.g., systemic racism and cultural narratives) that shape these outcomes. A comprehensive search of peer-reviewed literature from PubMed and other sources was conducted to identify barriers and facilitators to PrEP uptake in this population. Results: The analysis revealed significant barriers, including structural violence, socioeconomic disparities, medical mistrust, stigma, and inadequate healthcare policies. Empirical data showed variability in PrEP awareness and interest among Black women, while actual experiences highlighted misaligned marketing strategies, financial constraints, and interpersonal dynamics. At the real level, underlying mechanisms such as systemic racism and cultural narratives were identified as critical impediments to PrEP uptake. Discussion: Addressing these multifaceted barriers requires a comprehensive, multi-level approach that integrates personalized, community-centric strategies. Emphasizing the need for healthcare providers, community leaders, researchers, and policymakers to collaborate, the review proposes actionable strategies to enhance PrEP implementation, focusing on education, structural reforms, and policy changes to improve access and acceptability among Black women in the South. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The proliferation of policy notwithstanding, climate emergency continues to unfold and the need for new ideas is urgent. In this short article, I contextualize the need for 'revolutions for life' and set out some of the key ideas from Hosseini and Gills' recent book Capital redefined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In acknowledging psychotherapy as a space oriented toward philosophical exploration, this article embraces Schmid's challenge for person-centered psychotherapists to develop philosophy more congruent with the practice of the person-centered approach. Inspired by practitioners from other approaches, the author challenges the dominant interpretive-phenomenological foundations of recent person-centered conceptual developments, tentatively arguing the case for a critical realism as an alternate onto-epistemic framing for person-centered psychotherapy. The author acknowledges weaknesses of interpretive phenomenology in relation to the person-centered approach, particularly the challenges it presents for dialogue, development and decision-making in terms of theory, research and practice. These challenges are highlighted in reference to Rogers' conceptualization of a 'New Integration' of science and experience put forth in On Becoming a Person. An abridged explanation of critical realism is offered before considering critical realism's application to the person-centered approach. The author demonstrates critical realism's use in formulating congruence theoretically, providing robust frameworks for research that can generate knowledge without assuming the role of expert, allowing critical reflexivity on socio-cultural contexts of theory, and offering holding, developmental frameworks for practitioners and trainees. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Digital platforms such as Spotify have specific characteristics and properties that influence, to some extent, how the platform is used. However, users develop their own interpretations of these properties as well as unique ways to engage with the platform. This study applies a critical realist framework to explore how reflexivity modes are practiced in the context of Spotify as an example of algorithmic recommendation systems. From this perspective, reflexivity is a person's capacity to reflect on their contexts, data, previous experiences, and knowledge, among other elements, before deciding how to act. Findings from interviews with Spotify users suggest that participants practice multiple reflexivity modes when interpreting Spotify's recommendations and deciding what to listen to. These modes depend on each participant's concerns and algorithmic knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT Much of Charles S. Peirce's philosophy hinges on his “universal categories” of Firstness (qualities, potentialities), Secondness (action, otherness) and Thirdness (relationship, rule‐boundedness). Despite their abstractness, the categories have concrete applications and shed light on several critical realist theories, such as its ontological domains, its social ontology and its more nascent semiotics. Using Peirce's categories this way requires building on his effectively non‐deterministic materialist arguments and extricating his ontology from his better‐known phenomenology. Peirce's universal categories, which are stratified and emergent, unearth a systematic pattern unifying critical realist ontologies and address certain problems elsewhere in critical realist philosophy. Most significantly, Peirce's semiotics provides critical realism with the mechanism connecting epistemology to ontology and grounds a case for reconceptualizing critical realism's empirical domain as the semiosic domain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critical realism refers to a broad project to realize a post-positivist social science. At its best, it responds to the challenges thrown down by social constructionist critiques of positivist science, while also allowing us to make interrogable claims about reality—a priority for many working to expose and eradicate structural oppression. In the social sciences, interviews remain one of the foremost methods through which researchers generate data to inform our understanding of reality. In this article, however, we argue that for critical realism to deliver on its promise as a philosophy of science for critical social scientists, we need theoretically sound guidance on what a critical realist approach to research interviewing might look like. Currently, this guidance is lacking. Through a systematic analysis of prominent qualitative research interviewing textbooks, we found that critical realism is ignored, mischaracterized, and underdeveloped. In response, we offer five principles, rooted in critical realism's key tenets, that can guide researchers as they design, conduct, and evaluate critical realist interview studies. These principles are: (1) craft interview protocols to generate data that can inform answers to ontological research questions; (2) keep in view the interview as social practice throughout the study; (3) treat interview data as both interactively achieved co-constructions and as verifiable evidence for real phenomena; (4) be guided and informed by an aim to reduce suffering and promote social justice; and (5) demonstrate reflexivity as ongoing self-awareness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Against the backdrop of the rise in child migrants across the world, this study advances understanding of the transformative potential of centralizing children's stories and experiences through multi-sensory materials, producing accessible and creative ways to disrupt, counter, and draw critical attention to the impact and legacy of displacement. Focusing on two controversial historic migration/refugee schemes, Kindertransport and Windrush, this study integrates haptics with vision and audition, presenting contemporary children as co-producers/researchers, experts and "experiencers", with former children's objects, stories, memories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historical institutionalism has fruitfully moved beyond its initial focus on institutional effects to incorporate change. I argue, however, that the resulting advances have become misaligned with their conceptual bases. "Institutions as rules" was a useful first approximation, but it cannot accommodate changes in institutionalized practices occurring while sources of law remain the same. I propose reconceiving legal rules (material objects) and institutions (behavioral dispositions) as distinct elements that nonetheless remain fundamentally associated through the belief-shaping actions of specific groups. While rules change with the introduction of officially recognized materials, legal institutions change in response to new beliefs regarding what could pass as officially permissible. Far from a mere exercise in conceptual precision, the proposals draw distinctions that matter for description and explanation. In that regard, I show how the current literature mischaracterizes court-led change and how we might advance on the underexplored issue of collective meaning-making amidst unequal legal expertise. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Current discussions surrounding organizational sociology theories indicate a state of stagnation. This paper aims to invigorate theoretical innovation by drawing on contemporary social theories, particularly employing a critical realist perspective. Focused on addressing the theoretical convergence between organizational and collective action sociologies, as identified by Friedberg, the paper reinterprets his concept of organized collective action through the critical realist collective subjectivities theory, as proposed by Vandenberghe. The objective is to generate an original Critical Realist Model for Organizational Sociology. This initiative stems from critical realism's critique of flat ontologies and epistemologies that tend to conflate different objects of reality. The proposed model takes the form of a trialectic generative sequence, highlighting driven objects configured in a specific ontological situation as the necessary, but not sufficient, condition for the emergence of organizations. This sequence includes (a) time-space co-presence and the embodiment process; (b) symbolic community sharing and the identification process; and (c) power dynamics and the processes of representation, delegation, and subordination. This model positions collective organized action as a fundamental intermediary concept for understanding organizations and collective action within a realistic social theory. It indirectly contributes to addressing the broader debate on agency and structure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article enriches discussions about the metaphysics of normative facts with conceptual resources from social ontology that metaethics has neglected so far: the resources of Haslanger's critical realism as social constructionism. By pointing out the viability of understanding reasons as socially constructed facts, the article shows how normative facts can be understood as features of mind-independent reality that are, however, not features of the universe independently of social practices. The move into social ontology allows us to understand normative facts as mind-independent in a more substantial sense than deflationists do, by stressing individual mind-independence, while denying collective mind-independence – the subsistence independently of established human cultures. The new position can fruitfully mediate between realism, error theory and constructivism. Finally, the metaphysical nuances provided by social ontology pave the way for novel approaches to normative change and progress – thereby indicating pathways to normative theorising that many traditional metaethical positions lack. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Plantations are not inherently normal, yet they have been normalized within traditional agricultural landscapes. This is the premise through which we explore why plantations thrive despite numerous social and ecological drawbacks. Accordingly, the aim of this paper is to present a framework to elucidate why Hass avocado plantations succeed, using Salamina, Colombia as a case study. We argue that these plantations prosper through a process of normalization, driven by the dynamic interplay between social structures and human agency in agriculture. Our theoretical framework regarding normalization unfolds in three stages: prescription, implementation embeddedness, and integration. To reach this outcome, we first build a theoretical foundation based on realist social theory and subsequently conduct a primarily qualitative case study, focusing on neighboring respondents to plantations for understanding the process of introduction, development, and persistence of these plantations in the landscape. Additionally, we consider supplementary interviews and secondary information to understand the context of Hass avocado expansion. We found that while normalization may appear to involve passive conformity, our analysis highlights the critical role of human agency. As our study demonstrates, agency fosters reflection and sustains various forms of resistance and counterbalance against systemic pressures. This recognition underscores the potential for proactive engagement and transformative action within agricultural systems, challenging and reshaping the prevailing norms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we first set out what complexity theory is and its place in economics. We then discuss whether complexity economics has observably transformed the mainstream before asking, even if complexity economics did in fact succeed in changing the mainstream, would this make the mainstream significantly different? The purpose of the article is to establish that complexity economics is different than the previously existing mainstream but, drawing on critical realism and social ontology, not as different as one might think. We conclude by suggesting there is scope for a more ontologically nuanced understanding of complexity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a concept, agency stretches from philosophical and meta-theoretical elaborations to studies documenting largely idiosyncratic happenings in a particular empirical context, which could be dismissed as anecdotal. In between, and the source for the recent revival of scholarly interest, lies the promise to explain transformation processes, multiplex governance, and varieties in wellbeing and development pathways, which are needed in a world overshadowed by crises. Have studies on agency and structure lived up to the promise? Only partly, we argue and suggest that we need to develop a common ontological commitment as well as adequate mid-range theories and methods coherent with such a commitment. We suggest critical realism as the backbone of such a common ontological commitment and discuss potential ways forward for a social science research programme with emancipatory potential, this is to say to contribute to our capabilities to make a difference in the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Are the many crises of higher education real, or are they in the eye of the beholder? They are evidently something of both: The crises to which we are characteristically alerted are manifestations in the real of the world and indicate much about our scholars' perceptions and even their values. To say this, however, invites the question: can we sort the wheat from the chaff? Might there be a way of validating any effort to identify a crisis that lies in the world, independently of claims made about it? There is straightaway a fundamental difficulty after all; namely, that the very concept of crisis is fact and value, both pointing to a phenomenon in the world and making a judgement about it. It seems then that, in the language of crisis, we may be conflating ontology with epistemology and ethics. When we hear talk of crisis, we may be being told more about the claim‐maker than the feature of the world that is in question. However, I suggest that, if we deploy the artifice of ecosystem, and so adopt an ecological approach to the matter, we can move on two planes at once: We can point to phenomena of crises in higher education that are in the world and that also warrant our evaluative judgements of them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This teaching tool is based on Savera (Dawn), a left-wing literary periodical published quarterly on the Indian subcontinent from 1946 onward under the leadership of the Progressive Writers' Movement. The tool foregrounds the genealogy of "critical realism," a revolutionary form of Urdu realism that perpetuated the movement's aim of bringing about social transformation in a former colony by critiquing India's indigenous conceptions of class, gender, nationalism, language, and religion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The forms and manifestations of power have varied from one era to another. Military power dominated in the agricultural society era, while economic power began to grow, becoming the most prominent form of power during the transition to industrial society. With the information age, soft power -represented by culture, values, and ideology - has become one of the most important elements of power in international relations, alongside military and economic power. This study examines theoretical trends in interpreting soft power in international relations and its impact on the international system, where interpretations have varied among realism, liberalism, critical theories, and other perspectives that provide multiple explanations of soft power, despite differences in how the concept is approached from one perspective to another. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The commentaries provided by Haig; Derksen and Morawski; and Trafimow vary considerably in how they address critical realism and its implications for replication. Haig's preference for Kaidesoja's "naturalised" version of critical realism and Lipton's inference to the best explanation is deeply problematic. While Derksen and Morawski concede that they deal only indirectly with critical realism, their endorsement of "performativity" negates it. In Trafimow's case, ontology's regulative role is untenably diminished and ultimately supplanted by classic methodologism. I conclude that replication should be replaced by exploratory stratified contextualism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our comment on Archer's enticing article focuses on his extension of Bhaskar's philosophy to psychology, and on direct replication, which the author says is of very limited use in psychology. We only deal with critical realism indirectly. Our arguments boil down to two points: experiments can usefully be seen as performative (and the same goes for research in general), and replication is not problematic in psychology because of the variability of results, but useful for precisely that reason. Replication studies may even inspire psychologists to accept a wider range of epistemic approaches, although there are reasons to be pessimistic about the likelihood of fundamental change in the discipline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Robert Archer argues that psychology should abandon its use of Karl Popper's philosophy of science. He recommends that psychology ought to adopt the philosophy of critical realism in its place. I put Archer's concern with Popper to one side and provide a selective critique of mainstream critical realism, in the light of some developments in contemporary philosophy of science. I express some misgivings about the ontological commitments of Roy Bhaskar's critical realism, and comment on the limitations of his DREI(C) model of scientific inquiry. In doing so, I also respond to a number of critical remarks Archer makes about replication in psychology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent so-called crisis of replication continues to dominate psychology's methodological landscape. It is argued here that the apparent renaissance of Popperian thinking that characterises some of the key responses to the crisis of replication is fundamentally flawed. In essence, there is a serious lack of any sustained and rigorous treatment of ontology that underpins much of the current debate about replication and Popper's falsificationist approach. The overriding problem is that the replication debate reflects the methodologist tendency for mainstream psychologists to avoid or gloss over crucial ontological questions. In contradistinction, this article (a) underscores the primacy of ontology; (b) delineates and applies a critical realist stratified ontology to psychology; (c) utilises the latter as a springboard from which to argue for Popper's methodological "retirement"; and (d) revindicates the indispensability of context and the subtlety of psychological phenomena in arguing for the intrinsic limits of replication and experimentalism in general. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Homeless families include children whose experiences of homelessness and extreme poverty can have long-term negative impacts over the life course. This paper proposes a resource-orientated causal explanation of the mechanisms of family homelessness in Australia. Given the critical role of poverty in housing insecurity, the model explains why some families living in extreme poverty and disadvantage become homeless and others do not. The research is positioned within a critical realist approach to theoretical causal explanation. It is influenced by interdisciplinary literature and psychologist Hobfoll's Conservation of Resources theory. Previously published empirical analysis informs and supports the development of this theoretical model. Families use their resources to mitigate challenges to their housing security. However, disadvantage limits their accumulation of resources, contributes to accelerating resource loss, and constrains their capacity to act. An acute lack of affordable housing and insufficient welfare payments to secure private rental accommodation severely impacts a family's capacity to navigate crises and avoid homelessness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The emergence of a 'cyber-physical world', defined as the profound entrenchment of physical and digital processes, has revolutionised modalities of production and consumption of products and services, radically changing the landscape for individuals, firms and organisations. Embracing this paradigmatic change requires a creative leap as the behaviour of agents, aggregated structures and their relationships have been completely reshaped. Up-to-date innovation policies suffer from cognitive rigidities that impede escape from traditional instruments and concepts. With this paper, we aim to fill this gap, conceptualising the disruptive emergence of the cyber-physical world and its impact on innovation policies. We use a two-step methodology based on the critical realist approach. The first step concerns the application of the explanatory model of social science to infer the causes, properties and consequences of the cyber-physical world. The second step exploits the results of the first as a departure point, using congruence analysis to demonstrate mismatches between existing innovation policy frameworks and the emergent cyber-physical world, and to propose new driving principles to reframe theoretical, methodological and strategic elements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a critical realist reflection on methodological decisions that frame examination of the effectiveness of destination branding using food and cuisine. The authors use a multi-method strategy to evaluate the degree of congruence amongst (1) destination marketers' promotional food images, (2) internal stakeholders' perception of images, and (3) tourists' views of food destinations. Results reveal that critical realism enhances the capacity to explore the less observable forces influencing food image across diverse stakeholder groups and builds a more coherent attribute-based framework to measure gaps in perception. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Corpus linguistics, with its methodological orientation towards the empirical analysis of language based on large text collections, has the potential to offer significant tools for addressing real-world problems across various social science domains, including climate change, criminology, healthcare and policy making. Despite this potential, the integration of corpus linguistics into social science disciplines (beyond linguistics) remains hampered by fundamental differences in epistemology, definitions and methodological approaches. This article explores the relationship between corpus linguistics and the social sciences. It is argued that epistemology, or the theory of knowledge, represents a primary barrier to integration, with much corpus linguistics research aligning with positivist and naturalist epistemologies. By contrast, many social science disciplines embrace more interpretive, conventionalist approaches that account for the dynamic nature of social phenomena. Considering the role of naturalism and conventionalism within both corpus linguistics and the social sciences, this article illustrates how these epistemological stances are likely to influence the acceptance and use of corpus methods in social science research. Despite the challenges, areas of convergence (e.g. shared use of data processing tools and the acknowledgement of the central role of language in social processes) provide opportunities for cross-disciplinary collaboration. As means to bridge the epistemological divide, this article advocates for a critical realist approach and concludes by calling on users of corpus linguistic methods to be reflexive and transparent about their epistemological stances when reporting their research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: We present configurational theorising as a novel approach to developing middle-range theory in two steps: (1) we illustrate configurational theorising as a new form of supply chain inquiry by connecting its philosophical assumptions with a methodological execution, and (2) we generate new insights underpinning a middle-range theory for supply chain resilience. Design/methodology/approach: We synthesise information from a range of sources and invoke 'critical realism" to suggest a five-phase configurational theorising roadmap to develop middle-range theory. We demonstrate this roadmap to explain supply chain resilience by analysing qualitative data from 22 organisations within the Australian food supply chain. Findings: Coopetition and supply chain collaboration are necessary causal conditions, but they need to combine with either supply chain agility or multi-sourcing strategy to build supply chain resilience. Asymmetrical analyses showed that the simultaneous absence of supply chain collaboration, supply chain agility and multi-sourcing results in low supply chain resilience, but coopetition was indifferent to low supply chain resilience. Similarly, high supply chain resilience is possible with the non-presence of supply chain agility and multi-sourcing. Research limitations/implications: The configurational middle-range theorising roadmap presented and empirically tested in this paper constitutes a substantial advancement to both theory and the methodological domain. Originality/value: This is the first attempt at developing a middle-range theory for supply chains by explicitly drawing on configurational theorising. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the past few decades, social sciences and humanities has been involved in numerous methodological and theoretical debates that is described as the paradigms war between positivists, interpretativists and critics. In the 1970s or theoretical turn period, first constructivist interpretive and critical approaches emerged then hybrid approaches entered into this field. Critical realism is a modern approach that tries to combine paradigms and make a new definition of reality, knowledge, values, and research. This paper intends to overview the three dominant paradigms in social sciences and humanities in order to analyse methodological and theoretical innovations of critical realism.

School autonomy with accountability (SAWA) reforms have developed in diverse forms in Northern Europe. Following processes of decentralization to the municipal and school levels, quality assurance and inspection became key to the test-based accountability agendas of Denmark and England respectively. With an abductive approach, we explore the epistemological potential of a hybrid theoretical framework, which combines assemblage theory with critical realism, to analyze the production stories of these two policy instruments. Drawing on data from an international comparative research project, and more recent policy document analyses, we examine the arrangement of social entities – discourses, instruments, technologies, artefacts, and actors – that led to particular accountability outcomes within these specific educational assemblages. We argue that, despite distinctions in their social entities, the dominant state assemblages of accountability in Denmark and England have been captured by the global SAWA and capitalist assemblages at distinct times. Although school actors are incorporated into, and antagonistic towards, the state assemblages, change is limited due to the resilience of the underlying logic of epistemic governance and the desire to improve educational standards for a global knowledge economy. We conclude briefly with an assessment of the utility of the hybrid framework to the comparison of SAWA.

AbstractThis article argues that the GeoCapabilities project should be rethought using the philosophy of critical realism. This would resolve issues that some of the project’s main actors regard as outstanding and shed new light on capabilities that are best met in a degrowth society where all actors fulfil their roles as sustainable global citizens. Doughnut economics and the foundational economy offer bridges to degrowth while new insights into the dimensions of sustainable global citizenship offer new pedagogical approaches to global citizenship education that complement those based on agonistic pedagogy. In conclusion the article suggests that the key priority for such education, whether delivered via geography, environmental education, or otherwise, is that it is founded on a critically realist philosophy of knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This special issue was based on a flagship panel of the 2022 International Association for Critical Realism (IACR) annual conference held at the Institute of Social Studies (ISS) in The Hague on realist complexity. The aim of this special issue is to capture and specify what Critical Realism (CR) can contribute to the literature on complexity. Against the background of previous attempts that have subsequently coalesced the two under the rubric of 'Complex Realism', the primary objective here takes stock of the various analytical shortcomings of 'Complex Realism' and aims instead to understand how CR scholars analytically treat complexity. Put differently, the contributors of this special issue problematize the amalgam between CR and complexity evident in 'Complex Realism' and ask instead how CR deals with complexity (Realist Complexity). In so doing, they present a variety of arguments and approaches which will be dealt with below. The next section will provide a short background on the origins of complexity sciences before it highlights both the tents and shortcoming of Complex Realism. The final section will provide a summary of all key contributors of this special issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As Petter Naess observes, some specifically prominent voices within CR have expressly denied our ability to predict much in the social domain while others express great caution about endorsing any such ability. In print, Naess has been the most prominent CR voice defending predictability, but there are others of us critical realists who share Naess's view. The purpose of this paper is to further defend the view that critical realists have no special problem with predicting events. We just do not grant prediction the same status that positivists do. The argument here is parallel to Porpora's that critical realists can and do run regressions but without granting them the same explanatory status as positivism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents an alternative general model of democracy to traditional minimalist (electoral and liberal) and deliberative theories by drawing from critical realist philosophical thought. Realist or real democracy is proposed as a societal system where preconditions exist to fully empower all citizens to realize their individual capabilities. This includes empowerment opportunities at the ballot box - but also other preconditions such as health, educational and living standards. Real democracy also separates democratic preconditions from democratic outcomes. Democratic outcomes require the absence of inequalities in power as result from the contingent interaction preconditions and human agency. The new approach is argued to provide a more holistic and dynamic concept of democracy which is also more grounded in the everyday experience of the citizen compared to traditional approaches. It reconnects democracy with theories of human development and enables a new classification of political regimes and conception of democratic politics. An initial empirical mapping of patterns of global real democracy shows evidence of rising preconditions since 1990 – but stagnation since 2010 and some signs of decline. Democratic outcomes by socio-economic position saw the most notable decline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the possibilities and limitations of Roy Bhaskar’s critical realism on the problem of structure and agency. Bhaskar’s realist perspective on the problem starts from discussions in the philosophy of science and extends to social theory. In this regard, Bhaskar, building upon the layered reality concept in the philosophy of science, attempted to construct a naturalistic social theory, starting with the concept of ontological stratification and continuing with the theory of causal powers, reinforced by discussions of emergentism. Through this conceptual framework, he offered an explanation beyond the reductionist and synthesist approaches around the mentioned debate. On the other hand, the criticisms of Bhaskar’s naturalistic perspective, especially by contemporary representatives of the critical realist tradition through cognitive neuroscience, have shown the limitations of Bhaskar’s naturalistic view. The article discusses these criticisms and then lays out the grounds for both Bhaskar and his critics. Finally, the similarities between the seemingly conflicting approaches, the sources of these similarities, and the questions they fail to answer are addressed. In addition, it has been argued that the theoretical diversity on the structure-agency problem around these questions is merely an expansion within critical realism itself, and that a paradigmatic solution to the problem could not be produced. For a paradigmatic solution, it is argued that new theoretical considerations based on human nature and human singularity/subjective experience are essential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

School autonomy with accountability (SAWA) reforms have developed in diverse forms in Northern Europe. Following processes of decentralization to the municipal and school levels, quality assurance and inspection became key to the test-based accountability agendas of Denmark and England respectively. With an abductive approach, we explore the epistemological potential of a hybrid theoretical framework, which combines assemblage theory with critical realism, to analyze the production stories of these two policy instruments. Drawing on data from an international comparative research project, and more recent policy document analyses, we examine the arrangement of social entities – discourses, instruments, technologies, artefacts, and actors – that led to particular accountability outcomes within these specific educational assemblages. We argue that, despite distinctions in their social entities, the dominant state assemblages of accountability in Denmark and England have been captured by the global SAWA and capitalist assemblages at distinct times. Although school actors are incorporated into, and antagonistic towards, the state assemblages, change is limited due to the resilience of the underlying logic of epistemic governance and the desire to improve educational standards for a global knowledge economy. We conclude briefly with an assessment of the utility of the hybrid framework to the comparison of SAWA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this research was to explore 14 elite refugee athletes' experiences of transitioning to the Canadian sports system and to examine the social contexts that enabled and constrained meaning, a psychological mechanism that facilitates adaptive cultural transitions. Framed within critical realism, arts-based conversational interviews were undertaken with the elite refugee athletes. Through a reflexive thematic analysis and Viktor Frankl's theory of meaning, four themes (feelings of hope and empowerment, environmental challenges and adaptations, despair, and social support) were created to trace the fluctuations of meaning throughout the refugee athletes' transitions into their new sports systems. The results are presented through a single polyphonic vignette to highlight and contrast the how interacting contextual factors of time within a new sport system, support, and structure of the receiving sport system, enabled athletes to find meaning within their experiences. The manuscript provides an initial immersion into elite refugee athletes' experiences which may be used by sports psychology practitioners (SPPs) to inform meaning-based interventions that encourages such athletes to connect with values present in their lives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Zimbabwean higher education was not spared by the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. To avoid on-campus infections, Zimbabwean universities, like their global peers suspended classes and asked resident students to vacate their accommodation. Academics, parents and students alike, expressed concern over the possibility of the 2020 academic year being lost. However very little, if any attention was paid to students' psychological wellbeing despite the huge potential that there was of it being negatively affected by the pandemic. Using the holistic approach to wellbeing, this study investigated Zimbabwean higher education students' psychological wellbeing during COVID-19. A mixed methods approach which employed an online questionnaire was used to gather data from 36 students enrolled at universities both in Zimbabwe and internationally. In the light of the generally negative sentiments expressed against the support which the students received and based on the holistic approach to wellbeing, we argue that the students' psychological wellbeing should have been conceptualised as a function of interrelated dimensions such as the physical, social and spiritual. The paper concludes by suggesting a conceptual framework which would not only have been useful during the COVID-19 pandemic to enhance students' resilience but one from which insights could be drawn in dealing with any future disruptions to higher education in the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Depression is a cause of disability globally and affects not only the person living with the condition, but the whole family. How people construct meaning to 'live well' and make sense of the reality of living with a person diagnosed with depression were explored through narrative inquiry and stories. The purpose of this article is to justify the use of narrative inquiry methodology to explore how people make meaning and find ways to live well and live with a family member who lives with depression. An interpretivist epistemological perspective, with the ontological principles of critical realism, and a social constructionist approach were chosen to guide the methodological framework. This was because how people construct the stories about their experiences will influence how those stories are told and what meaning is given to them. Eight people who live with a family member diagnosed with depression told their stories for this study. A realist approach to data analysis was taken, transcribed data were re-storied with redundancies removed, and member checked for accuracy. Using McCormack's and Chases' Lenses, the data revealed the strengths and challenges individuals faced when living with a family member with depression. Narrative Inquiry was an appropriate methodology to reveal how participants made sense of and constructed meaning about living well when living with a family member who lives with depression. Through the cyclical nature of depressive illness, participants navigated the fluctuations and uncertainties to find ways to live well and live with their family member. The research has the potential to adopt aspects of a family strengths-based and family systems approach into clinical practice, which would be valuable in supporting families living with depression and other mental health conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Questions and concerns about artificial intelligence (AI) technologies in education reached a fever pitch with the arrival of publicly accessible, user‐facing generative AI systems, especially ChatGPT. Many of these issues will require regulation and collective action to address. But when it comes to generative AI and literacy, we argue that posthuman perspectives can help literacy scholars and practitioners reframe some concerns into questions that open new areas of inquiry. Agential realism in particular offers a useful perspective for exploring how generative AI matters in literacy practices, not as a unilaterally destructive force, but as a set of phenomena that intra‐actively reconfigures literacy practices. As a sociocultural (and as we argue, sociotechnical) practice, literacy arises out of the entanglement of bodies, spaces, contexts, positions, histories, and technologies. Generative AI is another in a long line of technologies that reconfigures literacy practices. In this article, we briefly explain how generative AI systems work, focusing on text‐based systems called Large Language Models (LLMs), and suggest ways that generative AI may reconfigure the sociocultural practice of literacy. We then offer three provocations to shift discussions about generative AI and literacy (1) from concerns about intentionality to questions of responsibility, (2) from concerns about authenticity to questions of mattering, and (3) from concerns about imitation to questions of multifarious communication. We conclude by encouraging literacy scholars and practitioners to draw inspiration from critical literacy efforts to discover what matters when it comes to generative AI and literacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses critical realism to identify mechanisms that activate successful relationships. It draws data from a longitudinal, mixed‐methods study of youth who used multiple services. It examines functionality of four relational mechanisms: power, recognition, responsiveness and mutuality that lead to positive change and explores the implications of these for practice with youth with complex needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By reflecting on the research journey in an ethno-case study, this study attempts to identify the potential and limitations of critical realist grounded theory (CRGT) that hitherto remain unsubstantiated. My research sought to uncover how a Cambodian NGO's rights-based approach fostered people's transformative learning (TL) towards claiming their rights to development and how various structures influenced the extent of their TL. CRGT enabled the elucidation of the stratified realities, particularly land grabbing that influenced people's TL, through the abduction and retroduction processes. However, using CRGT—which treats people's meaning-making as a point of departure—and progressively focusing on the structures through the same processes led to the lack of empirical data on the structures. Therefore, I suggest some measures to overcome this issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims: To identify barriers and enablers that influence engagement in and acceptability of diabetes prevention programmes for people with pre‐diabetes. The results will provide insights for developing strategies and recommendations to improve design and delivery of diabetes prevention programmes with enhanced engagement and acceptability for people with pre‐diabetes. Methods: This review used a critical realist approach to examine context and mechanisms of diabetes prevention programmes. Medline, Embase, PsycInfo, Cinahl, Web of Science, Scopus and Pre‐Medline were searched for English language studies published between 2000 and 2023. A quality assessment was conducted using Joanna Briggs Institute critical appraisal tools. Results: A total of 90 papers met inclusion criteria. The included studies used a variety of quantitative and qualitative methodologies. Data extracted focused on barriers and enablers to engagement in and acceptability of diabetes prevention programmes, with seven key mechanisms identified. These included financial, environmental, personal, healthcare, social and cultural, demographic and programme mechanisms. Findings highlighted diverse factors that influenced engagement in preventive programmes and the importance of considering these factors when planning, developing and implementing future diabetes prevention programmes. Conclusions: Mechanisms identified in this review can inform design and development of diabetes prevention programmes for people with pre‐diabetes and provide guidance for healthcare professionals and policymakers. This will facilitate increased participation and engagement in preventive programmes, potentially reducing progression and/or incidence of pre‐diabetes to type 2 diabetes and improving health outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Older single women in Australia are increasingly experiencing homelessness. Age and gender seem inherently related to single older women's housing crises, but no attempt has been made to account for the causes of their homelessness through an intersectional lens. This article develops a complex and contingent causal explanation of the structures and mechanisms implicated in growing homelessness for this group. We demonstrate an original use of critical realist-informed intersectional analysis which is characterized by stratified social ontology and emergence. We theoretically reframe existing literature to demonstrate how the intersectional causal powers of gender and age ('gender*age') discrimination and conventional life course experiences intersect to generate financial precarity for older women. Our causal model explains how economic insecurity, structural and individual contexts, and crisis events interact, challenging older women's housing security and precipitating first-time homelessness later in life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

William Outhwaite is well-known as an early proponent of critical realism and for his work on European politics, critical theory and on Jürgen Habermas. In this wide-ranging interview, he discusses his life and career, including how he came to write on subjects that intersected with and developed themes Roy Bhaskar was also working on at the time. This work resulted in three early books, Understanding Social Life, Concept Formation in Social Science and New Philosophies of Social Science, the last of which makes the case for the incorporation of critical theory and hermeneutics into critical realism. He goes on to discuss various issues, including, briefly, his involvement in an early discussion group with Bhaskar, his participation in the Realism and the Human Sciences conferences and how he and Margaret Archer came to edit Andrew Collier's Festschrift. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this wide-ranging interview Graham Scambler provides an overview of his long academic career. He discusses how he became a medical sociologist, his early work on epilepsy and stigma, his part in the development of sociology textbooks for medical students, the diversity of his work and his many collaborations, his 'theoretical turn', his longstanding interest in critical realism and his attitude to 'bridge building' between philosophy and empirical work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the issue of innovation is widely recognized in many scientific disciplines, innovators themselves have received scant attention in research literature. The aim of this study is to explore the experience of innovators from the perspective of the social agency paradigm developed by Margaret Archer, which suggests that structural and cultural properties affect individual reflexivity through the accessibility of resources and the beliefs that agents endorse. Data was collected through individual in-depth interviews with Polish innovators, revealing that they function in an entrepreneurial culture with ease in establishing networking relations. However, institutions in the national innovation system continue to reflect post-Soviet hierarchies, creating a division between those who have access to resources and those who do not. The study supports the hypothesis that post-Soviet culture is a factor in determining the low innovation level in Poland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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