The aim of this course is to discuss basic concepts and methodologies, train students in identifying relationships between theory and data, and enable them to develop such relationships on their own. The course will teach students the relevance of positivist, hermeneutic and discursive approaches to the study of organization and politics with a view to developing a research design of their own. Furthermore, the course aims at presenting specific methods to the students in order to assist them to a wide variety of research methods in connection with the Master thesis writing. As a preparation for conducting their own literature reviews the course will train students in understanding and assessing critically different methods used in other research contributions. A recurring topic will be research design. Thereby, the course aims to illustrate how the various parts of the research process are interconnected. Finally, an aim is to illustrate how methodological choices are related to different traditions in the philosophy of sciences.

The course consists of the following components:

1. Philosophy of Science and Basic Conceptual Analysis
2. Research Design
3. Case as Research Strategy
4. Textual Analysis and Documentary Data
5. Qualitative Interviews

A student who has completed the course should have the following learning outcomes defined in terms of knowledge, skills and general competence:

Knowledge

The student can

• Discuss basic concepts and methods of the discipline
• Identify relationships between theory and data
• Explain the relevance of positivist, hermeneutic and discursive approaches
• Understand and critically discuss methods in the empirical works of others

Skills

The student can

• Argue for the choice of methods approach on the basis of a research question
• Apply different methods in empirical analyses
• Integrate different methods in a research design
• Construct well grounded research designs
• Integrate the different parts of a research design

General competence

The student can

• Apply different perspectives from the philosophy of sciences in order to argue for a specific choice of methods
• Develop one's own research design
• Support other sudents in developing research designs

Presentation of an essay (about 2000 words) to be written on the basis of the syllabus. In addition, each student is required to at least one time comment on another students¿ written/oral presentation.

The compulsory assignment must be approved in order to take the exam. Approved compulsory assignments are valid in the current and following two semesters.

Studierettleiar@aorg.uib.no

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