Illustration of OpenSystems Analysis in the Context of Case Study Research

The case study method traditionally aims to represent between one and twenty contrasting cases whilst we recommend its augmentation with an overview of the organically changing system -- the 'case' redefined. The case study method has traditionally been understood as dealing with cases set in particular context and drawing on a wide range of sources and types of evidence. We want to extend this both by emphasizing systematic comparison among cases and by exploring cases understood as nested open systems. The approach is that of developed iterative methodological pluralism. The starting point contrasts data triangulation with methodological triangulation. Data triangulation was traditional in 'case study research' whereas a progression toward methodological triangulation has recently been advocated (Bryman, 2000 Social Research Methods). We consider the nature of the process of operationalization in the context of a researcher who iterates between ethnographic, case-study, case-based, and survey-data based interpretive work. The workshop reviewed advanced material from the philosophy of science, concerning measurement and the discursive positioning of the. This concluding workshop took up the issue of meaning and the limitations of symbolic representations of complex cases. We thus explored the limits of naturalism in social science.