History Of Case Studies 7o50

History of Case Studies

Fatih Avcılar 1002130103

What is the Case Study? A case study is an of an activity, event or problem that contains a real or hypothetical situation and includes the complexities you would encounter in the workplace. Case studies are used to help you see how the complexities of real life influence decisions. Analysing a case study requires you to practice applying your knowledge and your thinking skills to a real situation. To learn from a case study analysis you will be "analysing, applying knowledge, reasoning and drawing conclusions" (Kardos & Smith 1979). According to Kardos and Smith (1979) a good case has the following features:  It is taken from real life (true identities may be concealed).  It consists of many parts and each part usually ends with problems and points for discussion. There may not be a clear cut off point to the situation.  It includes sufficient information for the reader to treat problems and issues.  It is believable for the reader (the case contains the setting, personalities, sequence of events, problems and conflicts)

Introduction It is generally believed that the case-study method was first introduced into social science by  Frederic Le Play in 1829 as a handmaiden to statistics in his studies of family budgets. Other roots stem from the early 20th century, when case studies began taking place in the disciplines of sociology, psychology, and anthropology. In all these disciplines, case studies were an occasion for creating new theory, as in the Grounded Theory work of sociologists Barney Glaser and Anselm Strauss.. The popularity of case studies in testing theory or hypotheses has developed only in recent decades. One of the areas in which case studies have been gaining popularity is education and in particular educational evaluation. Case studies have also been used as a teaching method and as part of professional development, especially in business and legal education. The problem-based learning (PBL) movement is such an example. When used in (non-business) education and professional development, case studies are often referred to as critical incidents.

Who is Frederic Le Play

Frédéric Le Play, in full Pierre-Guillaume-Frédéric Le Play   (born April 11, 1806, La Rivière-SaintSauveur, —died April 5, 1882, Paris), French mining engineer and sociologist who developed techniques for systematic research on the family. Le Play was engineer in chief and a professor of metallurgy at the École des Mines from 1840 and the inspector of the school from 1848. He devoted his spare time to sociological research until about 1855, when, dismayed by the conditions of industrial labourers and by the recurring revolutions in , he gave up mining in favour of sociology. He served as a senator from 1867, but, after his country’s defeat in the Franco-German War of 1870–71, he also abandoned politics. As a sociologist, Le Play opposed the then-fashionable notion of society’s continuous evolutionary progress. He viewed the family as the chief agent of social stability and moral authority in the face of industrialization and its accompanying social conflicts, and he propounded a theory of cyclic changes in society that were related to rises or declines in family morale. In the course of gathering data for his theories, Le Play developed what is now known as the case-study method, in which a field-worker lives with a family for a period of time, gathering data on the family ’ attitudes and interactions and on their income, expenditures, and physical possessions. The development of statistical sampling, fundamental to social survey methodology, was influenced by Le Play’s method of collating data that he obtained through field research.

ing and Finance

Case studies in Finance and ing The research methods books of Yin are frequently cited as references to justify the use of case study research. In his early work he defined a case study as:  an empirical inquiry that investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context;  when the boundaries between phenomenon and context are not clearly evident; and  in which multiple sources of evidence are used (Yin, 1984, p. 23).

However, case studies are used in many different ways in the various disciplines of the social sciences, and across the humanities. In ing, and business management more generally, case studies are frequently used to understand the nature of ing and management practices. Frequently, such studies are criticised as “not generalisable”. However, such criticism is grounded in a rather positivistic view of case study research, whereas in ing and business management case studies are used in a broad range of different methodological approaches. ın simple it is possible to distinguish positive to interpretive case studies. Both types of studies fit Yin’s definition (summarised above), but they use case studies in very different ways. Positive case studies present objective facts which should ultimately lead to generalisable findings, but further quantitative work is usually needed for (statistical) generalisation. Hence, the case studies can only be exploratory - providing insights and propositions which could be tested through statistical analysis of large samples. In contrast, interpretive case studies are grounded in subjective understandings, which provide local explanations of the social phenomena of interest. Hence, such case studies should seek to be explanatory; providing ways of understanding the nature of ing and management practices as social phenomena.

Scapens and Roberts

 Scapens and Roberts, 1993 Research Issues and Questions  Role of Management ing Systems  ing Control & Impacts of New Systems Case Analysis  Understanding the Process of Change  ing as a Social Process of Control Theoretical Framework  Giddens' Duality of Structure Signification/Legitimation/Domination  Sensitizing Device: Production-v-ing meanings

Positive vs. Interpretive Case Studies

 Positive case studies: seek to discover verifiable facts want generalisable findings Hence, usually exploratory  Interpretive case studies: seek possible explanations provide (local) understandings Hence, should be explanatory  Positive Case Studies • Neo-classical economic/functionalist framework • Role of management practices not questioned • Exploratory cases • Small samples  Interpretive Case Studies • Management practices are socially constructed • Interpretation: Understanding day-to-day practices • Holistic perspective • Explanatory cases

Summary of Case Research Methods

Bibliography  http://www.scdl.net/s/samplecsfin.pdf  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_K._Yin  http://www.ft.com/management/case-study  http://www.methods.manchester.ac.uk/medialibrary/docs/casestudy.pdf  http://www.britannica.com/biography/Frederic-Le-Play  http://www.methods.manchester.ac.uk/resources/categories/casestudies/ing/  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWfcwGwGag0  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Case_study