The uncritical realism of realist evaluation

This paper is a response to Ray Pawson’s critique of critical realism, the philosophy of science elaborated by Roy Bhaskar. I argue that Pawson misinterprets critical realism’s positions on both natural and social science. His charges concerning its totalising ontology, its arrogant epistemology, and its naive methodology are largely unfounded, such that the differences between critical realism and his own approach of realist evaluation are not as significant as he contends. The main differences between the two realisms lie in their approaches to the relationship between social structures and agency, and between facts and values. I argue that evaluation scientists need to clearly distinguish structure and agency. They should also make their values explicit. The uncritical approach of realistic evaluation, combined with its underplaying of the importance of social agency, leaves it open to implication in the abuses of bureaucratic instrumentalism.