Intervention Research in Organizations: Some Reflections upon an Empirical Case

In this paper, we will describe and discuss an intervention research currently carried out in an Italian medium sized athenaeum. In addition, we will try to identify the appropriate path to assess it.The intervention research at hand aims at changing the existing ways of organizing the administrative work process of the athenaeum, in order to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of the administrative action which supports the implementation of the political decisions made by the athenaeum’s academic bodies. We will first draw on the existing organizational literature in order to identify the main features which distinctively characterize intervention research, and differentiate it from other forms of research in organizations. After having described the implications of the recourse to the epistemological choice, and ontological standpoint put forward by Weber for intervention research in organizations, we will describe the empirical case of intervention research at hand. We will highlight the main points that mean it can be regarded as an intervention research prevailingly directed by the epistemological choice put forward by Weber, and the related ontological standpoint according to which the organized work situation is seen as a form of social Handeln. Finally, we will address the issue concerning the most appropriate criterion which should be used to assess intervention research prevailingly directed by Weber’s epistemological choice and ontological standpoint