Preserving methodological consistency, a reply to Raftery, McGeorge and Walters

Raftery, J., McGeorge, D. and Walters, M. (1977) Construction Management and Economics, 15(3), 291-297, criticise Seymour, D.E. and Rooke, J.A. (1995) Construction Management and Economics 13(6), 511-523 for setting out battle lines in their use of the terms rationalist and interpretive paradigms and argue that such dichotomies lead to a degeneration in research standards. Sharing their concern for research standards, in reply, we argue that Raftery et al.'s plea for methodological liberalism will itself undermine standards. Different research methods are required for different research purposes and are to be evaluated according to different criteria. These criteria must be made explicit. We state our own research purposes and make an initial attempt to set out some criteria against which we would wish our own research to be judged