Abstract
The Anatomy of the Case Study by Gary Thomas and Kevin Myers, both senior academics from the University of Birmingham, provides a comprehensive insight into case study research design for social science educators and students. The book focuses on how the methodological frame of case studies is constructed and theorized by paying specific attention to the two essential components of this form of scientific inquiry: its design and practice. Throughout the book, the authors address the issues of generalizability and the practical procedures for conducting case study research. Therefore, the book can be of interest to and offer a resource for both experienced and novice researchers.
The book is divided into seven chapters as well as an introduction and a conclusion. Each chapter focuses on a different topic by unpacking the theoretical and practical nature of case study research. The authors integrate, review, and critically reflect on the recent literature concerning case study methodology. They move from examining different definitions of a case study to illustrating concrete examples of case studies in practice. The book incorporates the most important analytic developments in the past decade that have promoted case study methodology as a form of social science inquiry used to study complex phenomena in their contexts. In explaining the logic of inquiry, the authors bring together different philosophical positions (e.g., positivist, postpositivist, pragmatist, and interpretivist views of reality) while simultaneously tracing methodological development of the case study. This is particularly important as it provides a comprehensive overview of the scholarly sources that can be explored further by readers. Each chapter from the book can be used as a stand-alone piece for teaching of a course on research methodologies and methods of social inquiry. Particularly, chapters 5, 6, and 7 are the most engaging for students who are in the process of designing their own projects and require more knowledge about the complexities of applying methods to social research.
Although there are already multiple definitions of the case study, the authors present a new definition in chapter 1. The proposed definition embodies three commonalities: the focus of the research, the choice of methods for data collection, and the crucial difference between the subject and the object of the study. The authors acknowledge existing different disciplinary starting points based on epistemological and ontological perspectives. The most important part of chapter 1 is the discussion on the rationale for case study to be considered as a scientific method. It focuses on the logic of the scientific inquiry; the authors simply conclude, “Scientific inquiry is about supplying answers to questions with good evidence and good reasoning, and this can be done in a variety of ways, with the principal feature of importance being the thought and the analysis that goes into providing those answers” (p. 10).
Since the case study has its roots in multiple disciplines and is therefore attached to different schools of thought, chapter 2 looks at the case study in the light of a long intellectual history. Within this context, specific attention is paid to the discussion on holism versus reductionism, starting from the opposing views of Socrates and Aristotle. The most interesting part of this chapter is a reference to two psychological theories: gestalt psychology, developed in the first half of the twentieth century, and ecological system theory, introduced by Urie Bronfenbrenner in the 1970s. Both theories have commonalities with the case study method of viewing the world as a whole by explaining interconnectedness and causality between different layers of the social fabric. According to gestalt psychology, things should be seen in their totality. As a result, the human mind and our behavior need to be examined as a complete entity. Similarly, ecological system theory sees the environment as composed of different systems, where culture and society provide a set of instructions for how social settings are made.
Chapters 3 and 4 turn to the issue of generalizability. Case studies are often criticized for a lack of scientific rigorousness, especially in producing findings that may not be transferable to other settings. In discussing this, the authors make a distinction between theory and phronesis, by arguing that phronesis provides the basis for generalization. Phronesis is defined as a type of exemplary knowledge about meanings and behaviors in particular situations. As Spicker (2010:12) argues, “The generalizations are about experience—about what happens—rather than about theoretical relationships. That means that they have to be understood in the circumstances where they are found.” In a similar vein, the authors suggest the logic of reasoning in case studies follows abduction rather than induction, which is largely overlooked among social scientists.
Chapter 5 focuses on a detailed typology of the case study. The authors return to the proposed definition introduced earlier in the book, by emphasizing the distinction between the object and subject of a case study. The object of the study is referred to as an analytical or theoretical frame. The subject is defined as a practical, historical unity, when one of three principles is followed in selecting a case: a local case, a phenomenon case, or an outlier case. Having made a clear distinction between the subject and the object, the authors continue by explaining the purpose—specifying different options, such as instinct, instrumental, evaluative, and exploratory—and approaches that can be used within case studies. These approaches include theory testing, theory building, or just being descriptive. The most important part of this chapter is the visualization of the typology for case studies. This can be used for identifying different routes for the empirical application within given settings, starting from the subject to the choice of analysis conducted within either single or multiple case studies.
Chapter 6 demonstrates 10 practical examples of case study research. Each example is accompanied by an explanation of the internal logic that follows each step of designing a case study. On the basis of the typology introduced in the previous chapter, the authors graphically show how different components are connected and follow each other. Furthermore, the examples presented in the chapter demonstrate the variety of quantitative and qualitative methods that can be used for data collection within case study methodology.
Chapter 7 presents an annotated case study titled “Contesting Certification: Mental Deficiency, Families and the State in Interwar England,” written by Kevin Myers (2011). The chapter applies the typology presented in chapter 5 by offering a research report that contains the following elements: the background, the issue that emerges from the background, an account of the subject, the methodology employed, narrative, analysis, and theorization.
The Anatomy of the Case Study can be used for more advanced undergraduate and graduate courses, specifically those dedicated to teaching research methods in sociology as well as other disciplines, such as political science, education, law, psychology, or business studies. For advanced undergraduate courses in social research methods, the book offers different practical examples of how the case study can be used to research social realities in all their complexities. The aspect of connecting theory and methodology is particularly important for undergraduate students in developing their sociological imagination toward taking initial steps in designing individual research.
However, the book suits graduate courses better, especially in the context of broad-based research training for those wishing to proceed to a PhD. In particular, this book can be used in combination with other books—such as Blatter and Haverland’s (2012) Designing Case Studies: Explanatory Approaches in Small-N Research or Goertz’s (2017) Multimethod Research, Causal Mechanisms, and Case Studies an Integrated Approach—to understand how different methods can be combined for data collection and analysis within case studies. This aspect is particularly relevant for case study research, as different methods for data collection, both qualitative and quantitative, can be combined to reveal interconnectedness between the behaviors of research participants and social forces.
The way the typology is presented through the practical examples in chapters 6 and 7 provides an excellent example of how it can be practically integrated into coursework. This is the most noteworthy part of the book and can be easily applied for designing practical exercises for students in and out of the classroom. For instance, the typology can be used for small-group discussions in the class, where students are required to read a short piece, identify elements of the internal logic of designing a specific case, and demonstrate it visually. The typology can also be paired with a TRAILS resource developed by Cottingham (2017), which looks at how to study gender from different theoretical perspectives. This combination can enable students to advance their knowledge in understanding the relationship between ontology, epistemology, and methodology. Alternatively, the example of the analytical reflection in chapter 7 can serve as a basis for developing a written assignment, where students need to not only identify the elements of the case study methodology but also reflect on the complexities related to its theorization.
Even though the book is well structured and easy to follow, it might not suit undergraduate students who are just beginning their journey of grasping basic concepts in sociology. The discussions presented throughout the book are quite abstract and advanced, especially when it comes to the introduction of such concepts as phronesis and abduction. This weakness can be overcome by pairing the book or individual chapters with Yin’s (2018) classical textbook on case study research. Nevertheless, for more advanced students, the book provides a comprehensive overview of relevant literature that would be thought-provoking to anyone interested in the philosophy of science and especially the epistemological development of scientific methods of social inquiry.