Social science research has become defined by the three paradigms first suggested by Habermas: empirical-analytic, interpretative, and critical-theoretic. This article examines, for the sake of argument, how program evaluation would be constituted if it were to be conducted within each of the pure paradigms in turn. Major emphasis is placed upon how the constraints of each of the paradigms would condition the type of information gathered and how that information would be used to improve programs. The main focus is upon the implications of how data gathered according to the rules of the paradigms would affect decision makers and participants in the programs being evaluated.
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