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Processual Case Research

Processual case research involves the empirical examination of how and why some significant temporally evolving phenomenon unfolds over time. For example, processual case research has been used to examine identity development in individuals; group decision making; organizational change; the process of program implementation; and the process of emergence, development, and dissolution of relationships over time.

Conceptual Overview and Discussion

Andrew Van de Ven identifies three key meanings of the word process in research. First, the word may refer to a causal mechanism that links dependent and independent variables in a conceptual framework. Second, it may refer to a class of variables that characterize temporally evolving phenomena on static scales. For example, decision making may be expressed as more or less rational, more or less intuitive, and so on. These first two meanings are associated with the development of what Lawrence Mohr and others have labeled variance theories, in which the relationship between variables constitutes the main theoretical form. The third meaning of process focuses instead on the sequential unfolding of events. In processual case research it is this third meaning that is predominant. This meaning is associated with the development of what Mohr calls process theories, in which temporal relationships among activities, events, and choices replace relationships among variables as essential conceptual components. Process theories may take the form of a series of deterministic phases (e.g., organizational life cycles); however, other theoretical forms are also possible, including models with parallel paths, feedback loops, nondeterministic branch points, interactions, and reversals.

Another distinction relevant to processual case research concerns the status of processes versus things in understanding the nature of the world. Although most social science research implicitly views the world as composed of things that maintain their identity over time even as they change (a substantive ontology), process philosophers have argued that the essence of the world lies in movement or processes (a process ontology). Nicholas Rescher's representation of this perspective is eloquent: “Process is fundamental: The river is not an object but an ever-changing flow; the sun is not a thing, but a flaming fire. Everything in nature is a matter of process, of activity, of change” (p. 3). A good deal of processual case research implicitly retains a substantive ontology and formulates its objectives around understanding how things change over time. However, some researchers have explicitly adopted a process ontology, focusing rather on how flows of activity continually reconstitute apparently stable phenomena, such as organizations, structures, cultures, identities, routines, and institutions. Examples of such case research include Stephen Barley's classic work on how organizational structure is regenerated through ongoing interactions surrounding technology. These conceptual distinctions may influence research design choices as well as modes of data collection, analysis, and theorizing.

Application

With its emphasis on diachronic phenomena, processual case research raises some particular methodological and practical issues. For example, drawing boundaries around the object of study is often a challenge in case study research, particularly so when that object is a process. Thus, those who have studied organizational decision making have tended to define a decision process as constituting all the events and activities leading up to a commitment to action. Yet, when does a decision begin? (When someone first identified a problem? When a committee was struck?) When does it end? (When the leader said so? When the board of directors approved it? When it was actually implemented?) What criteria determine which events and activities should and should not be included? As Andrew Pettigrew, an early proponent and practitioner of processual case research, has observed, process phenomena tend to have ambiguous boundaries, spreading themselves out over space and time.

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