ABSTRACT
The qualitative-quantitative binary obscures how questions arise out of philosophical conceptions of “the real” (ontology) and how we might know it (epistemology)—whether these conceptions are consciously embraced or buried in research practices or doctoral methods curricula. This chapter examines how qualitative evidence has been used within feminist economics and then reviews two research traditions that use qualitative evidence: a positivist one, employing cases to uncover causal mechanisms, and an interpretivist one that positions the meaning-making practices of human actors at the center of scientific explanation. These distinctive traditions are erased by the quantitative-qualitative binary that focuses attention solely on evidentiary forms. Feminists using either a positivist-qualitative or an interpretivist-qualitative approach will, likely, still share goals, particularly the desire to get closer to phenomena than economists who use quantitative data sets.
