Situated Objectivity Malcolm Williams

Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour
35:1
00218308

The Executive Management Committee/Blackwell Publishing Ltd. 2005. Published by Blackwell Publishing, 9600
Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.

Blackwell Publishing, Ltd. Oxford, UK JTSB Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour 0021-8308 The Executive Management Committee/Blackwell Publishing Ltd. 2005 35 1Original Article Situated Objectivity MalcolmWilliams

Situated Objectivity

MALCOLM WILLIAMS

ABSTRACT This paper is a re-examination of the issue of objectivity in sociology. Though it begins from the premise that objectivity is a necessary precondition for a minimally scientic sociology, it sides with subjectivists who claim that values are ever present in investigation. Values are shown to exist along a continuum in investigation. The paper develops the argument that objectivity is a value itself and is nested in other values that will take on a contextual character dependent upon disciplines. Two brief research examples are used to illustrate the way in which objectivity is transferred (or fails to get transferred) through three different levels in sociology.

Since the 1960s social scientists have embraced a range of positions on objectivity.
Whilst some see it a technical matter of removing values or bias (Hammersley
2000) others see it as impossible or undesirable. The latter position of subjectivism
has particularly found favour since the advent of postmodernism and poststruc-
turalism (Rosenau 1992). Yet a complete abandonment of objectivity brings into
question the whole project of social science as science (though studies of the social
world as art do not require objectivity). My starting premise for this paper is that
a science of the social world is both desirable and possible

1

and consequently
objectivity is a crucial issue.
Nevertheless I do not wish to give the impression that the subjectivist position
is entirely without merit. Critiques of objectivity nd their mark, but the problem
is with so many of these is that they move from the often articulated and wholly
correct position that objectivity as value freedom is untenable, to the incorrect
and undesirable position that objectivity is impossible.
In this paper I will argue that value freedom is indeed impossible, but a version
of objectivity that begins from values and is therefore situated within particular
social contexts is possible. The key premise of my argument is that all investigative
disciplines are rooted in social values, but one of these values must be that of
objectivity for investigation to be possible. If natural and social science are desir-
able and possible enterprises, then objectivity must also be desirable and possible.
This paper focuses on the possibility of objectivity in sociology, though I think it
would be quite possible to generalise the argument to and substitute examples
from other social science disciplines.
I will commence by considering three classic statements on objectivity in soci-
ology from Weber

2

, Gouldner and Becker. Though each provide valuable insights
into the issue, they each conate objectivity and value freedom. In the second
section of the paper I will show how values underpin every aspect of the scientic
enterprise and I will suggest that one of these values is objectivity. But what do
we mean by objectivity and how does it manifest itself as a value? I will try to
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Malcolm Williams

The Executive Management Committee/Blackwell Publishing Ltd. 2005

answer these questions by considering how objectivity is operationalised in inves-
tigation and in the wider social world. Specically I will suggest that objectivity is
situated at three different levels in sociology and I will describe how it can fail at
each or all of those levels.

VALUES AND OBJECTIVITY IN SOCIOLOGY

A position of value freedom, construed as doing sociology without (moral social/
cultural) values has been something of an oddity for some time and is little more
than a straw person, though such a position is often attributed to positivists
usually by its critics (e.g. Lincoln 1994). Mostly it is held that sociology (or social
science) cannot be value free because values are both the subject matter and
at the same time constitute the subjectivity of researchers. Such positions often
conate methodological, ontological and epistemological issues, but more confus-
ingly whilst conating value freedom and objectivity, they will often then go on
to claim that the latter is at least partially possible. Sometimes it is claimed objec-
tivity is possible in quantitative studies, but not in qualitative ones (e.g. Sarantakos
2005: 923). In contemporary social science and sociology in particular, there is
little discussion of what value freedom might entail or what kind of values
sociologists can or cannot be free of.
In the philosophy of the natural sciences there have been more sophisticated
articulations of value freedom. Usually these rest on the argument of the level of
autonomy of cognitive values or rational practices in science from external nor-
mative social values. Those that adhere to value free positions will usually refer
to mechanisms within science, in particular within theories or theory choice,
which underwrite internal scientic values such as impartiality, autonomy and
neutrality ( Lacey 1999: chapter 4). Such positions do not claim that social values
do not enter science, but that they can be identied and controlled for to one
extent or another and to attribute a value free description to many of these
positions is perhaps somewhat misleading

3

. Where the divide lies between the
social and the rational and how much the former shapes the latter has been
the source of extensive debate in the philosophy of the natural sciences and the
sociology of natural science in the last 20 years or so (see for example: Longino
2002; Kitcher 1993; Laudan 1984; Barnes and Bloor 1982). In this paper I refer
selectively to some aspects of this debate, but for space reasons a detailed and full
discussion is not possible. However amongst philosophers of natural science it
would be hard to nd anyone who would espouse the value free position attrib-
uted by some social scientists to positivists.
Sociology has not always taken such an unsophisticated view of values. Max
Weber (1974 [1917]) recognised the difculty in separating off ones political or
moral values from social investigation. He was writing at a time when many
believed that the existence of moral values in the social sciences was a mark of

101


their immaturity and their inability to specify the mechanisms that led to alter-
native moral perspectives. A.J. Ayer summed it up thus:

the principal reason why the moral had lagged behind the natural sciences was not that mens
thoughts and feelings and motives in any way escaped the rule of [scientic] law, but that the
ultimate laws which they obeyed were excessively remote from their concrete instances (Ayer
1987: 10).

In the position summarised by Ayer the aim of science, including social science,
was to discover a pre-existing domain of concepts

4

and consequently objectivity
in science permitted the isolation of such concepts from subjective valuesthe
separation of is statements from ought statements. Weber took a different
view to this maintaining that the concepts of the social world were subjectively
constructed. Consequently moral and political views and regimes would differ
between times and places (1974: 64). There were no concepts free of human
subjectivities to discover and consequently social laws have no scientic justica-
tion in the cultural sciences . However Weber did not embrace the epistemolo-
gical relativism this would seem to imply (Weber 1974: 110). He was concerned
to show how, under these circumstances, a scientic sociology was possible. His
starting point can be summarised as saying that in matters of policy there will be
always be a debate about ends, about what should be achieved and therefore
what investigation should be pursued. Investigation is value driven and in sociol-
ogy the subject matter of investigation

is

values. However he claimed that it does
not follow from this that the moral and political values of commitment should
bias investigation.
The social scientist should not be indifferent to policy issues, indeed the desire
and need to investigate arises directly from commitment. However in investigating
the issues that arise from such commitment, the social scientist should examine
his/her value positions for their logical coherence and their relationship to other
concepts and principles. Indeed Weber proposes two levels of analysis (1974: 77),
the rst that of the cultural signicance of a phenomenon and the second an
investigation of the causal factors that lead to the mass signicance of such a
phenomena. The existence of (his example) the money economy is a concrete
historical fact, thus (he implies) existing outside of any given subjectivity, but
nevertheless a product of subjectivities.
What is often described as Webers value free sociology was not a sociology
without values, but rather a sociology that began with values, yet was neutral in
the conduct and means of its subsequent investigation.
The Weberian position underwrote a lot of mid 20th century US sociology
(and social science more generally), though in the view of Gouldner (1973 [1962])
this had degenerated (in US sociology) into a narrow and inappropriate inter-
pretation of Weber that regarded objectivity as simply a technical matter. He
attacked Webers view of a value free sociology as propagating a group myth
that had no place in science. Indeed, he claimed, the myth had become an excuse
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Malcolm Williams


for complacency amongst US sociologists, a self serving narrow professionalism
that did not contribute to the public interest (Gouldner 1968: 109). In its place
he advocated objective partisanship, by which he meant that objectivity is
directed toward the goal of serving some end. In Hammersleys interpretation a
commitment to a particular value, or set of values, rather than commitment to
any particular social or political group, or even to the interests of that group
(Hammersley 2000: 110). Gouldner claimed such values are universal, for exam-
ple the alleviation of suffering. He contrasts this version of objectivity with that
arising from the technical standard of methodological replicability. A consequence
of adhering only to this type of objectivity, he maintained, is that it can sanction
morally dubious or reprehensible science, whilst at the same time remaining faith-
ful to objectivity.
Gouldner describes two other kinds objectivity, besides his objective partisan-
ship: objectivity as replicability and objectivity as personal authenticity. He is
critical of the former maintaining that at a purely technical level it could be
upheld, whilst the research itself was underpinned by highly subjective values.
The second he is more positive about and sees this as being promoted through
method which can create obstacles to the yea-saying impulses of our own
conviviality, mutual affection or dependence, our personal biases and our move-
ment loyalties or involvement. (Gouldner 1973: 100). This critique of value
freedom, as a smokescreen for the status quo, resonated with the growing
anti positivist social constructionist movement in sociology in the mid 1960s,
though it was probably far from Gouldners intention to provoke a charter for
subjectivism.
Beckers contribution to the debate on objectivity was equally inuential. In a
paper entitled Whose Side are We On? (1967) he discusses the issue of bias in
sociology. Becker was also recruited as an ally by the subjectivists

5

, though he has
denied that he intended his work to be against objectivity (Becker 1974) and
indeed Martyn Hammersley has presented an analysis which casts some doubt on
the interpretation that Becker advocated taking sides (Hammersley 2000: chapter 3).
Much of Beckers argument in his 1967 paper concentrates on accusations of
bias. Sociologists will be accused of and will accuse each other of bias. We nd
ourselves on a side whether or not we like it.
He begins by posing the question of whether sociologists should be neutral and
not take sides, or should they express a deep commitment to a value position.
This he believes is an imaginary dilemma:

For it [value freedom] to exist, one would have to assume, as some apparently do, that it is
indeed possible to do research that is uncontaminated by personal and political sympathies . . .
the question is not whether we should take sides, since we inevitably will, but rather whose side
we are on (Becker 1967: 239).

He goes on to describe the ways in which sociologists will accuse each other of
bias, or will themselves be accused of bias from those outside the discipline.

103


Much of Beckers work has been concerned with deviance. The question is,
when we study deviance should we study it from the point of view of the deviant,
or from the perspective of the non deviant? Sociologists, he maintained, have
been accused of favouring the deviant who is portrayed thus only because he (sic)
has been made so by respectable citizens (1967: 240). He does not adjudicate on
whether this is right, or wrong, but rather on what are the circumstances under
which this charge of bias is made.
He describes two groups of people, subordinates and superordinates and two
kinds of situations he terms apolitical and political. The superordinate parties
[ . . . ] are those who represent the forces of approved and ofcial morality; the
subordinate parties are those, who it is alleged, have violated that morality. In
apolitical situations the former may be the ofcial and professional authorities in
institutions and subordinates are those who use, or are conned in those institu-
tions. These may be schools, asylums, hospital prisons etc.
Becker describes a hierarchy of credibility where denitions, practices etc. are
determined by superordinates. The further up the hierarchy the greater the cred-
ibility. If researchers conduct their research within the terms of these normative
denitions etc., then they will not be accused of bias by superordinates, though
they will have been guilty of favouring the normative position. Conversely if they
adopt the denitions, or investigate (say) the complaints, or situations of subordin-
ates, they will be accused of bias by those higher up the hierarchy of credibility.

As sociologists, we provoke the charge of bias, in ourselves and others, by refusing to give
credence and deference to an established status order, in which knowledge of truth and the right
to be heard are not equally distributed (Becker 1967: 2423).

Yet when a normative position is adopted this does not provoke accusations of
bias, even from other sociologists. For example in the sociology of health, or
youth, research is conducted from the position of the doctor, or adult. Mental
illness is viewed from the perspective of normality, youth are seen as normal or
delinquent (1967: 240).
What he terms the political situation is different. Here it is the hierarchy of
credibility itself that is being challenged by groups outside of sociology. Sociology
can side with particular perspectives and under these circumstances sociologists
rarely accuse other sociologists of bias. Sociologists, he contends, are usually
politically liberal and

usually take the side of the underdog; we are for Negroes (sic) and against Fascists. We do not
think anyone biased who does research designed to prove that the former are not as bad as
people think or that the latter are worse (Becker 1967: 244).

However, whilst sociologists might not accuse each other of bias parties who are
offended by the research or ndings will and they will focus on deciencies in
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Malcolm Williams


conceptualisation, or research focus. Beckers conclusion from all of this is that
there is no position from which sociological research can be done that is not
biased in one way or another (1967: 245), though despite this he defends a role
for objectivity at least in principle. In a response to a critique from Gresham Riley
(1974), he distinguishes two meanings for the term bias:

1)

Work is biased when it presents statements of fact that are demonstrably incorrect, the demonstration being
according to accepted scientic canons of evidence . . .

and

2)

When

[.]

results favor or appear to favor one side or another in a controversy

(Becker 1974: 1412).

He goes on to say that whilst we dont fully succeed, objectivity (construed as the
removal of bias) is in principle obtainable in 1) even if not in the case of 2). (Becker
1974: 143)
Whilst Gouldner and Becker each raise key issues about the role of values and
objectivity in sociology, their writings are confusing in two ways. First, that it is
not at all clear about whether and how they favour objectivity. In this and despite
his protests, Becker occupies a particularly contradictory position. Second the
confusion about whether or not they favour objectivity probably arise from a
deeper confusion about its status. At no point do either of them attempt to
separate value freedom from objectivity (though Gouldner does say that value
freedom is itself a value), or tell us what objectivity is, as opposed to where it is
or where it fails through bias. If, as they claim, there can be no value freedom,
what is the status of objectivity, either as partisanship or method?

WHAT ARE VALUES?

The origin of the concern with values was actually a value freedom very much
like the straw person of contemporary sociology. It was a concept which
emerged in the natural sciences from the development of experimentation in the
18th and 19th centuries, a process philosophically underwritten by a Cartesian
separation of the object of the experiment from the subjectivity of the experi-
menter (Hacking 1983) ). Value freedom was the belief that subject and object
could be separated. It was an early import into social science, but as I noted at
least since Weber there was a widely held view that values cannot be expunged,
but must be managed in some way.
Some, though far from all, of the problem of values in social science resulted
from a generalisation of a subjectobject separation from controlled experimen-
tation on inanimate objects, to research on people in open systems. In short,
whilst it may be possible to maintain emotional distance from physical objects or

105


systems, say particles in Brownian motion, this is more difcult in conceiving,
designing and conducting research on deviance. However values also lie at the
heart of natural science and as I indicated above the separation of human values
from the objects of study has been shown to be problematic there also. That
physical objects are themselves not autonomous bearers of value makes little
difference, what is important are the values we bring to their identication and
investigation.
The Value Continuum in Science
Values exist in a continuum in science and this can be illustrated by considering
four uses of the term

6

and their relationship to each other.
1. Value is used as a numerical measure of a quantity or number denoting
magnitude on a conventional scale. This may take a concrete form such as values
on a scale designed to measure a specic characteristic, or it may be used in the
more abstract sense of a mathematical value. The latter can come to stand in
for something concrete. Thus a value of 32 can be 32 of anything, or it can be
applied, say in the measurement of temperaturesay 32 degrees Celsius. The
latter is capable of numeric translation into other scales, such as Fahrenheit or
Kelvin. Temperature is a good example of a conventional scale of values. Though
such scales measures a physical characteristic, there is nothing determined about
what the scales are, other than they should remain stable forms of measurement
in time and place. Though sociology does not much measure physical things, the
means of measurement denote the existences of characteristics that are taken to
have enough invariance to make them measurable. Descriptive and inferential
statistics are likewise numeric values that have conventional origins (Hacking
1990), but once their properties are agreed they can be used as tools that are
morally blind of context.
2. Methodological values. These may relate, for example, to taxonomy, parsi-
mony, replicability etc. They may be particular to certain disciplines. For example
Bayesian statistics are hardly present and even controversial in some sciences (e.g.
chemistry or physics), but widely used in others (e.g. epidemiology, psychology,
petrology), though there are no strong methodological reasons why they should
be used in some sciences, but not others. Some methodological values may go in
and out of fashion, or be more fashionable in one country than another. For
example experimentation in sociologyin fashion in the US up until recently, but
not in fashion in Britain, yet at the time of writing (in the form of randomised
control trials) becoming increasingly advocated (Oakley 2000).
Disagreement on numeric values is present in science, for example in statis-
ticswhen and under what conditions certain tests should be used. Disagree-
ments about methodological values can potentially divide some disciplines, as
they have arguably done in sociology. All of these values are conventions, but this
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Malcolm Williams


does not make them arbitrary or subjective, indeed such values are necessary for
classication or measurement. Moreover numeric and methodological values
depend on each other. It is, for example, a methodological decision to use case
based analyses (such as cluster analysis), though the numeric techniques may be
morally blind. Yet the results will again have methodological implications (see
Byrne 2002 for a discussion of the implications of alternative analysis techniques).
3. Social values are usually distinguished from methodological ones. These
might include modes of dress, disciplinary hierarchies, sexual divisions of labour
etc. Whilst some of these would seem not to impinge upon methodology, the
divide is far from sharp. Indeed, as Helen Longino (1990) Sandra Harding (1986)
(and others) have shown, sexual divisions of labour and more generally androcen-
tricity in science, make a specic difference to the subject matter of science and
its methods. Methodological values may become autonomous within science, but
all have a social origin and many continue to bear their social characteristics.
The social values of science are not internal to science. Many are imported, for
example androcentricity, from wider society, but also the social values of science
will be exported to wider society. For example the authority of science is often
represented in advertising by laboratory scenes and men in white coats.
4. It should be clear then, that the fourth type of value, moral value is also
closely related to social values. Indeed, sociologically, the former are a subset of
the latter and moral values are only distinguishable from social values as a result
of their imperative character or longevity. Many imperatives seen at a particular
historic moment as timeless moral values, such as a duty to denounce witches,
can be seen with hindsight to have been normative social values. Nevertheless
some moral values hold for considerable periods, though like scales expressing
numeric values there is nothing determined about them and their only condition
of existence is consensual or legal enforcement.
It is often argued that a decision to work on projects such as the development
of the means to weaponise anthrax is a moral one, whereas a decision to
conduct bacteriological research on anthrax has no

particular

or

necessary

moral
consequences. Often the divide between the two has been presented as that
between technology and science (Wolpert 1992: 2534) in which science remains
neutral of moral purpose. This distinction has been hard to sustain and just as the
divisions of labour and intent are not clear between science and technology, so
there is an indeterminacy between what constitutes moral and

social

values.
Critics (or advocates) of value freedom will usually only see values as social (or
moral), but there is a value continuum from the methodological to the social/
moral, yet the social is imprinted upon all of the kinds of values. They cannot be
cleanly separated. For value freedom of any kind to exist such separation would
be a necessary condition. However if this is the case, what of objectivity? It too
must be a value.
The feminist philosopher of science, Helen Longino, has recognised the issue
of the relationship between values and objectivity. Her view is that knowledge and

107


consequently science are social enterprises and that values from outside of the
scientic process can be legitimately admitted (1990: 220). Her starting point is
that of theory choice. A scientist must choose between several competing theories,
each logically consistent with the data. In order to make such a choice they must
refer to background assumptions and these are shaped by what she terms con-
textual values. In a similar way to my distinction of methodological from social
or moral values, she separates contextual values from constitutive values ( the
latter include things such as accuracy, reliability etc.) internal to the scientic
process. Different scientists will (legitimately) bring different background assump-
tions, underpinned by contextual values, to bear on theory choice To illustrate
this she discusses a case study of rival behavioural research programmes: the
selectionist and linear hormonal programme. Both programmes, she maintains,
are grounded in assumptions about sex and gender and the results of neither
could be determined on the basis of constitutional values alone.
If contextual values can legitimately inuence constitutive ones, then how can
scientists be objective? Longino saves objectivity by grounding it in the social
characteristic of the scientic enterprise, specically (what she terms) a trans-
formative interrogation by the scientic (and extra scientic) community as the
way to good science. However the transformative interrogation must be based on
criteria such as recognised means and standards of critique of evidence, a respon-
siveness to such a critique and an equality in intellectual authority (1990: 7681).
Thus:

That theory which is the product of the most inclusive scientic community is better, other
things being equal, than that which is the product of the most exclusive. It is better not as
measured against some independently accessible reality but better as measured against the
cognitive needs of a genuinely democratic community (Longino 1990: 214).

On this basis, as a feminist, she is specically critical of the linear hormonal
programme for its androcentric and deterministic assumptions and the limita-
tions on human capacity imposed by [its] explanatory model (1990: 190), but
also because if its ndings were to be accepted by the policy community, the
deleterious effects this would have on womens lives. Conversely the selectionist
programme, whilst it too is not free of contextual values, nevertheless better offers
the possibility to understand ourselves and others.
Longino is not simply saying, here are two theories, neither of which can be
corroborated or falsied on the basis of constitutive values alone, but one is
androcentric so we should choose the other. She seems to be saying that there are
reasons to believe that androcentric theories inadequately describe the world and
an outcome of this misdescription is sexist bias already written into the assumptions
of secondary theories which nally get translated into the policy outcomes of the
science conducted. We might add that this in turn sets the agenda for selection of
future projects. Therefore on the basis of good science we should reject those theories
seen to be androcentric, the pay off being better theories and better outcomes.
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Malcolm Williams


This position has some similarity with that of that of Weber, but Longino goes
further and says that contextual values do and should inform constitutive values.
The history of the natural and social sciences bears this out. Developments in
methodology have nearly always been linked to contextual goals. In sociology, for
example, the rapid industrialisation of the United States in the rst half of the
20th century coincided with the growth of scientic sociology, both survey
method and experimental method (Madge 1963). Likewise it was not just idle
curiosity that led to the development of urban ethnography by the Chicago
School, but the perception that the poverty that grew out of urbanisation was a
serious social problem (Hammersley 1989: 667).

OBJECTIVITY AS A VALUE

If value freedom is impossible and a value continuum exists then objectivity must
be reconsidered. It cannot remain as a means to be free of, or neutral about
values. If it is possible and it exists, then it too must be a value, but what kind of
value is it?
I have characterised values in science as existing along a continuum. This is a
useful metaphor to demonstrate their contiguity, but another metaphor is apt.
Values are nested and relate to each other horizontally and vertically. The hori-
zontal is that of the logical relationship of one value to another within a discipline
or practice. For example the relationship between induction and inferential statis-
tics. The vertical is the relationship of values in one social practice, say science,
to higher level values, such as policy or moral, philosophical values. Like any
other value inside or outside of science, objectivity is likewise nested. It came
to exist as the result of the development of other values and it in turn shaped
values. Could there be deductive logic without objectivity, for example?
This brings us to the crux of the problem in describing objectivity. Even with-
out dening it, at a common sense level

7

, each of us has a grasp of what is meant,
but when we come to dene it we must do so in relation to other concepts, or
values. Some of those values exist in many contexts, but some exist only in specic
contexts. To be objective in science commits us to other scientic values, but to
be objective in the law commits us to values of law. Objectivity, then, is not an
homogeneous value and its context will determine its relationship to other values
(and therefore what it is in context). This is a key point, because when we talk
about objectivity in science we are talking about something different to objectivity
in other spheres. But, if my argument about the value continuum is right, then
the meaning of objectivity in any discipline will relate to its internal use

and

its
use in the relationship of that discipline to the rest of the social world. I think it
is the fallacy of the denial of this that Gouldner is getting at when he complains
of the narrowness of methodological objectivity. Thus in any investigative dis-
cipline there will be a discipline specic manifestation of objectivity and a more

109


general one, the properties of which may extend beyond that discipline into other
areas of social life (and into the discipline from other areas of social life). I shall
presently try to develop this point with regard to sociology, but rst I will describe
some general values that objectivity will relate to both inside and outside of
particular spheres or disciplines.
Purpose. Objectivity as value freedom implies neutrality about the purpose of
investigation, but this is an impossible condition to preserve. It is possible to be
neutral in respect of specic purpose, but not all purpose. A jobbing sociologist,
typically a contract researcher in a university, may be indifferent to the results
either way of studies s/he works on, but purpose such as career advancement or
fealty to particular methodological or theoretical positions will provide purpose
for activity. Usually, however, purpose is not just an individual matter but one for
several sociologists working on a research programme. In the UK there is proba-
bly more sociology of health and illness done, than any other kind, because
government and agencies of government have prioritised health and associated
elds for research and development. This is sociology with purpose, but it is no
less objective for it. Disciplines may be completely objective, but serve economic
or political interests as their purpose. Alvin Gouldner considers the role of the
physician in this respect

[the physician]

is not necessarily less objective because he has made a partisan commitment to his patient and
against the germ. The physicians objectivity is in some measure vouchsafed because he has committed himself to
a specic value: health

(Gouldner 1973: 58).

Differentiation. Objectivity must be concerned with objects, or perhaps more
correctly their properties. I use this term very broadly. Objects may have physical
properties, they may be states of affairs, institutions, mental states or they may be
abstractions such a mathematics. What they must minimally have is existential
properties so that their properties, may in principle, be differentiated from the
properties of other objects. In sociology it is often said that objects are socially
constructed, but the implication of this is that if X is a social construction, it has
been constructed and may be differentiated from Y.
Truth seeking: Differentiation supposes that we wish to know the properties of
objects, at the very least a simple taxonomy. Im using the term truth here to
imply correspondence with the facts, or at least the facts as we know them. A
common complaint of postmodernists is that science/modernism etc. are
concerned to establish truth. This is indeed so, but it does not follow that truth
will be established and most natural scientists are much more circumspect about
truth claims (see Chalmers 1990: chapter 3 for a discussion). Truth seeking is a
value. This may be expressed as the value to know what is the case about X,
or in a falsication approach to eliminate error (see for example Popper 1979:
247). The

search

for the truth is, however, necessary. Consider the following
sentences:
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Malcolm Williams


a) Sexual orientation is a condition that is biologically determined
b) Sexual orientation is chosen as a result of social or psychological factors
There are only three likely candidates for truth. That a) is true, that b) is true or
a third residual possibility c) that sexual orientation results from some combina-
tion of both

8

. Now it may be the case that one may be disinclined to see an
investigation of the matter as a worthwhile or proper purpose, but if one does then
this requires an attempt to seek the truth of whether a), b) or c) is correct. Any
conclusion arising from such an investigation may only be provisional, but hopefully
in conducting such an investigation some things will be shown not to be the case.
In most versions of law guilt must be shown beyond reasonable doubt and the
detective and afterwards the prosecuting counsel will seek to deductively show the
accused committed the crime (likewise the defence will attempt to show the oppo-
site). In science absolute proof is rare and the pursuit of truth may be the pursuit
of the most likely explanation (Lipton 1991).
These are necessary but not sufcient conditions in which objectivity is nested.
I am aware that these values themselves are also nested. Truth, for example, is
nested in rationality. The value regress may not be innite, but it is complex and
long. However these three rst order values are each necessary and together
possibly sufcient to give a specication of objectivity:

as the purposeful search for truth
about the properties of objects

.
What kind of value is objectivity?
In my description of the scientic value continuum I depicted four uses of the
term value: numeric, methodological, social and moral. I suggested that each of
the other three values begins as, or is a subset of social values.
Objectivity is a social value, but one that can have methodological and conven-
tional characteristics. Its conventional characteristics can be both inside and
outside of science. Any person can be minimally objective in the way I suggested
above and the way they are objective in particular contexts will be conventional.
The physician will frame his/her objectivity in something like the Hippocratic
oath, the lawyer in a body of law and the procedures associated with that law.
These are conventions and the objectivity will be shaped by them.
In natural and social science objectivity is likewise shaped by conventions. The
most important of these are the conventions that give rise to the methods the
science employs. Thus, as I suggest above, methodological values are shaped by
social convention. What is objective in science will be shaped by the conventions
of its particular method. For example the gold standard in social survey sam-
pling is the probability sample. Quite often a probability sample is not possible
and the researcher must emulate such a sample by some other means-say quota
sampling. But if it is possible to use a probability sample and the researcher does

111


not do so, then s/he is in error, or is not being objective. I discuss a specic
example of this below.
What is good methodological practice is not always agreed and will change
over time, but objectivity pursued as a methodological value will use the best
known means possible to seek the truth about the properties of the objects of
interest. Indeed methodological debate can itself be an exercise in objectivity and
an attempt, at least implicitly, to maximise objectivity by improving methods.
There is a second sense in which objectivity as a conventional social value
impinges on science and that is when the investigation, research programme or
sub discipline is employed in pursuit of purposes outside of the discipline. Indeed
those purposes, as is the case in the sociology of health and illness, signicantly
shapes the discipline/sub discipline. It would be rare to nd any science that is
not shaped to some extent by outside purpose. But the purpose itself need not be
capricious and the values of objectivity will be adhered to. However in the
absence of widespread community agreement about conventional values, such as
that found in respect of methodology in science, more than one purpose may be
objectively pursued. This is especially the case in the policy community where
quite different and contradictory goals may be objectively pursued.
Now this does not mean I am suggesting that everything is somehow objective.
Objectivity requires the pursuit of truth, but it does not guarantee it. Scientists
are commissioned to investigate the natural and social world by non scientists,
who if they are acting objectively will be keen to pursue truth. The value relation-
ship is vertical as well as horizontal and objectivity pursued in science (through
methodology) has the capability of challenging external truths.

OBJECTIVITY IN SOCIOLOGY

Sociology, unlike many other disciplines, has had a strong tradition of advocacy
and for sociologists in that tradition the aim is to directly shape particular contexts.
This view can be summarised as sociology is partisan and it is about changing
the world for better. The better might be in a very broad sense of being directed
toward the goal of serving some greater good, such as the alleviation of suffering,
or it may be in a narrower one directly in favour of some political or ideological
view, perhaps to use sociology to further the cause of women, ethnic minorities,
gays etc., or to bring about resistance and change (Fox 2003: 86). Sociology as
advocacy is perhaps best exemplied by action research, in which there is a direct
relationship between knowledge and advocacy (David 2002). Objectivity may be
present in advocacy sociology but this is likely to be in the narrow sense of means
to an end. If a research question or method does not suit those ends then logically
it must be ruled out.
However I think we can distinguish advocacy sociology from investigative
sociology which is not

itself

a means of advocacy, though it may serve as a tool of
112

Malcolm Williams


those advocating one or other purpose. The divide I suggest here is not entirely
straightforward. However key principles would be that investigative sociology
does not rule out any evidence and is committed to the differentiation of objects
in the social world.
Objectivity and Purpose
I suggested above that a minimum purpose for objectivity would be curiosity
about the world, but that there are usually other purposes in investigation. It
follows that those other purposes are external to the investigation and will have a
social or moral content. If this is so how does sociology as investigation differ
from sociology as advocacy?
To answer this it might be helpful to think of three levels of sociology. First and
the highest level, its relationship with civil society. A second level is that of its
relationship with particular aspects of civil society and nally the third level is that
of its expression through method. Now Weber conceived of the latter as being
separable from societal considerations, once investigation was underway. Similarly
to Longino, my position is that this cannot, nor indeed should be the case and
there will be an exchange of information and inuence between these three levels.
The social organisation of a society will shape, possibly determine, whether it
will have sociology at all and what kind of sociology it will be. Fascist or Stalinist
societies did not have sociology, or if they did it was limited by the state to specic
activities that served ideological ends, which amounted to a state directed advo-
cacy sociology. The values of the state determined the character of sociology. One
can envisage the opposite kind of state, possibly something like Poppers ideal
open society (Popper 1986: 113120), where the values of the state promoted
and indeed required a sociology steadfastly committed to the pursuit of the truth.
Such a state has never existed and is unlikely to do so in the near future, but what
we actually have in Western liberal democracies are states which

de jure

favour
such ideals, but

de facto

, either through directed research programmes (such as the
ESRC in the UK) or through necessity and constraint will prioritise other objec-
tives. Indian sociology, for example, is characterised by a specialisation in rural
and development issues (Mukherji 2000). Some countries will fund basic research
more than others, some countries do not fund sociological research at all. Some
kinds of research will advance the careers of sociologists (thus permitting more
research) than others. In one sense sociologists are free to pursue any form of
investigation they wish, but it is a constrained freedom. The kind of research that
sociologists do is enabled and constrained at this level and consequently so are
decisions about objectivity.
This does not necessarily mean that decisions about funding regimes or prior-
ities are capricious, irrational or immoral. Though the purposes they serve, in
terms of policy may be. Probably the most famous example of this was US

113


government Project Camelot, in the 1960s. This project was research to inves-
tigate the causes of and means to avoid internal war in other countries and in
reality was at least partly intended to recruit sociologists (and other social scien-
tist)s into counterinsurgency efforts (Horowitz 1967). The sociological community
was mostly opposed to this, though as Earl Babbie (1995) asks what might have
happened had Project Camelot been proposed to a steadfastly conservative and
anti-communist social research community?
The sociologist is not wholly without agency at this level. First it may well be
that his or her values as a citizen inuenced the decision to become a sociologist
and indeed what kind of sociologist and that his or her training as sociologists will
inuence their citizen values in favour of values such as pursuance of truth,
justice, anti sexism, ant-racism, but particularly objectivity. Karl Mannheim
(1936) made a similar point in respect of intellectuals in a society. He believed
such people, particularly social scientists, occupied a unique role in so far as whilst
a persons social location will shape their views and ideas, social scientists have the
role of trying to understand others viewpoints and ideas. He concluded that they
should occupy a relational position, apart from other social groups but in touch
with them.
At the second level the sociologist must decide what kind of things can or
should be investigated. They may choose to work in the area of deviance, or
homelessness and these choices may emanate from their values as citizens, but if
they are combined with a commitment to objectivity then investigation is open
and ndings that are anomalous to their citizen values should serve to challenge
the latter. In other words it is specically the process of investigation which may
well cause the sociologist to question his or her citizen purpose or motivation.
Furthermore sociological investigations will often, indeed usually, reveal results
which may challenge societal suppositions. If these ndings have been obtained
through objective investigation, then not only the ndings will present a value
challenge to society, but the fact that they were objective upholds and possibly
transfers to society the value of objectivity.
At the third level objectivity is a methodological value of the kind found in
other sciences and as I have indicated above in respect of science generally, meth-
odology becomes a tool in the pursuance of objectivity at a higher level. The
decision of who to focus investigation on (in research on deviance it may be
deviants or those who dene deviance or both) will have implications for ndings.
By making the ndings more objective through method one may inadvertently
challenge the objectivity of higher level assumptions within sociology or within
society. These three levels can be thought of as a vertical manifestation of objec-
tivity as opposed to the horizontal one I earlier described in respect of method.
Objectivity may exist outside of the discipline and be transferred in and it will
exist inside and may be transferred out.
There is one further point to be made. Objectivity is a social value. Though
it is operationalised at an individual level it must be held as a social value for
114

Malcolm Williams


a number of individuals to think it worthwhile to pursue. Its presence or
absence is a social matter and if it is present it will be the business of the
sociological community who will be the arbiters of whether objectivity has been
upheld.
The picture I have painted of the three levels is inevitably an idealised one and
may be read more as a hypothesis, or even a manifesto than a description, though
hopefully at least some of the picture is faithful to an investigative sociology.
However to illustrate the relationship of objectivity to other values at the three
levels I will briey describe two examples of sociologically orientated policy
research in housing.

(i) Homelessness.

In most societies homelessness or severe housing need are con-
sidered to be social ills and many governments invest at least some of the money
used to ght the problem in researching it. It follows from this that those serving
this broad policy as civil servants, activists or researchers support the purpose of
the reduction or elimination of homelessness. However, below this level there is
much less agreement.
Within homelessness research there is some debate about whether the homeless
should be counted and if so what methods should be used. The argument for
counting is that in order to know how much resources one should expend, the
size of the problem must be known rst (Burt 1999). The argument against this
is that counting the homeless is too problematic to warrant the resources required
and homelessness research should be in the form of action research and directly
serve the purpose of its reduction (e.g. Payne 2002). The latter view is, I think, an
example of advocacy sociology.
Amongst those in favour of counting there are ideological and methodological
positions. The UK government, with the backing of some charities, favour simple
headcounts of those who are street homeless. Whether intentional or not, this
position is an ideological one in that it both limits the denition and thus the size
of the homeless population and by rendering that sub population visible, success
in it efforts to reduce it can be claimed as political success (Williams 2005). To
favour and participate in this kind of research, is again to do advocacy sociology.
A second methodological problem is that such methods are subject to over or
under estimation and in practice it is usually the former (Shaw et al. 1996). The
messages from the state, in respect of objectivity, are mixed. On one hand by
limiting and prescribing the kind of investigation that can be mounted there is a
lack of objectivity and a pursuance of political aims, but on the other hand that
investigation is considered worthwhile at all then there is a minimal commitment
to objectivity. As I noted above advocacy does not necessarily rule out methodo-
logical objectivity.
Researchers can and do criticise existing headcount methods and advocate
other more rigorous alternatives, thus when successful (and some have been) the
value of objectivity is transferred from the second level upwards

9

. Another way of

115


phrasing this might be that the standard of research has been raised, by demon-
strating the possibility of the success of more objective methods.
The transfer downwards of this objectivity to a better way of counting is more
difcult, because there are methodological debates around how this can be best
achieved. Some of these are to do with statistical inference, some to do with how
methods can be operationalised, but also and most importantly about how home-
lessness is dened. This methodological decision will have political consequences.
Dene too narrowly and numbers are small, dene too broadly and numbers may
be too large. In the second case there is the additional difculty of operationalis-
ing a broader denition in so far as certain homeless states are hard to count
( Williams 2004).
The temptation is to see the methodological problem as taxonomic and oper-
ational. That is the denition should be operationalisable and t with an agreed
denition of homeless, or even that of the homeless themselves ( Williams 2001).
This does not resolve matters for the problem is much deeper and has its origins
in the political evolution of the term homelessness. This was not initially a
researchers term, but one that was inherited from a shifting policy agenda that
described homelessness in ways convenient to that agenda. Trying to nd an
encompassing taxonomic description of homelessness thats satises all parties and
is operationalisable is a labour of Sisyphus. Ontologically there is no universal or
homogeneous concept of homelessness, but heterogeneous states of housing need
that are shaped by local socio economic and housing conditions ( Williams and
Cheal 2001). Research agendas need to reect this by developing comprehensive
programmes of linked research, using methods such as capturerecapture, for
example (Shaw et al. 1996).
How do sociologists know all of this? The simple answer is that through
attempting to do methodologically rigorous research lacunae and limitations
become revealed. These in turn give rise to conceptual challenges. Arguably by
questioning the very concept of homelessness on methodological grounds, socio-
logists are inadvertently challenging ideological or politicised concepts.

(ii) Home ownership and social change.

The second example is concerned with a spe-
cic research project, that of an investigation of the growth of home ownership in
Britain by Peter Saunders (1990). Saunders work has attracted a great deal of
sociological criticism on both methodological and ideological grounds. Saunders,
unusually amongst sociologists, is on the political right and as he asserts his
work was an attempt to confront the left academic orthodoxy (1990: 7). Saunders
is primarily interested in the consequences of the growth of home ownership on
individuals and British society more generally. His initial motivation and indeed
his conclusion, is that this is overall, a good thing.
Saunders research consisted of an interview based survey with members of 450
households (522 individuals) living in 3 towns and in three types of housing, all at
the lower end of the market and characterised by a preponderance of recent
116

Malcolm Williams


buyers, though around a third of the sample were council (public housing) tenants.
His conclusions supported his initial views about the benets of home ownership,
including a greater likelihood to participate to local organisations and have a
greater social engagement generally, that home ownership generates greater onto-
logical security, but most importantly that homeowners have made substantial
gains from buying property and that this will have major consequences for
the distribution of wealth and life chances in Britain. Indeed, he concluded,
home ownership should be further encouraged to prevent non owners from
slipping into a marginalised underclass. Only through home ownership can such
groups escape state dependency and become active citizens participating in the
market.
His ndings do not always wholly support his starting position and they are
much richer and nuanced than this brief summary can show. However the ques-
tion is, given Saunders avowed starting position and ndings was he being objec-
tive? This matter is considered by Fiona Devine and Sue Heath (1999). They
make a number of criticisms of the research, some are methodological and others
are that he makes unsubstantiated claims from the data to support his position.
The former criticisms include the choice of three industrial towns, rather than a
national sample. These towns are almost certainly not typical and generalisations
to Britain as a whole are unwarranted. Second, the sample size is too small. This
presents problems of cell sizes in the multivariate analysis and reduces the scope
to examine the association between several variables at once and estimates
from sample statistics to population parameters are imprecise, and apparently
substantial differences between groups in the sample might not signal real differ-
ences across the population (Devine and Heath 1990: 95). Third non response
was high and in some groups it is likely to have crucially inuenced ndings.
The second kind of criticism concerns Saunders overall claims, particularly in
respect of the equity advantages gained by the home owners. These were far from
equally distributed across classes and from Saunders data it is clear that the
middle classes beneted disproportionately. Devine and Heath also draw attention
to analyses that were not made/presented but should have been. What were the
differences between home owners and tenants in respect of sex, age, ethnicity,
employment status and occupational class to get a feel for the two categories of
people whose attitudes and behaviour Saunders subsequently compares and
contrasts (1999: 101).
Devine and Heath conclude that he was not being objective and this seems to
be inescapable on two grounds. Firstly the lack of objectivity at a methodological
level. The problems with the research sites, sample size and non response should
have led him to more modest conclusions. Secondly he emphasises and prioritises
those analyses convenient to his ideological purpose and those not make or
present those which might falsify or cast doubt on his position. There was a failure
of methodological objectivity and a failure of objectivity at the prior (second) level
through the directional choice of the initial research question.

117


However, there are things to say in favour of objectivity in this study. First, as
Devine and Heath acknowledge (Devine and Heath 1999: 86), Saunders is well
known for being transparent about his methods. We can criticise his methods only
because he is open enough about them to permit this. Objective critique is facil-
itated in others, which brings me to my second pointthat objectivity, at all three
levels, is not exclusively an individual matter, but is subject to the scrutiny of the
sociological community, which has some of the characteristics of Longinos trans-
formative interrogation. In the Saunders case specically, his research provides a
good basis to do further work that does not begin from his ideological starting
point, nor is biased by his methodological transgressions.

CONCLUSION

It has not been my purpose in this paper to adjudicate between Weber, Gouldner
and Becker, nor particularly to try to draw out things of value from their analyses.
However, to an extent, each pregured a situated objectivity, by questioning the
possibility of value freedom, asking what kind of values sociologists should hold,
but also attempting to keep the goal of objectivity. In the case of Gouldner and
Becker there is perhaps too much contradiction and vagueness to take this a great
deal further. Nevertheless Gouldner identies purpose for objectivity, but also sees
method as a critical tool in the pursuit of purpose. Becker is closer to Weber in
so far as he (especially in his response to Riley) believes bias can, in principle, be
removed from method. Neither takes the next step (as Longino has done) and I
have tried to do here, to embrace objectivity as a value. This limits their ability
to show what the relationship might be between objectivity/bias at different levels
of activity in sociology. Although Longino was mainly writing about the natural
sciences, her grounding of objectivity in social knowledge is especially applicable
in sociology, where (as Weber rightly insisted) cultural values will shape research
agendas. With minor reservations I think Longinos position is compatible with
the one I have developed above. My reservations rest on Longinos tendency to
be too liberal in one respect and too conservative in another.
She is too liberal in her emphasis on the consensus of the transformative inter-
rogation. Whilst such an interrogation may lead toward truth, it is quite possible
that caprice or social interests may instead dominate and indeed may be passed
off as a search for truth. Similarly her denial of the Cartesian subject-object divide
leads her to ignore or dismiss the possibility of an individual being right and the
community being wrong. Objectivity is social, but it is also individual and sometimes
individuals may be right and the community wrong (Williams 2000: 110111).
She is too conservative in seeing objectivity only through the lens of science. It
is more than one thing and what it is depends on context. Objectivity for the
citizen, is different to that of the physician or the judge and each are different to
that of the social or natural scientist. In each case objectivity is for purpose.
118

Malcolm Williams


Perhaps additionally we can say that the location and purpose of objectivity in
social science and sociology has unique features. As Mannheim (1936) held, the
social scientists particular role is to try to understand others viewpoints and
ideas. If they hold the value of objectivity this will be present both methodolo-
gically and in analysis terms in respect of adjudicating between social positions
expressed as viewpoints and ideas, which they will not just serve, but shape as well
(horizontal and vertical manifestations of objectivity). The sociologist has work to
do at a higher conceptual level, a policy or theoretical level and a methodological
level and though the way objectivity will be operationalised in each and the
purpose in each may be different, there can be a vertical transferability of objec-
tivity as a value between these levels

10

.

Malcolm Williams
School of Sociology, Politics and Law,
University of Plymouth,
Plymouth UK PL4 8AA
M.Williams@plymouth.ac.uk

NOTES

1

My view can be summarised as: A moderate social science is both possible
and desirable. It is possible because our methods do lead to successful predictions and
explanations in the social world. These in turn become actionable in terms of policy or the
advocacy of particular courses of action . . . It is desirable because human beings strive
toward a better world and it is because there is disagreement as to what a better world is that
we need science. A critical science is itself emancipatory because it is the tool with which
we can examine our assumptions and prescriptions for the world. ( Williams 2000: 1489)

2

In his essay Objectivity in Social Science (1974: 49112) Weber refers generally
to social science, though his views have been taken to be specically pertinent to sociology
and indeed in a further essay (1974: 149) he specically singles out sociology (along with
economics) in a discussion of ethical neutrality.

3

Hugh Laceys position is such an example. Indeed Laceys position on natural
science has features similar to my own in respect of sociology.

4

Or for positivists regularities. Statements about realities were considered pseudo
statements and devoid of cognitive content by the logical positivists (Carnap 1991: 868).

5

See the discussion in Hammersley 2000: chapter 3 for examples in the sociology of
deviance.

6

This does not exhaust the use of the term. Cognitive or psychological values could
equally have been cited, but these too would t into the value continuum.

7

This ability is perhaps the result of the mode of rationality that underpins our culture
and makes science possible, but also is the result of the importation of scientic values into
everyday life (Williams 2000).

8

That we can say this at all implies the falsication of possible earlier metaphysical
theories that God made people hetero/homosexual .

9

An example of how methodological innovation in counting homeless people in the
Australian Census can be found in Chamberlain (1996).

10

Conversely, a lack of objectivity may pass between the levels.

119


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