WHOLES, NOT JUST PARTS
The designs discussed in earlier parts of this book focus on variables rather than cases. They examine how different traits of cases are associated with one another (Mitchell, 1983: 192). Typically, however, these traits are not considered within the context of the case of which they ear part. By wrenching traits out of the context in which they occur we strip them of much of their meaning and consequently risk misreading their meaning and significance and thus misunderstanding their causes.
Blumer (1956) uses the term ‘variable analysis’ to describe analysis that focuses on variables rather than cases. He argues that although such analysis can establish statistical relationships between variables they do not provide much insight into causal processes. He argues that:
The independent variable is put at the beginning part of the process of interpretation and the dependent variable is put at the terminal part of the process. The intervening process is ignored … as something that need be considered.(1956: 97)
Although this is a somewhat simplistic version of the statistical analysis of relationships between variables; it contain some truth. While many of the designs covered earlier in this book can isolate variables that produce particular outcomes, they are not so good at telling us why they produce these outcomes.
Case studies, on other hand, emphasize an understanding of the whole case and seeing the case within its wider context. Good and Hatt (1952) describe case studies as
A way of organizing social data … to preserve the unitary character of the social object being studied … it is an approach which views social unit as a whole. (1952:331, their italics)