Although some of these philosophical claims have recently been subjected to criticism (Barnett 1993; Harrison & Dunham 1999), critical realism offers a methodological framework that is genuinely sensitive to spatial and temporal ‘context’: a major reason for its popularity among human geographers. Realist method traces a complex and symbiotic relationship between abstract theoretical and concrete empirical research. The conceptualisation outlined below follows this logic by identifying the necessary relations and causal mechanisms
which generate a causal tendency for rural
manufacturing SMEs to be more ‘enterprising’,
before going on to outline some possible empirical
scenarios that encourage the development
of contrasting competitive strategies.