Realism and Post-Modernism
As we will see, this basic idea is not a million miles away from the type of argument put forward (in a slightly different way) by many post-modern writers.
One of the features of post-modernism, it is argued, is the attack on "traditional scientific" conceptions of knowledge - yet it is evident that, at least in sociological terms, a good many ideas put forward by post-modernists as "new" and "radical" are merely variations on a well-known theme.
In addition, it might be instructive to note Ray Pawson's observations ("Methodology" in "Developments In Sociology", Vol.5, 1989) about the relationship between positivism, interpretivism and a scientific methodology:
"Both the proponents and opponents of the idea of objective social data have been fooled into assuming that scientific enquiry is equated with positivism. Real science, it has now become quite clear, has nothing to do with such a doctrine and is constructed along quite different lines. Thus, if I am asked to name the most exiting development in sociological methodology in the eighties, then it is the attempt to reconstruct strategies for social science research according to what are often called post-empiricist or realist principles.".