Mapping the aliran of the academic discipline of entrepreneurship: A ...

collection process which provided a sound (verifiable) basis for a more qualitative analysis
of such data, that evolved into content analysis with a discursive interpretation as part of an
overall methodology that could be considered qualitative, but, by dint of my particular
circumstances as a researcher, must, by Clark’s [2000] definition, be considered mixed.
In terms of epistemology, quantitative research assumes the researcher to be
independent from that being researched, approaching the research process in a
value-free and unbiased manner. The qualitative paradigm assumes a different
epistemology, one that presumes that the researcher does interact with that being
researched and t hat a value-free research process is untenable [p2].
As a business person, who has been entrepreneurial, studying how academics approached
the subject of entrepreneurship, with my own bias and prejudices on the subject, I needed
to approach the ‘research process in a value-free and unbiased manner’. This was best
served by having a quantitative data collection process, that could be verified to ensure any
prejudices I may possess had not become integrated into that part of the process.
3.1.1.06 However, given my 25 years of being a business person, I do consider myself to
have solid experience in the application of entrepreneurship. In such case my (self
proclaimed) expert status qualifies me to look at the data, collected through a quantitative
process and, analyse that data qualitatively. It can be assumed that, in this part of the
process, ‘the researcher does interact with that being researched’ in as much that I am like
the figurative laboratory rat mentioned earlier. However while some research looks at
‘theory development and theory testing’ [Mahoney, 2005, p4], my own aim is the
development of the theories of knowledge as discussed in Part Two and the illustration of
these theories with the application of an epistemic analysis of the Web of Science database
on ‘entrepreneurship’.
3.1.1.07 The second issue referred to in section 3.1.1.03 above is the ‘perceived strong
dichotomous delineation between the qualitative and the quantitative’, be these in reference
to either methodologies or data collection processes. My perception is that, in academia,
there is sometimes an established sense of mutual exclusivity between the qualitative and
the quantitative that offers only a simple dialectic whereas it may be possible that, without
such mutual exclusivity, a range of possibilities, greater than a simple dichotomous choice,
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